A Race to Freedom

[tingara]

Every now and again the sounds of shod hooves colliding with rock rang out across the Ramshead. An oddly coloured Thoroughbred mare was nothing more than a blur. Shadow was enjoying her new found freedom a little too much to realise she’d left her two companions in the dust. She laughed when she finally realised, they would catch up eventually.
“This place has so many good places for running! I can’t believe I didn’t know about this place until recently,” she called to the sky without stopping. The only way Her Shadow could be stopped was if she ran out of track, or flat in this case. Racing was what she was born to do but Shadow had gotten bored of just racing other racehorses, they were too easy. She wanted to challenge the famous Brumbies who supposedly had amazing stamina and could run extremely fast. Shadow snorted and said through breaths, “We’ll see about that.” Amazingly Shadow decided to stop and wait for her stablemates Elle and Donkii to catch up. She looked herself over while she stood waiting. Her bay coat had dulled in colour from the sweat of running but the queer white spots that had made her even more known through the racing world still stood out. Shadow took pride in being from a sport horse stable that took pride in breeding oddly coloured Thoroughbreds and she felt she was an excellent example of a Birdcatcher marked horse.

[Illu]

Elle was torn between tearing after Shadow as fast as she possibly could and waiting up for their much slower little donkey companion. Eventually the thrill of having so much room finally got to her, and the dappled buckskin filly suddenly launched her head down, kicked up her heels in a buck and tore after the spotty brown bullet. Although not nearly as fast as a meticulously trained thoroughbred with a rigid feeding and workout schedule like Shadow, she was still one not to be challenged lightly and this time she was hoping Shadow had gone and worn herself out enough for herself to have a shot at winning. ”Hurry up Donkii!”

[Tiggs]

Grumbling, the small brown equine was glad at least that her hooves were unshod, and she was better build for steep climbing. When the rise flattened, she set off in a steady canter. She would never catch up, but she was hoping the two horses would race back this way. Coming across some good-looking grass, the donkey slowed and came to a halt. She brayed to her companions, and began to eat.

The High Country was wondrous. Full to the brim of grass. Donkii liked grass. Munching happily, the little brown donkey was quite content to graze here all day while Shadow and Ele raced around and around.

[Tex]

A small brumby was cantering across the Ramshead Range, her white mane and tail ruffling in the breeze and her beautiful silver legs in a blur. A look of supreme impatience crossed her face. She hated being so small! Being small, she wouldn't be able to run away from things fast, nor could she race the wind like she was dying to. And also, her legs were long, but they weren't in the least bit powerful yet. Doowi bared her little teeth and snorted shrilly.
Finally her legs slowed down, and Doowi stopped to suck up some water from a tiny stream. She lifted her head from the water to survey her surroundings, then sucked up some more water and began to trot.
She hadn't gone 10 steps before an odd-looking equine passed her. Doowi followed, interested.
It stopped and began to graze. The filly approached the wise-looking donkey, and began her greetings.
"Hello. I'm Doowi. Who are you?" she demanded bravely, pretending not to be nervous.

[tingara]

Out of nowhere finally Elle appeared. Shadow sidestepped in anticipation, whinnying challenging at her huge friend.
“Come on let’s race back the other way,” with that Shadow tore off without waiting for Elle’s response. As the two horses tore up the flat, Shadow looked behind her where her friend normally was when they raced.
“Come on slow poke,” she called while looking at Elle. Shadow was too busy jesting Elle to see that Donkii was coming up fast in front of her. Luckily she turned to see her just in time. Shadow skidded to a sudden halt just bumping her little friend as she came to a stop.
“Hehe, sorry Donkii,” she laughed as she nipped her playfully on the rump.
"Oh you've made a friend, another donkey!" Shadow had never seen a brumby and didn't know most of them would be shorter than her, "hi there I'm Her Shadow but most people just call me Shadow. You don't know where I can find some Brumbies do you?"

[Illu]

Elle slowed up amusedly when she saw Shadow about to crash into Donkii and started cackling gleefully at her friend’s error. ”Silly goose! That’s what you get for not looking where you’re going!”

She quickly spotted the little silver filly that had inexplicably popped up and trotted over quickly with her ears pricked to take a sniff. ”Donkey’s can’t teleport silly!” she snorted, leaning in for an uncomfortably close look, ”Besides, this one’s got cute little ears and a fuzzy tail. Hey! Maybe she’s one of them ponies Cranky-pants supposedly had as a stablemate. Wow, looks a bit like a silver brumby too! Where’d you escape from darlin’?”

[Tiggs]

Donkii scowled at Shadow. "She's not a donkey, you idiot! She's a small one of you." The donkey trotted up the the creamy and had a good look. "I think she is a brumby. No shoes, unclipped hooves, definitely not groomed. You guys were never bred for brains." Donkii wandered away again, dismissing the brumby in favour of food.

[Tex]

Doowi immediately puffed herself up, furious at being called a donkey. Yeah, okay, she was small, but donkey? Donkey?! Her coat was silver, for crying out loud!
"I am no donkey! I am a brumby! I am small, but that is only because I am 2 years old!" she snorted shrilly, and did an agitated dance in a circle. She didn't expect to be given a red carpet, but they could at least acknowledge her superior status as a silver horse!
Then a donkey dismissed her in favour of food! Now Doowi was really cross. She whirled around and began to canter away, making her hooves noiseless and her hoofprints invisible.

[tingara]

Shadow was positively taken aback.
“Oh I’m sorry I didn’t...” she called after the silver filly’s rapidly fading shape but soon gave up on her. It didn’t click until later that that small silver filly could have led the race horse to other brumbies.
“Why was she getting so worked up about her colour I wonder?” Shadow said, absently grooming the caked sweat off Elle. It wasn’t like that filly was the most exciting colour Shadow had ever seen, she had come from a stable where unusual horses were bred.
“Wanna race again Elle?” she perked up again, soon all problems were forgotten as Shadow’s undying urge to race sprang up again.

[Illu]

”Nah, hang on, I’m trying to work it out,” Elle said thoughtfully, screwing her face up in concentration as she watched the silver filly disappear. Something here wasn’t adding up. The silver horses were also called ‘creamies’ right? With manes and tails that – Oh shit. ”Um. Shadow? I think that was one of the silver brumbies...”