burning cities and napalm skies; Castile

[Starlin]

STARLIN grit and grace. Though she had grown up in Sylva, the autumnal woods are little more than a faded memory to the tobiano filly. Nerine is the home that she knows, and more importantly – the home that she has chosen. She knows Nayl, and Isobell, though the Princess has been less frequently seen of late. She has seen Lior and knows that the Guardian and the queen have an older son, and that he is called Castile. This dragon-winged creature must surely be him, and he’s just confirmed it. There is a single ant travelling across a frosted blade of grass at her hooves, and Starlin is determined to stare at it while Castile – clearly unimpressed at her first attempt at socialization – leaves. Instead, she finds herself looking up at him, her chin lifted by a gentle touch. She blinks long lashes across her blue-grey eyes, still not entirely sure how to recover from this failure of a situation. He is kind – kinder than she’d have expected from a son of Nayl – and Starlin wonders if perhaps he might not hate everything about her. No, she decides, that’s far too optimistic of a thought. His apology does at least reassure he that he’s not about to simply fly off into the sky and leave her gawking, so when he says that he has a lot on his mind, she attempts to grasp the threads of a better conversation. “What’re you thinking about?” She asks, tilting her head curiously. “Are you sick?” He does look a little off-color, after all, and it would explain his apparent disappointment at seeing her. There’s no feverish look in his eye though, and no visible injury. Starlin, not quite two, has not yet come to realize that there are more types of illness than those that affect the body. Heartsick, she’d albel him, if only she had the words or experience to know it.