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Levent Kartal · 09-07-2012, 10:22 PM

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Sorry for the wait! :c I had a post written up on my phone, but stupid thing didn't save. Hover for Turkish translations!

Levent Kartal had decided it was a good idea to go riding on the shoreline, too—but this was work rather than rollicking on the beach. He shifted his scrawny body in the saddle to keep balance as the paint mare began to twist around, her teeth reaching to grab him before he commanded her in the horse tongue to go onward. Thrashing her head, her blue eyes set with a frightening resolve, she bolted down through the shallows, hooves kicking up water and wet sand both. She made another sharp turn, and he gripped the reins until his fingers ached, his claws digging into the pads of his palm. Eventually, she slowed down and snorted, and he let out a heavy sigh. It wasn’t quite an admission of defeat, but he was quick to scramble off her back and land in the sand on his butt—still preferable to being thrown from the saddle again.

Then again, it could have been worse. He’d noticed that Mai calmed when near the water, and it did her temperament wonders when it came to permitting a rider on her back. As she’d just demonstrated, it didn’t turn her into a perfect angel, but the fact that he’d been able to ride her for so long was testament to the calming effect of the waves. Once he let her free, she ambled only as far as the grass on the shoreline to graze. Licking his lips, Levent wondered how she could tolerate the taste of so much salt; it made him sick.

“Are you going to be able to even travel tomorrow, mate?” came an amused meow from a safe perch on the stones. Backlit by the sun resting on the hills, the cat looked almost a dark, pinkish grey rather than white. He waved his tail jauntily when the Turkish wolf came over, setting down beside him and stretching his back.

“Probably not,” Levent answered honestly. “But we don’t really need to keep moving that quickly.” He brushed some hair out of his eyes that had escaped from his colorful headband, staring out at the sea. It was still touched by the colors of the sunset, but perhaps not with the same intensity he had grown used to over the past few months. On the other side of the peninsula, in Cercatori d’Arte, the sun had sank into the water; here, on the eastern coast, he knew it’d emerge from the ocean instead. It wasn’t something he was used to, and the thoughts and their associated images made him melancholy before a sharp mew from the tom brought him back to the present.

He scowled and followed his wide amber gaze. “What is—o aptal atı!” he growled, scrambling back to his feet in alarm as he saw that the mare had wandered off and was trotting, head and tail high, along the beach. He exchanged a quick glance with Wilson then ran after her, calling to her in low speech and probably sounding absolutely ridiculous doing it. When he finally caught up with her, though, she’d stopped and was staring curiously at another equine on the beach: a spotted beast of draft hose descent. His gaze flicked from the large animal to its caretaker, a dark she-wolf, and he cleared his throat as he grabbed for Mai’s reins.

“İyi akşamlar, hanımefendi,” Levent said, nodding in greeting and managing not to sound as awkward as he felt.

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