Sabba had killed.

The snake's body lay limp in the grass, curled back and over itself and torn along its length by Sabba's hooves. A sense of ownership washed over the foal. This rock, this simple clump of forage, was his now. He'd won it through battle, and as if to show his dominance over it, he lowered his muzzle and crunched off the tips of a few blades.

It tasted bitter, dry, and unwieldy on his tongue. He mouthed it, shifting the blades back and forth while his milk teeth gummed at them. Eventually, he swallowed, gagging on the thick paste that was nothing at all like his mother's milk. Not sweet. Not warm. Not remotely comforting. Still, his belly welcomed it. His fatigue shivered for more. Sabba bit again. Chewed again, with more vigor this time. After he'd swallowed the third bite, he pawed the snake's body aside.

It was possible there were more about, but something deep in Sabba's belly told him they would not be near this rock. They would not have hidden in the same shade with the one he'd killed. This creature, his instincts insisted, was not a herding sort of beast. It was not social, not sentient in the way a horse was, and that thought settled the last trace of uneasiness that had whispered to him of guilt. He shoved it fully aside and ate, thinking, My rock. My grass.

My survival.

The meal sat heavily in his belly when he finished. He’d cleaned the circumference of the rock, trimming the blades into a tiny stubble around its base. Though he hadn’t enjoyed the taste, it filled him. It gave him strength but also put a dry longing on his tongue.

He needed to drink, and one glance around his rocky surroundings told him there would be no answering that need here. Besides, Sabba felt no desire to face more snakes, fighting one serpent after another for his dinner.

He lifted his nose to the breeze, stretched his nostrils, and inhaled the scents, hoping for anything familiar. His mother’s sweet pelt, perhaps. Only chalky stone and hot dirt answered his searching.

He shook himself, pranced away from the rock, and then trotted onward. The meal had eased his hunger, but his muscles still ached from the fall. Trotting teased these complaints to the surface, but Sabba’s victory was more pressing. Pride coursed through him, and it overshadowed the pain, both from his bruises and the hot trenches where the raptor’s talons had raked his neck.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

The cleft he traveled widened slightly after the rocky place. Creeping vines returned, and the soil they covered turned as red as the walls to either side. The clumping sagebrush he’d known on the grassland, also returned, but if there was any egress from his trench to the plain above, Sabba could not find it.

He watched to the sides, sniffing, and fluttering his ears back and forward, as alert as any young foul had ever been. There was no one to guard for him. No one to hide behind, and Sabba felt the weight of his own future settling across his short back.

Then he caught a new smell, a silvery freshness that made his tongue press against his teeth. His throat tightened, and he veered in the direction of the odor. Three paces toward the far stone wall and his ears picked up a twittering sound that was unlike the noise of any bird he knew.

He approached cautiously, for it had been a bird which tore his neck, which chased him into this crevice in the plain from which he could find no escape. The sound grew as he neared, and there was a steady rhythm to it, a constant which told him it was not alive. He recognized it mere steps before he spotted the water trickling down the red stones.

Some moisture on the plain above had spilled its confines. The rivulet drizzled over the slick rock, dancing and splashing to the dry earth below and only barely managing to pool before it was absorbed by the sere earth.

The puddle it made was too small for his muzzle, too filthy to be appetizing, but Sabba pressed his lips to the trickle and let his tongue roll free to gather the moisture. It lacked the rich flavor of his mother’s milk, but as soon as he drank, the dryness in his throat parted. He let a soft rumble shiver through his nostrils and sucked at the thin tendril of water until all his thirst abated.

When he was satiated, full of grass and water, the colt lowered his head, let his eyes drift closed, and rested.

Why hadn’t his mother found him? Sabba chased that thought into the darkest corner. The raptors screamed at him from his memory, and a low whimper slipped free of his lips. The weight he’d been carrying doubled, made him want to fold his long legs and curl up beside the little patch of mud.

It was too much to face on his own, and he was far too young. The world was too terrifying, wide and varied and full of surprises that hissed and struck at him just for trying to eat. To live. His rear leg cocked, easing the burden of his own weight to the other side. He was tired. Sore and saddened.

But he was also a Wind Singer.

Sabba jerked his head up and stamped his foreleg. He sucked in a breath and blew out through his nostrils, trumpeting a squeaky call of defiance and anger. The world had dealt him an overpowering blow, but he would not roll over for it.

Eventually, the trench would end. He would find his way back to the plain, and he would turn, as his mother had, to the north and the east. To the place where the sun rose each morning. He would not stop. He would not die.

And one way or the other, Sabba would find his herd.