Others may have been startled by the cacophony of colors on the mare who has approached Sloene at the oasis. Others, but not the little mare who stands there today. Sloene was an orphan (no, not just an orphan…a killer. Killer. Killer. Always the first memories were the blood), but she was raised in a herd with many siblings, and those siblings were all of the colors of the universe. The result of a magician who played in space, though of course little Sloene didn’t know that. She only knew that she was the only somber color in a herd of little cosmos.
Once, she had resented it. Their colors and their powers. Thankfully, maturity had ended the resentment. She is able to smile at the bright stranger with no hint of anything except natural, if cautious, friendliness. “I’m Sloene,” she offers in return, shifting her own body to turn away from the water and towards the stranger. “This seems like a nice place. Have you lived here for long?” There are not many here – as Kreios had assured her in the Field. She thought it would be nice, the quiet, but Sloene is finding that it’s not all its cracked up to be.
Instead the long silence has grown oppressive. The force of her own dark memories is too strong to overcome without the chatter of so many adoptive siblings to drown them out. Syl has nightmares – so does Sloene. Perhaps Kreios is collecting them because he can sense they are broken.