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Description
Nordanner RPG Chapter 2 | Mini Prompt 3

Horse: A5552 Swimmin' In Nog
Rider: Kassia Feteke
Tack Shown: Flying Harness (or half of it, anyway!)

Guest Appearance: 1031 Balthazar

Prompt: wounded.. a small group of creatures are surrounding a local and their horse, they are clearly injured. How does your nordanner and their rider help?

Admittedly, I am taking some artistic license with this. I had originally intended to feature Cookies as the injured horse, but the Spooktacular offered me a chance to feature Balthazar instead.

Drawing Reference: none

Drawing time: 45 min
Painting time: 6.5 hrs
Tools: 15" MacBook Pro, Wacom Intuos Pro Medium, Adobe Photoshop CC

Story 2127 words

The trees dripped the leftover rain onto the forest floor, splattering Kassia, Nog, and the injured stallion they were leading. Glancing sideways, Kassia found herself riveted by the pulsing purple veins bulging from the horse’s neck, and the bone-white scars on his face. His eyes had changed from normal brown to a disturbing shade of violet, but his ears drooped with exhaustion, and she could plainly see that every step he took was painful.

Poor Balthazar. What had happened to him wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, really. They had all chosen to go after the missing generals, and the strange man who had charmed them away. They had all faced the dragon spectre, had seen the lifeless body of one gallant Nordie being feasted on by shadowstalkers. In the end, the Queen had been so consumed with grief for her beloved Nordanners that she had almost made a bad decision. Thankfully, her most trusted advisor had talked her out of it, had pulled the Queen, the remaining horses, and their riders away from the danger. Except for Griffin, a late favorite of the Queen, they had all gotten away safely. Well… Kassia amended to herself, mostly. No one knew if Balthazar’s condition was curable yet or not.

She hadn’t slept in approximately twenty-one hours, and the day before that long vigil, she had ridden back to the northern camp from the last, lonely village in nearly a day. It might have taken less, but she had decided to take a shortcut, which had proved disastrous. Then she was stalked by shadowstalkers for most of the ride home (in hindsight, that was far worse than her frightening encounter with the swamp mule). When she finally reached camp, she had found it short staffed and everyone frantic. Something was horsenapping the Generals. Every night, a few more disappeared, and no one knew why. The Queen was riding north to confront whoever was doing it.

Durango was still missing, too. He had disappeared before the Queen arrived. Kassia had been patrolling with Marshira and Toxicity when it had happened. Three generals had disappeared, and the riders had woken up with the dawn with only foggy memories of the event. The horses remembered, though. Nog had been frantic. Durango was her friend.

Hopes of finding and rescuing Durango had been her motivation for joining the Queen’s party to go after the Generals. She hadn’t planned on meeting any action head on, not with Nog’s condition being her primary concern, but to stay and wait at the camp was unbearable. Besides, she was a sharp lookout, and even if she did ride in the rear of the guard, her ears and eyes would be put to good use.

They hadn’t found Durango, of course. Kassia swallowed, trying to stave off the nausea that worry inevitably brought her. Balthazar stumbled just then, and his head bumped her knee. Nog slowed from her steady trot to a walk, turning her head around slightly to get a better look at the black stallion. She was worried, too, and she extended her soft nose to touch Balthazar’s with a gentle nicker.

Balthazar didn’t respond. There was plenty of slack in the lead rope, so Kassia knew he was following them of his own will, but he didn’t seem to care much about anything beyond that. He probably needed sleep – they all did.

Darkness was brooding over the valley by the time they reached camp. Across the meadow, Kassia saw Billy and Marshira tending to the other General that had been rescued – a mare named Fragment. She would be in good hands with them, Kassia knew. She turned back to Balthazar. His head nearly touched the ground, and he was so, so still, barely breathing. Cautiously, Kassia reached out and brushed the flat of her palm against one of the bone white markings, feeling the pulse of the corruption vein against her skin. There was a wicked, unsettling energy there.

Aside from the corruption markings, there wasn’t an injury on him. Not a single bruise or scratch that Kassia could see. She tied the stallion to the post outside her bivouac and began unsaddling Nog. The mare snorted gratefully, and dropped almost immediately into the dirt to scratch the itchy places on her withers and back. As she watched the mare, Kassia thought hard about what she could do to make Balthazar more comfortable. Water first, she decided, and then maybe a warm mash. Something comfortable that he would recognize, that would ground him back to reality.

The Hunt Master found her as she was drawing water for the horses. In silence, he helped her carry back the buckets, slosh water into the trough, and then he lit a fire in the nearby pit and pulled a grate over it so they could cook the mash. “Groom yer mare,” he said gruffly. “I’ll make it.”

They ended up feeding Nog the hot mash, too. Not surprisingly, the mare guzzled up her portion. However, Balthazar only picked at his, eating a little and then letting it dribble out of his mouth. He was more interested in the water, and had drunk quite a lot out of the trough.

“That magic might be dehydrating him,” the Hunt Master said. “His body is going to fight it like a disease until it acclimates.”

“Do you think he will live?” Kassia asked in a very small voice.

“Eh… there’s always a chance he won’t,” the Hunt Master said. “But he’s a General, lass. The Queen’s Generals are the best mares and stallions in the land. Some of them came from the other place, the old land that is no longer. They’ve seen sickness, death, fear, and despair, and come through it all with Nordanner pride.” He laid a hand on Balthazar’s neck, stroking his hands over the white scars. “This is one of our older Generals, and he has seen many a difficult day. He’s not too old to succumb, and he’s not too young to wither away.”

“He’s not a General anymore,” Kassia said soberly. “I heard the Queen say that he and Fragment can’t ever be Generals again.”

“The Queen is mad with grief just now,” the Hunt Master sighed. “But she’s probably right. Until we know what magic this is, the safest place for Balthazar is probably not on the front lines. Look at him! He might not have a scratch on him, but the poor lad is hurting and sick, no mistake.”

“She… she said… she said I could keep him,” Kassia added humbly. “I mean… when we got away and all, and we were trying to figure out what to do, everyone else was afraid to touch him, but all I could think about was ‘what if he was Durango’ and I went up to him and quieted him.”

“The Queen likes you, or respects you, at least,” the Hunt Master said. “Take it as an honor and move on, lass. She may have thought that perhaps a non-Alerian would be better able to deal with him,” he added thoughtfully. “It’s strange, this magic. I wonder what it’s going to do to him in the long run?” He smiled ruefully down at the young women. “Get some sleep. You of all people have really earned it tonight.”

Balthazar settled himself underneath the big tree at the end of the little enclosure and began to doze. With a sigh, Kassia ran her hands through her hair. She needed a long, long bath. No, she needed sleep first. But she didn’t want to go into the tent. Not yet. Too much had happened too soon, and her nerves were still frayed and anxious. Closing her eyes, she leaned against Nog and wrapped one arm around the mare’s strong neck, breathing in the scent of wind and forest that lingered still in the mare’s faded brown mane. Nog rumbled softly to her, her ears drooping in fatigue. The Hunt Master estimated that she was halfway into her pregnancy, but she had yet to show. This was her first foal as far as anyone knew; sometimes young mares didn’t show until right at the very end on their first time.

Halfway into her pregnancy... had Kassia really been in Aleria for six months? A slow, sick feeling curled into her stomach. Her friends and family in Etnar must think she was dead, or stolen, or worse. Delmor would have been frantic with worry, she knew. Was it really only six months ago that she had resolved to kiss him if she ever saw him again? Would she ever see him again? The Queen had promised to return her home, but there didn’t seem to be a way and now… now she might have forgotten with the terrible dangers facing her and her people. Kassia didn’t blame her – it wasn’t her fault any more than it was Kassia’s. Maybe fate had played a cruel trick again, like it had when Kassia’s parents were found and eaten by the wicked northern giants of Ettinsmuir so long ago.

Tears began to flow down her cheeks, and she couldn’t hold back the sobs. She hadn’t cried in a long time, either, but she did now. Oh, to see Etnar again! The gentle rolling hills, the deep forests with the ancient trees that had stood over a thousand years, the little, twining rivulets that watered their roots, and the Etnarian horses that were the denizens of the forest. She remembered her home at Seven Oaks on the Middleland Bald towering above Lake Joelle, itself a shining gem, the high rolling plains ringed by white and yellow sycamores, and the distant mountains quivering like scraps of blue silk against the burning sky.

What kind of magic had made her forget so easily?

Nog didn’t understand tears, but she understood that her human was greatly distressed. She nosed her affectionately, bumping her head underneath one of Kassia’s elbows. Her dark mane fell into Kassia’s face. It’s alright. I’m here, she seemed to say, her pale amber eyes glowing like stars in the night.

Kassia hiccupped and looked over to Balthazar. He wasn’t really asleep, she could tell. His head was lolling against the ground, but one delicate black ear was swiveled in her direction, and he was definitely watching her. Poor thing. The night would be long and painful for him as he adjusted to the changes the dark magic was creating in his body. An ironic smile twisted her face. They were both lost, both she and the stallion, both thanks to magic that neither of them understood. Softly, she stepped over the damp ground until she was right next to him. A faint purple glow ringed his black body from the corruption vein and the magic smoke still seeping from his eyes and hooves. Sinking to her knees, she reached out with both hands and caressed the hard white hairs that formed the new scars.

“Balthazar,” she said, and his ears twitched in recognition of his name. “That’s quite a mouthful, you know?” It was the name of a General, she knew, a beautiful, ancient name suggestive of great power and nobility. Like many of the Queen’s horses, his name would have been known in most of the households across the country, not the least because he was one of the original that had crossed over from who knows where (the Hunt Master still hesitated to tell her where and when that was). “We need to give you a common name, one that’s a little easier for me to say,” she said. She looked up at Nog, who had covertly grazed over in their direction. Nog was a pretty easy name to remember and say. The mare’s full name, Kassia understood, was Swimmin’ in Nog, a bit fanciful and showy, not to mention more than should be used on a daily basis. Balthazar wasn’t quite so mouthy, but it still was a lot to say.

“I think…” she said slowly as she wiped the last of her tears from her face, “I think I’m going to call you Zar. Zar. Yes, Zar. I like the sound of that. You’ll still be Balthazar formally of course – I wouldn’t dream of changing your name – but, to me, you’re going to be Zar.”

She shaped his long black forelock so that it fell over the massive, skeletal markings on his face. He really didn’t look that bad, actually, if she was honest. He looked… eerie, but in a beautiful way. Once he regained his strength, he was going to be a powerful, impressive stallion once again. And she was going to heal him. Together, they would find their way back home.

“Welcome to the family, Zar.”

Description
Nordanner RPG Chapter 2 | Mini Prompt 3

Horse: A5552 Swimmin' In Nog
Rider: Kassia Feteke
Tack Shown: Flying Harness (or half of it, anyway!)

Guest Appearance: 1031 Balthazar

Prompt: wounded.. a small group of creatures are surrounding a local and their horse, they are clearly injured. How does your nordanner and their rider help?

Admittedly, I am taking some artistic license with this. I had originally intended to feature Cookies as the injured horse, but the Spooktacular offered me a chance to feature Balthazar instead.

Drawing Reference: none

Drawing time: 45 min
Painting time: 6.5 hrs
Tools: 15" MacBook Pro, Wacom Intuos Pro Medium, Adobe Photoshop CC

Story 2127 words

The trees dripped the leftover rain onto the forest floor, splattering Kassia, Nog, and the injured stallion they were leading. Glancing sideways, Kassia found herself riveted by the pulsing purple veins bulging from the horse’s neck, and the bone-white scars on his face. His eyes had changed from normal brown to a disturbing shade of violet, but his ears drooped with exhaustion, and she could plainly see that every step he took was painful.

Poor Balthazar. What had happened to him wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, really. They had all chosen to go after the missing generals, and the strange man who had charmed them away. They had all faced the dragon spectre, had seen the lifeless body of one gallant Nordie being feasted on by shadowstalkers. In the end, the Queen had been so consumed with grief for her beloved Nordanners that she had almost made a bad decision. Thankfully, her most trusted advisor had talked her out of it, had pulled the Queen, the remaining horses, and their riders away from the danger. Except for Griffin, a late favorite of the Queen, they had all gotten away safely. Well… Kassia amended to herself, mostly. No one knew if Balthazar’s condition was curable yet or not.

She hadn’t slept in approximately twenty-one hours, and the day before that long vigil, she had ridden back to the northern camp from the last, lonely village in nearly a day. It might have taken less, but she had decided to take a shortcut, which had proved disastrous. Then she was stalked by shadowstalkers for most of the ride home (in hindsight, that was far worse than her frightening encounter with the swamp mule). When she finally reached camp, she had found it short staffed and everyone frantic. Something was horsenapping the Generals. Every night, a few more disappeared, and no one knew why. The Queen was riding north to confront whoever was doing it.

Durango was still missing, too. He had disappeared before the Queen arrived. Kassia had been patrolling with Marshira and Toxicity when it had happened. Three generals had disappeared, and the riders had woken up with the dawn with only foggy memories of the event. The horses remembered, though. Nog had been frantic. Durango was her friend.

Hopes of finding and rescuing Durango had been her motivation for joining the Queen’s party to go after the Generals. She hadn’t planned on meeting any action head on, not with Nog’s condition being her primary concern, but to stay and wait at the camp was unbearable. Besides, she was a sharp lookout, and even if she did ride in the rear of the guard, her ears and eyes would be put to good use.

They hadn’t found Durango, of course. Kassia swallowed, trying to stave off the nausea that worry inevitably brought her. Balthazar stumbled just then, and his head bumped her knee. Nog slowed from her steady trot to a walk, turning her head around slightly to get a better look at the black stallion. She was worried, too, and she extended her soft nose to touch Balthazar’s with a gentle nicker.

Balthazar didn’t respond. There was plenty of slack in the lead rope, so Kassia knew he was following them of his own will, but he didn’t seem to care much about anything beyond that. He probably needed sleep – they all did.

Darkness was brooding over the valley by the time they reached camp. Across the meadow, Kassia saw Billy and Marshira tending to the other General that had been rescued – a mare named Fragment. She would be in good hands with them, Kassia knew. She turned back to Balthazar. His head nearly touched the ground, and he was so, so still, barely breathing. Cautiously, Kassia reached out and brushed the flat of her palm against one of the bone white markings, feeling the pulse of the corruption vein against her skin. There was a wicked, unsettling energy there.

Aside from the corruption markings, there wasn’t an injury on him. Not a single bruise or scratch that Kassia could see. She tied the stallion to the post outside her bivouac and began unsaddling Nog. The mare snorted gratefully, and dropped almost immediately into the dirt to scratch the itchy places on her withers and back. As she watched the mare, Kassia thought hard about what she could do to make Balthazar more comfortable. Water first, she decided, and then maybe a warm mash. Something comfortable that he would recognize, that would ground him back to reality.

The Hunt Master found her as she was drawing water for the horses. In silence, he helped her carry back the buckets, slosh water into the trough, and then he lit a fire in the nearby pit and pulled a grate over it so they could cook the mash. “Groom yer mare,” he said gruffly. “I’ll make it.”

They ended up feeding Nog the hot mash, too. Not surprisingly, the mare guzzled up her portion. However, Balthazar only picked at his, eating a little and then letting it dribble out of his mouth. He was more interested in the water, and had drunk quite a lot out of the trough.

“That magic might be dehydrating him,” the Hunt Master said. “His body is going to fight it like a disease until it acclimates.”

“Do you think he will live?” Kassia asked in a very small voice.

“Eh… there’s always a chance he won’t,” the Hunt Master said. “But he’s a General, lass. The Queen’s Generals are the best mares and stallions in the land. Some of them came from the other place, the old land that is no longer. They’ve seen sickness, death, fear, and despair, and come through it all with Nordanner pride.” He laid a hand on Balthazar’s neck, stroking his hands over the white scars. “This is one of our older Generals, and he has seen many a difficult day. He’s not too old to succumb, and he’s not too young to wither away.”

“He’s not a General anymore,” Kassia said soberly. “I heard the Queen say that he and Fragment can’t ever be Generals again.”

“The Queen is mad with grief just now,” the Hunt Master sighed. “But she’s probably right. Until we know what magic this is, the safest place for Balthazar is probably not on the front lines. Look at him! He might not have a scratch on him, but the poor lad is hurting and sick, no mistake.”

“She… she said… she said I could keep him,” Kassia added humbly. “I mean… when we got away and all, and we were trying to figure out what to do, everyone else was afraid to touch him, but all I could think about was ‘what if he was Durango’ and I went up to him and quieted him.”

“The Queen likes you, or respects you, at least,” the Hunt Master said. “Take it as an honor and move on, lass. She may have thought that perhaps a non-Alerian would be better able to deal with him,” he added thoughtfully. “It’s strange, this magic. I wonder what it’s going to do to him in the long run?” He smiled ruefully down at the young women. “Get some sleep. You of all people have really earned it tonight.”

Balthazar settled himself underneath the big tree at the end of the little enclosure and began to doze. With a sigh, Kassia ran her hands through her hair. She needed a long, long bath. No, she needed sleep first. But she didn’t want to go into the tent. Not yet. Too much had happened too soon, and her nerves were still frayed and anxious. Closing her eyes, she leaned against Nog and wrapped one arm around the mare’s strong neck, breathing in the scent of wind and forest that lingered still in the mare’s faded brown mane. Nog rumbled softly to her, her ears drooping in fatigue. The Hunt Master estimated that she was halfway into her pregnancy, but she had yet to show. This was her first foal as far as anyone knew; sometimes young mares didn’t show until right at the very end on their first time.

Halfway into her pregnancy... had Kassia really been in Aleria for six months? A slow, sick feeling curled into her stomach. Her friends and family in Etnar must think she was dead, or stolen, or worse. Delmor would have been frantic with worry, she knew. Was it really only six months ago that she had resolved to kiss him if she ever saw him again? Would she ever see him again? The Queen had promised to return her home, but there didn’t seem to be a way and now… now she might have forgotten with the terrible dangers facing her and her people. Kassia didn’t blame her – it wasn’t her fault any more than it was Kassia’s. Maybe fate had played a cruel trick again, like it had when Kassia’s parents were found and eaten by the wicked northern giants of Ettinsmuir so long ago.

Tears began to flow down her cheeks, and she couldn’t hold back the sobs. She hadn’t cried in a long time, either, but she did now. Oh, to see Etnar again! The gentle rolling hills, the deep forests with the ancient trees that had stood over a thousand years, the little, twining rivulets that watered their roots, and the Etnarian horses that were the denizens of the forest. She remembered her home at Seven Oaks on the Middleland Bald towering above Lake Joelle, itself a shining gem, the high rolling plains ringed by white and yellow sycamores, and the distant mountains quivering like scraps of blue silk against the burning sky.

What kind of magic had made her forget so easily?

Nog didn’t understand tears, but she understood that her human was greatly distressed. She nosed her affectionately, bumping her head underneath one of Kassia’s elbows. Her dark mane fell into Kassia’s face. It’s alright. I’m here, she seemed to say, her pale amber eyes glowing like stars in the night.

Kassia hiccupped and looked over to Balthazar. He wasn’t really asleep, she could tell. His head was lolling against the ground, but one delicate black ear was swiveled in her direction, and he was definitely watching her. Poor thing. The night would be long and painful for him as he adjusted to the changes the dark magic was creating in his body. An ironic smile twisted her face. They were both lost, both she and the stallion, both thanks to magic that neither of them understood. Softly, she stepped over the damp ground until she was right next to him. A faint purple glow ringed his black body from the corruption vein and the magic smoke still seeping from his eyes and hooves. Sinking to her knees, she reached out with both hands and caressed the hard white hairs that formed the new scars.

“Balthazar,” she said, and his ears twitched in recognition of his name. “That’s quite a mouthful, you know?” It was the name of a General, she knew, a beautiful, ancient name suggestive of great power and nobility. Like many of the Queen’s horses, his name would have been known in most of the households across the country, not the least because he was one of the original that had crossed over from who knows where (the Hunt Master still hesitated to tell her where and when that was). “We need to give you a common name, one that’s a little easier for me to say,” she said. She looked up at Nog, who had covertly grazed over in their direction. Nog was a pretty easy name to remember and say. The mare’s full name, Kassia understood, was Swimmin’ in Nog, a bit fanciful and showy, not to mention more than should be used on a daily basis. Balthazar wasn’t quite so mouthy, but it still was a lot to say.

“I think…” she said slowly as she wiped the last of her tears from her face, “I think I’m going to call you Zar. Zar. Yes, Zar. I like the sound of that. You’ll still be Balthazar formally of course – I wouldn’t dream of changing your name – but, to me, you’re going to be Zar.”

She shaped his long black forelock so that it fell over the massive, skeletal markings on his face. He really didn’t look that bad, actually, if she was honest. He looked… eerie, but in a beautiful way. Once he regained his strength, he was going to be a powerful, impressive stallion once again. And she was going to heal him. Together, they would find their way back home.

“Welcome to the family, Zar.”