Ni'Srilan: The Desert: A bullet and a target - I dedicate this post to Ebaran, because we could both use some friends.

"Well," he said, shifting about in the bushes and bramble that was their home, "I leave before sunrise." She was a simple mare, like he was a simple stallion, and once they'd both shared simple thoughts about a future. Perhaps he loved her; he could not know, at the tender age of two, if it was really love he felt. And she was not special, not really - but perhaps that was what made her perfect, unique even in normalcy. She was a sensible creature, a brown and white mare with one blue eye. That wall eye turned to him in the night, bespeckled in moon-shine, especially somber, but she had smiled. The future was here, even if it was not the one they had both planned on. "I know," she said softly, and turned back to the night.

*

He meditates with a patience given only to those who are at once simple and exquisite, as he is, the motley-part, mud-brown stallion. The sun is hot and blazing on his back, and a light sheen of sweat makes him seem even darker than he is, an almost-black shade. Now he reflects on the things he has learned in his brief time here. First he learned of the oasis, a small pool of life hidden in their vast desert tundra; then, he learned of the army, and its Commander, Baraqel; and finally, of Elements, which, he'd been told, belonged to nearly everyone here.

He can not imagine what it must be like, to have magic filtering through one's blood and coursing through veins, sparking, transient and perhaps even wild, on the dark country of one's skin. He's not sure that he would like it; there are more special magics, he thinks, than the showy ones they have here - precious ones, like the blue-eyed mare under the moon, subtle but lovable, too. Kinh prefers that type of magic, the type that is rewarded from patience and deep, ritualistic understanding. He does not know what a horse must do to meld his mane with fire, or have sparks of lightning dance in his eyes. He's not sure he wants to know.

It is happenstance, like most things are, for a humble, modest thing like he is, to come upon the stranger. Kinh is prepared to nod once, not curt but not friendly, either, to take note of whatever element they show off as they linger in their disparate sands, and move on. That's when he notices, of course; the stallion, some middling age, he thinks, of obscure rank and class, is nothing more than - well, than horse.

No; that is not quite right. There is part of him that is - Kinh cannot think of the word - broken, unwhole, not quite mortal, a piece taken away and smashed to pieces and smoldered, somewhat cheaply, back together. It's a piece of blind understanding that he's found in everyone else, a simple acceptance of these strange things like he gives simple, modest acceptance to the sun or the trees; but this is not natural, not for Kinh.

So he has been here for some time, Kinh thinks, but not much. This strange magic has not yet sunk its claws into his skin and throat; he is whole, precious, a sand-grain jewel.

Kinh is not silent approaching; he is, in fact, loud enough to introduce himself by way of scuffing foot and soft, snorted breaths. "You're new here," he observes gruffly, his voice a thick and deep, cowboy-style. He doesn't smile, but behind the simple, mud-plaster face, he might be. A shrug, lackadaisical, rolls across his shoulder and his shortish brown tail flicks against his hocks. He's in no rush; it's apparent in the way he talks, the way he walks, the way his voice is softer than everyone else's, not quite as abrasive.

"You seen anything strange 'round these parts?" he wonders, mock-casual, and turns brown eyes to study the dunes.