The Horse Man

The Decision

Aristides is becoming a problem. Since the boy came to our meadow, he has been agitated and restless, screaming challenges and hunting for threats against his mares. He even challenged Bellerephon, who is the High King over all of my stallions. Bellerephon bit his rump for the temerity, but Aristides has not stopped his anxious guarding. I know, and he knows, that something is not right. My thoughts turn often to my lost Alannah, and I wonder if... but that is quite impossible. Her body could not be found after this many hundreds of years. I buried her. In earth. In a snow, under much ice.
Alannah was the offspring of two lines of horses; the line of horses which I had from the desert and the line which I was fortunate to purchase from the Ard Righ of the Tuatha da Dannan. Their line has been contorted into a sort of pony showing no similarities to the great stallion who sired Alannah. The jealousy of the invading Celts caused them to water down that pure line with their scruffy little beasts of burden, and when the wicked and greedy English got their hands on the result, they stole the remaining good animals, breeding them into their own quality stock, hoping to deny to the world that anything good had it's origins in Eire. I spit upon their accursed memory. I spit thrice, and I set the drains of my sewer upon them.
But I digress. Alannah was the treasure of both lines, the excellence of her breeding making a mockery of the horse that the English in their supreme arrogance call Thoroughbred. If her body should be found, it would be known that a greater horse than the Thoroughbred exists. And I should again be hunted, and my horses put in danger. I will not risk it, I will not.
In all the many years I have lived here in this land, I have given away only one of my loved ones. It now gnaws in my gut. What if the foals sired by that young stud lead greedy people to me? What if that stupid, stupid boy realizes what he saw, and leads people to me? Aristides screams his challenge, and I flinch. Perhaps it is time I found a new place to live.
Somewhere far enough away from the cities of men, yet near enough that I shall not be considered an abnormality. Though humans are inexpressibly stupid and bothersome, they are nonetheless clever and dangerous, made more so by their greed and their ignorance. They are much like wolves, who for the pleasure they derive from malice and cruelty fall upon vulnerable creatures and savage them to death. Abnormal is vulnerable.
With wolves, one demonstrates one's ascendancy over them by a show of power, preferably killing one of their members.
Humans are more complex. One must show ascendancy, but ascendancy is nearly always shown in different ways by different cultures. A show of power is often a good choice, but humans are, in ways, stupider than wolves. Their vanity causes them to be reckless, and there are subtle differences between a show of power and a show of dominance.
I must tempt their greed and their vanity with things that they find valuable. That I serve my guests from dishes which I purchased a thousand years ago in China tells them that I have wealth beyond their imagining. I tempt their vanity by indicating my belief that they are accustomed to consume their soup from translucent Ming bowls.
Oh, stupid people! Wealth and possessions mean power to far too many of you.
There are always those hasty men who are too greedy to possess what I have, however. These I deal with as I deal with wolves. I destroy them.
Destroying a thieving human is more difficult than killing a sneaky wolf. Humans, like a gaggle of obnoxious hens, begin to squawk when one of their number is killed. One must have proof that one was acting in defense of his property.
I am afraid that the boy who came here will bring others back with him, and I must not let the wolves find me here, where I am vulnerable. It is time to return to the society of men.

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