Name: Arivae [Ah-RE-Vay]
Called: Ari
Gender: Mare
Age: 9
Species: Arabian Uni
Father: Ibn Al Badieh (Son of the Desert) Also called Emir (Prince)
Mother: Jadwah al Salam (Gift of Peace)
Birthplace: Jahwhar al Nil (Gem of the Nile)
Family: This must be borderline illegal o_O
Friends: NOORFACE
Owner: Kim
Companion: None at the moment
Skin Color: White, but stained slightly tan
Status: Wandering

When I awoke, I knew it was too flipping bright .

I was only three days old, and already I knew I didn't like the world. Where was mum's steady heartbeat, letting me know she was there? Where was the rhythm of her muscles as she walked? What was this terrifying pattern of too-bright and too-dark? And why, just why was it so loud?!

The enormous lump of she-that-fed-me shifted slowly next to me. I supposed this was the one that had given birth to me, but she certainly didn't look like I had imagined her - perhaps smaller, and with less hair.

Of course, I could only assume that she was the one that I should call 'mother,' since I wasn't sure of anything in the too-bright world. I only knew that the straw was scratchy, and weird, ugly monster-things kept staring into the 10x10 foot box I called home.

And Inari were they ugly! And they smelled really day. Three days in life, and I already knew the term "Body odor." It wasn't the lovely not-smell of mum, just... the smell I'd come to know as "Twoleg-beast stench." In time you get used to it, I guess, but the first days of my life were spent in miserable sensitivity to that odor.

Well, days passed. Months, I got used to the movement of the two-leggeds. As soon as I didn't need mum anymore, I was moved to a 8x8 box of my own, but it wasn't quite as large nor as lovely as the only I had with mum.

It did have a curious feature, though. Once I was old enough to bend my neck over the door of the 'stall,' I was able to see unfamiliar markings on a gold plate. They were upside down, and I could not look at it without straining my neck. At that moment in time, of course, I could not read, but later learned it was "Arivae." A pretty name, to be certain, for a pretty horse like me.

Months were spent in contentment. The Ugly-Two-Leggeds were kind, I soon learned, and they did not burden me much. I saw mother less and less, and stopped craving her attention. In short, I was growing up.

Aw, yes, you can shed some sentimental tears here now. I was a year old, long gone of my carefree foal-days.

The first time I had been tacked up had been many months ago. It was light, and I carried it easily. The two-leggeds were slow in adjusting me to it, and for that I resented them. My back was strong - I could easily have taken twenty times the load.

And, so they obliged.

Ugh, the two-legged that first mounted me was fat. I have no idea how any beast carried his enormous weight, for I certainly couldn't. With an easy sway, I fell over and began a roll.

Immediately, the fat two-leg jumped ship, and I was left feeling quite proud of myself.

Well, to make a long story short, the stupid two-leg was persistent, and in the end, I was broken.

It was the beginning to a long life of playing steed.

Hmm... the first time I saw her, she was framed in the doorway of the stable, the light of the sun lighting up her brilliant beauty. She was the first two-leg, I think, that didn't smell extremely bad. I think that's what attracted me to her.

She was young, though, but older than me. Did I mention that two-legs age as fast as a slug walks?

Anyway, she was beautiful, by human standards. Only twelve, and she had the pure, innocent air of not knowing her own beauty.

She was entirely superficial, though, but that was perfectly fine with me. By now, I had had many stallion suitors, their advances I deftly avoided. It made the two-legs nervous, which in turn made me laugh. There was talk of moving me, but I wondered if that would go through. The girl, too, thought I was gorgeous on first sight. I had her, hook, line, and sinker.

It was only later that I learned the girl was "bint Emir," the "Wajeehah," the "Amirah," the "Emira," the daughter of the Prince, the second princess. Illegitimate, she had been condemned to marry to another prince in the desert.

Of course, that would have been her fate in any case, but it was now that they were especially anxious to get rid of her. It was unfortunate, and I rather pitied the girl. By now, I was three, and fully mature, so when she chose me as her mount out of sheer attraction to my looks, nobody argued. Also to her hand in marriage, the man she would marry would enjoy an additional dowry of a mature, wellbred horse.

Not to say that there wasn't dowry enough. The prince would live very comfortably with the vast amounts of jewels and gold being sent to his homeland. Why, he could retire for life off of it, and buy a thousand stables, but by now I had knowledge enough to know it was never the end for the two-leg's greed.

The preparation time was less that one would have expected. By the time the princess (who's name was Sababa, meaning Excessive Love. Oh, hmm, I wonder where they got that from. Poor girl) was thirteen, she was shipped off.

The horses of the stable were barely whispering now, it was more like a scream across the stable. "Oh, di'ja hear? Girl's getting gone, took long enough! If it took them fourteen years just to ship me off, I'd've been put out to pasture!" And then then entire barn would ricochet with laughter, because, of course by then the horses would have passed their absolute prime.

I admit, I was taken of guard at first as I was led out into the bright sun that day. In my disorientation, I passed the castle and thought, "Wow, what a lovely stable. I wonder what the size of the stalls are in there," and proceeded to turn to the walls, wondering why they wouldn't open the gates for their newest member, me.

But when I was yanked to a standstill, reality snapped back, and I readied myself for a long journey across the desert. With the utmost care, the stable master steadied my tack on my back, added the full adornments and gold pieces, along with little irking tassel-things that were extremely annoying and served no purpose at all. In all, it was a very humiliating time.

In what seemed like hours but was probably only a half an hour, I was decked out, and the entire caravan of camels carrying a huge load of gifts were ready, armed with a veritable army of protectors. I'm not sure which was more expensive: The gold, or the people hired to protect it.

In any case, I neighed goodbye to the horses I had known for the first three years of my life , and began what seemed like an aimless journey in the desert.

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