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 Posted: Wed May 31, 2017 3:13 pm
 When Tepey left the herd of his birth, he had expected...not much, actually. He'd expected to be with his brother a lot (hardly a change from when they were foals, though), but other than that, he'd had no real expectations. If you had asked him what he was looking for when he'd been that naive runaway, he probably would have said that he was looking for people who would appreciate him, or perhaps that he was looking for a herd to lead. He had, after all, been the eldest son of the Ram, the leader of their herd. In most herds, he would have been expected to be the heir. That wasn't how it had worked for them, though--generally, it tended to be the youngest adult son, the one who hadn't gone as far afield by the time their father died or was chased off. Things were harsh back then. Maybe that was the real reason that Tepey had left: to find an easier place, a happier place, one where he could be comfortable. Maybe that had been it, or maybe it had been for some other reason. He wasn't sure if he'd ever truly know why he'd left.
But ask him now, and he would tell you that he had left his herd to find beauty, and to his surprise, he'd found it. Perhaps the beauty was not as magnificent as he'd expected--after all, there were so few people in this world quite as beautiful as he was--but to his surprise and delight, he had met a few who were as pretty as he was.
In fact, he'd even been able to make two stars as pretty as he.
He was walking side-by-side with one of them right now, a bright filly they had named Ostara. She was a loving mix of all that was gorgeous of her mother and all of her father that made her a stunner. And despite looking nothing like her, so was her brother. Such a miracle! Tepey nuzzled his daughter. "Where would you like to go today, Ostara?" Not that it mattered,
of course--what mattered was that Tepey had some time to spend with her today.
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Posted: Wed May 31, 2017 3:38 pm
Time to be with Daddy was the best. Which wasn't to say that spending time with Samhain was bad. Spending time with her brother was one of Ostara's all-time favorite activities. But given a choice between spending time with Daddy or spending time with Mother, she had to pick Daddy, every time.
It wasn't that Ostara didn't love her mother--far from it. She did love Mother, she really did. It was just that Mother was a little bit...difficult to spend time with. Even if she wasn't engrossed in running the herd, she was always making plans, and brimming with ideas. Worse, she had Expectations for her children. She expected all of them to compete with her, and whoever "won" (however that was determined) would get to be the heir, which sort of wasn't fair, in Ostara's opinion. It wasn't fair either way, to be honest--simply picking the oldest offspring wasn't all that helpful, after all. Either the eldest child won because he was the biggest and strongest and had the most experience with politics, or the eldest won just because they were born first. Either way, it didn't look like Ostara or her younger brother would be the rulers of the Shadow Herd someday.
It was better, then, to spend time with Daddy, whose expectations for his children seemed to be "be pretty," and he had a pretty broad definition of that word, too. When Ostara was with Mother, she had to be a Shadow Princess, an underhanded backstabber, always looking for an opening. With Daddy, she could just be...herself.
"I dunno," she said. "Let's go east today, Daddy." It didn't matter, so long as he was here. She picked east because it was easier--it was a less dangerous border, so they wouldn't have to bring an escort, and Daddy wouldn't be nervous about being near the border. She didn't want to make Daddy nervous or upset. He didn't deserve that.
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Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2019 12:59 pm
So thoughtful! Thinking out the answer. Tepey was brimming with pride as he leaned down to nuzzle Ostara. "Of course, darling. East sound wonderful." East was much nicer than west--west was the border with the Sunflare herd, where tensions had a tendency to rise quite unpleasantly. But the eastern border contained a meadow, and this time of year it was full of wildflowers. Anyone they met in the meadow would be one of their own, or perhaps an adventurous rabbit. Certainly nothing bigger than a deer, and it might be fun to chase a deer off anyway. This was their grazing ground, not the deer's! Stars had to eat too, y'know, and they ate basically the same thing.
Well, so did rabbits, but rabbits were cuter, y'know? Much, much cuter. Idly, he wondered if he should catch a rabbit for Ostara to keep as a pet. Probably not, since someone would probably harm it--the trouble with the Shadow Herd was how little people respected each other there, it was a tragedy, it really was--but he couldn't get out of his head how cute a widdle wabbit would be. The trick would be to catch one...
"We could try to catch a rabbit while we're out there, dear. It might be fun, don't you think?" He might as well float the idea past her. If she wanted one, then they could exhaust themselves chasing one. It didn't matter that much, after all, but it would be something to do together.
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Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2019 1:06 pm
She was glad that Daddy liked her suggestion--it had been spur-of-the-moment, and sometimes Daddy could also be a little...impulsive. Whimsical? She couldn't remember right now, she would have to ask someone else later. Maybe Nyctyr or one of the other kids her age would know. Nyctyr would definitely know, but he would be a bigger jerk about it than anyone else. Tonestue. She could ask Tonestue, or maybe Dahlia or Nile. Nyctyr was probably best avoided.
Daddy was walking slowly, which was good, because Ostara's legs were kinda short. They were moseying--they had all day, they had nowhere specific they had to go. They could take their time walking around, no big deal. The idea was just to spend time with each other, not to get super picky about what they did as they did it. On the other hand, a rabbit would be really cute. Maybe a white and black one, a real cutie pie. Nile had a pet rabbit, a blue one named Helter-Skelter, but honestly, Nile's rabbit was a little too cynical for Ostara. She wanted a nice one, one that would keep her company on days when her brother and her daddy were too busy to hang out with her. Someone she could talk to. She smiled at Tepey. "I would love a rabbit, Daddy! Let's try to catch one, come on!" Without waiting for his answer, she surged forward through the brush.
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Posted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 3:52 pm
Tepey laughed at her enthusiasm. She'd just hared off into the bushes (hared!) so excited and ready to get started on the fun of the day. Tepey followed after her, easily keeping pace with his much longer legs, but careful to stay just behind her. "Alright, I'm comin', Ostara! Just don't leave me behind!" There was little chance of that happening, of course.
The meadow beyond the eastern border was a fair one, full of wildflowers this time of year, buzzing bees, and of course the rabbits foraging through the grass. There were mice as well, and hawks hovered overhead, peering keenly in search of those smaller prey. Stars were safe, even little ones like Ostara. They might make a snatch at a size-shrunken Arion, but never at a normal-sized foal. They would, however, chase the rabbits away, just as surely as two Stars with great, big, heavy hooves and even heavier bodies would. Chasing rabbits was fun, but catching them, ah, well, that was tricky.
When they got to the field Tepey threw himself down in the grass, just behind Ostara. "Oop, you beat me. You beat me, look at you, you've exhausted me. You can just leave your old man to die here, I'm done for." He grinned at her from his position on the ground.
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Posted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 3:59 pm
She was fast, even faster than Daddy. He was just behind her, and while part of her knew that was by design, part of her didn't want to know that. It was more fun to think that she was so fast she could outrun someone with legs twice as long as hers and a chest three times as deep. This was play--it didn't have to be full of hidden logic and plot holes, it could just be fun, so the fun won out over plain and boring fact. They made it to the meadow, Ostara just a fluffy tail-twitch ahead of her father, soaring over the rabbit holes like the creatures they were here to catch, curving around bushes and jumping over the roots and rocks in the ground. You had to be careful out in the meadow--it was easy to hurt yourself on hidden dangers, but Ostara could be careful and run fast at the same time.
Ostara laughed. "Daddy!" she said, nudging him with her nose. "You're not gonna die, Daddy, you're just a little out of breath, now come on! I want to catch a rabbit." She pushed against him with her little body, willing him to get up. "Oof! Come on, I can't pick you up!"
"Why not?" Daddy whined. "I don't think I could get up on my own! No, face it, Ostara, I'm finished, it's the end of the road for me."
There was no convincing Daddy until she could get him to forget his stubbornness. He was doing this to get a rise out of her, and he wouldn't get that. She flopped down next to him and nuzzled him. "You know what I love about spending time with you, Daddy?" she asked him.
He looked at her, all serious now. "Yes, Ostara?"
She looked up at him. "When I'm with you, I get to be who I really am. And I love that." She snuggled up against his side, savoring his warmth and the slow thump of his heartbeat. She could hear it when she put her ear to his ribcage, as well as his breath. Sometimes she tried to match his breath with her own, but it never worked out--he was just breathing too slowly for her. She always ended up short of breath when she did that. "And I love you, Daddy."
Daddy nuzzled her and shifted, curving his spine so that more of his body was in contact with hers. "And I love you too, my little princess," he said softly. "With all my heart. I would do anything for you and your brother, dearheart. Don't you ever forget it."
Ostara nodded. "Don't worry, Daddy. I won't. Now come on." She stood up.
"Let's go catch a rabbit."
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