Wild Things

He woke soaking wet and miserable. A splitting headache greeted him, along with a sore body and a mouth dry as sand. The black stallion, once called Tamlin (a name he had not heard uttered from another’s lips in several years), was laying flat on his side in a neon-edged bush. He was dirty and shaggy. The dark bronze colour of his hooves hidden behind a layer of mud and his once velvety coat dull with wet dust. His black mane was in disarray; full of twigs and leaves, the hairs matted together by resin. His white tail, looking more greyish brown, was no better. He looked nothing like the prince he had once been; it was either tragic or laughable, depending on how you saw it. Only one thing was sure; if it had not been for his snow-capped rump and frost-dipped horn, a familiar horse would have had trouble recognising him. Headaches for Tamlin were nothing unusual, but the severity of this one surprised him. He felt like his eyes were about to pop out of their sockets and his skull crack from the throbbing pressure. He was dizzy and confused, wishing hard that he could fade away again. But it was too late now; he was already awake and there was no chance falling back to sleep feeling as he did. He grunted, deep and hollow, as he rocked his body and pulled his legs towards him. Once right-side-up he placed his black muzzle against the ground and closed his eyes against the pain in his head and body. It did not help any more than shutting out the strange lights that surrounded him. Like that he stayed, he had not the strength or the willpower to haul his thinned out body off the ground.