Kreios wakes slowly, reaching out half-awake for Ygritte beside him. But she is not beside him. He stretches further but she is absent, and he slowly blinks his eyes open, wondering what had roused the salmon-pointed mare so early. He is usually the first to wake; perhaps one of the children had needed something in the night.
But as the world comes into focus around him, he realizes that something else is wrong. Ygritte is not beside him, but nor is their kingdom around him. This place is unfamiliar, and he can feel his hair standing on end. Something isn’t right. Snorting sharply, the spotted stallion races forward, galloping haphazardly over unfamiliar ground. He is reckless, but he needs to find his family.
“Ygritte!” He calls, “Raene!” They do not answer, but around him are other horses still stumbling to wakefulness. For a moment he sees a half-remembered face, a colt that is now a stallion wearing his mother’s stripes, but Kreios has no time. “Marlyn! Zai!” He runs, down the mountain and into the Meadow, shouting for his family all the way. It is only when he stops, his breath misting in the chilly spring air, does he realizes that something else has changed.
His paws are paws no longer, but rather hooves, and try as he might he cannot change them back. He can also feel the cool wind, something he has not noticed in sometime, and there is a somewhat painful itching on both of his shoulder blades. He looks back, craning his neck to see what the source of the pain is, but sees only two lumps beneath his skin. They are what Mother’s wings looked like when she first grew them, he thinks. But why is he growing wings?! And why can he not shift to his wildcat self?
He hears a familiar voice in the distance, and turns to it.
@[Ygritte]
But as the world comes into focus around him, he realizes that something else is wrong. Ygritte is not beside him, but nor is their kingdom around him. This place is unfamiliar, and he can feel his hair standing on end. Something isn’t right. Snorting sharply, the spotted stallion races forward, galloping haphazardly over unfamiliar ground. He is reckless, but he needs to find his family.
“Ygritte!” He calls, “Raene!” They do not answer, but around him are other horses still stumbling to wakefulness. For a moment he sees a half-remembered face, a colt that is now a stallion wearing his mother’s stripes, but Kreios has no time. “Marlyn! Zai!” He runs, down the mountain and into the Meadow, shouting for his family all the way. It is only when he stops, his breath misting in the chilly spring air, does he realizes that something else has changed.
His paws are paws no longer, but rather hooves, and try as he might he cannot change them back. He can also feel the cool wind, something he has not noticed in sometime, and there is a somewhat painful itching on both of his shoulder blades. He looks back, craning his neck to see what the source of the pain is, but sees only two lumps beneath his skin. They are what Mother’s wings looked like when she first grew them, he thinks. But why is he growing wings?! And why can he not shift to his wildcat self?
He hears a familiar voice in the distance, and turns to it.
@[Ygritte]