There were open areas of the swamp, places where the sun beat down freely without worries of trees or large plants keeping its life-giving rays from reaching the earth, this place, where small streams and rivers would run at a very slow and soothing pace. Here grew tall swamp grasses and plants in the shallows by water’s edge, soaking up the nutrients of the soil along with the bright sun rays that penetrated the bodies surfaces with ease and revealed all water-dwelling creatures to any that cared to gaze at their beauty as they floated along so carelessly. A haven and breeding ground for many of the swamp insects, they hovered all around buzzing in his ears, accompanied with the air-floating seeds of the reedmace, gently gliding whenever the warm breeze would take over the humid, muggy air. So beautiful, he thought, even if the seeds did sometimes bother him, by becoming stuck in his rough fur or if he would accidentally inhale one through his nose.
The only sound aside from the light splashes and plunks of his hooves in the water were the natural sounds of the swamp, the light and constant buzzing of the insects and the flowing and trickling of the water.
So heavy, the air was so heavy. It was so hot. His fur would keep in heat, and it began to make him feel weak. But he continued on, striding on even further into the peaceful clearing. He was in the middle of it, now, at a large reedbed, all of the plants were releasing their seeds, which seemed to explode and dash away with the wind. Such a journey they might go on, if the wind were to allow it. Often in his young age, the Kimeti would sit by the reeds and watch the seeds drift away. Sometimes he and his friends would wish to be just like the seeds, to be taken by the wind, to venture to far away places, to other worlds.
Rubbing his face up against the reedflowers, he released the tiny seeds into the air; some were taken by the wind while some drifted only a few feet, and fell in to the water and shortly sunk down below the surface. A few even stuck to his face. But he didn’t care. Sitting down slowly in the water, the Kimeti blinked his dulled eyes, tired and overheated. After a few minutes, his sitting became lying, as he moved further into the reedbed and closer down the water. Rolling over on to his back, he stared up at the clear blue sky, closing his eyes slowly. One last, weak smile. The elder Kimeti was the property of the swamp, now. Just as the seeds of the reedmace, the breeze took him, too, away. He drifted over the trees and the marshes, up in to the sky. His horns, his scales, his fur and hooves, they didn’t matter anymore.
Slowly his body deteriorated, as his rough and ragged fur became fluffy and white, breaking apart. Drifting reedmace seeds dispersed throughout the air in hundreds of separate directions, each with its own undetermined destination.
