Acolyte by Fluffy Pony

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Acolyte
by Fluffy Pony

From early days as a foal, he had always attended services to the goddess Epona
with his dam and sire. Unfailingly, he listened intently to the beautiful music
of the elderly stallion at the pulpit-singing with a silver gilded candle in one
hand, a solid gold wheat sheaf in the other.

This life would be his for he so loved Epona and all of equine kind. They had
their quirks, but there was elegance in the citizenry of equine stock as well.
Little Sesan the snow puff well knew these truths as he attended solstice
classes, paid the old stallion some time for volunteer work as an altar colt,
and aspired to remember the truths of Epona the divine mare as though she had
lived inside of his very being.

Years had passed and the gangly little colt boy with the pure silken fur and
tail was granted the reward of his faith when the old priest laid down his robes
and his soul fled for her pastures not three days after.

Saddened, but he allowed the memory to stay within him just as the teachings
decreed that the old priest would graze well in her lush fields for the rest of
eternity.

Now, after his latest sermon, he cast his gentle patient blue eyes over the many
unicorn alicorn styled candles of ivory and spiralling silver-blowing them out
with deep slow reverent breaths; his silent prayers carried to Epona herself on
the fine pink wisps of smoke.

"Sesan?"

The soft voice behind him was almost unheard-even amongst the silence of the
abbey. Turning, the white horse appraised the visiting priestess with a light
lifting grin of his muzzle as the shadow of the last candle danced on his shiny
silken cheekbone.

"Lady Kilana. Services and prayers are over, I'm afraid." He observed,
straightening out his ornate gold and silver embrossed belt about his immaculate
clean white robes.

"Prayers? And who hath to pray to men-on behalf of men?" She remarked, arms
tucked into her burgundy wide sleeves like the wizened stance of an ancient
sage.

Calmly, Sesan turned to blow out the last adorned spiral candle, leaving the
temple in almost utter darkness.

"Men have their own gods. Let them not be bothered by ours. They once respected
her so many a time ago, but no longer-apparently they wish gods in their own
image just as we do. It's nothing shameful, Kilana."

She pulled a fresh vellum scroll from her sleeve.

"Take this-read it-burn it. Whatever you wish. It is a report on the state of
men signed by the great matriarch herself."

Sesan cast his eyes curiously on the parchment at that mention, his hand
reaching nervously forth for it-and then Kilana was gone with a swat of her
graceful black tail as she turned to trot off.

'It was determined in various proceedings that Epona's human herd hath left her
graces gradually over the course of many centuries, and now it seems that her
divinity has all but been forgotten in their memory save in legend.

-SilverSword, Epona high Matriarch-'

Startled, he rolled it up. Reciting that men had no interest and actually
reading it from her holiness to the goddess were two different things, and the
latter ever sobering.

Animated, he turned toward the silver gilded bust of Epona's great face-her eyes
gold...and crying.

"My goddess. I was a fool to dismiss the importance of such a travesty. I will
make arrangements to visit the world of men in hope that believers of our way
will still be able to see me with their eyes."

In older days, Her priests and priestesses were only visible to the numbers of
mankind who had faith in her compassion, and for those who did not believe, Her
representatives would not appear.

So Sesan received his body in a baptismal pool much later that night-soaking his
fur and skin in the glimmering bright waters until his frame shoan with vibrant
spectral light.

"As she decrees, only the faithful will cast their eyes upon my body-and all
others will not see but what they wish to, which is nothing."

In a blinding flash of quicksilver light, he was laying in the fresh straw of a
stable, a four footed equine right beside him; nickering in a friendly manner
toward him.

He stood up-naked-stroking her neck and chin.

"You know who I am. Perhaps this is encouraging."

Removing himself from the stall with one last kiss on the curious mares' lips,
he left the stable and went toward the nearby house-then decided against it.

"I will go to a city of men; surely some of them will see me." Sesan remarked,
flirting his tail elegantly.

In the city of men, he was careful to avoid their mechanical carriages-even
invisible, he wasn't invulnerable. Turning into one alley, one man in stained
clothes and drinking from a green bottle wrapped in brown vellum turned toward
him in surprise.

"I must be really drunk!" The man grumbled out, wiping vomit on his sleeve.

Frustrated, Sesan went past him and further down the alley, coming to the street
on the other side where lied a church for their god.

Curious, he went in and saw that it was very similar to how he would hold a
service except men were praying not to Epona, but another man who had died for
their innumerable sins.

Sesan sighed. According to Epona, there was no sin; it was all how humans were
made-a little good and a little bad so they knew what bad was. Animals couldn't
sin for the things they did, so how was it that humans COULD? He was confused.

Leaving the church, he wanted to go back to his world and never return. The
human religion disgusted him; placing blame where there should be none to have.

"Epona accepts us for the wickedness of our nature and loves us always no matter
what we do. She is our mother; she is the mother to everyone-divine mare and we
are her beloved foals...always."

He wanted to leave-in fact he was about to go back to the stable and transport
himself back to his temple, but he heard a strange cry. A cry unlike any animal
he had known, and so he curiously followed it until he came unto a dumpster-

And sitting on black shiny foul-smelling bags was a tiny human.

"What?!"

Then he truly had doubts in epona's forgiveness of all living beings; no mother
COULD do this to her offspring-it was unthinkable.

Surprised, Sesan looked on as the baby reached out for him and cried further.

"You can...you can see me?" He was flustered.

"How?" He went forward to pick up the human baby in his arms.

What would he do? He couldn't leave the baby here, and he didn't know what he
should do with a child when the world of men was confusing and he had no idea
what their ways were anymore.

Then his eyes softened with a newfound mercy and love-along with an inclination
he knew the divine mare had blessed him.

"I will take you back with me. Make you my foal and I will be your sire."

Licking the childs forehead, he went on back to his temple with a promise of
protection and love from the goddess herself. For so she had wished it, so shall
he do to honor her faith in him.

It had been a long and awkward eight years raising this tailless foal.

"To love her is to be a part of her spirit." The child quietly repeated as he
swept up the floors between the benches and busily worked to make a giant pile
of multi-colored horsehair; the leavings from the departing congregation.

It was the end of the winter season, so everyone would be shedding a great deal-
except for Izan; he would keep the same amount of hair he always had year round.

"Are you done there, Izan?" Sesan mused, adjusting his rounded glasses (age had
crept strangely upon him) as he listened to the light howling music of the draft
coming through the temple.

Many centuries, the architects had built it with special sealable openings that
would allow the wind to lightly blow through and make a harmonious litany worthy
only of the voice of Epona; for the wind and the breeze were her music.

"Yes, Father. Just a little more and I'll have it all." Izan remarked as he
swept.

"Come take a break. I wish to speak to you." The stallion puffed out his white
robes and smiled as the visiting light breeze tousled his mane and the black bow
holding some of it in place.

Izan looked back at his work, laid the broom on the armrest at the end of one of
the seating rows and strode calmly forth in the proud lope of equine grace.

The beautiful white horse looked him over, unable to believe this was the child
he had found so many years lying in garbage.

"Are you truly content to be here? To serve her will? I want only your
happiness, Izan, and if it is a dream outside of the faith, I wish only to help
you pursue whatever design you have."

"What am I?" He asked, uncertain as his eyes sailed over the wildly flickering
alicorn candles like the breeze itself; passing them over with only brief
attention.

Sesan almost had a heart attack when he heard that. In no other circumstance did
he ever hear his adopted son say such a thing, nor ever hint at such curiosity.
There was always something lonely in Izan's eyes, but it was so vague it could
be anything. Izan wanted to be told he was different, why he was different, many
unanswered truths.

Sesan didn't know how to proceed in answering his son-not at first. He took in a
long breath and blew it from his nostrils with a tired blustery sigh.

"Izan..."

He looked over the pulpit, the glimmering dim candles, the silver embellished
walls, and the fountain springing forth behind the altar of her face; where
molten silver pored forth from her mouth and into a waiting pool as gently as a
trickling stream.

Thus with silver, she had equally filled him with her words; the precious wisdom
flowing from his own mouth.

"You are special. You are the child chosen by her in the world of men to be her
devoted colt. She had led me to you-amongst the sinful mazes-amongst the taint
of blasphemers and beggars-to a...manger...where you could easily be rescued
from the world which forsakes her love."

He became studious, his face contemplating the sudden bestowed answers.

"My kind-men-forsake her?" Izan finally responded, shrugging in disbelief.

Sesan well knew the boy-colt couldn't understand why; Izan had been raised with
her love always. Ever since he could hear the words of his prayers-ever since he
could hear the music of her very breath through the temple.

Xenophon was probably one of the last men wise to her ways before her teachings
left the world to be replaced by others that were more tempting. Why worship a
horse when you can worship a man?

"Your kind found someone else. I don't agree with the teachings, but it is their
choice and they must be left alone."

Izan frowned, going back to sweeping as Sesan contentedly watched. The fur had
been collected into a confusing colored mass of fuzz. When Izan went to throw it
out as he usually did, Sesan stopped him.

"Not this time child. I have something else in mind for all that hair."

Izan raised a speculative eyebrow but said nothing, collecting the fur into a
bag he had been given and handed it back to Sesan who went to his study with a
pat on his apprentices' head.

Another eight years had passed since that special moment. Izan had become wise
in the ways of the priesthood, now bucking excitedly for his journeyman robes
like any frolicking yearling.

The graduation from apprentice to journeyman of Epona was a very private
ceremony.

Normally.

Today, rather, there was a special gift to bestow to the human foal goddess
Epona had discovered in the other realm. Indeed, her boon and the boon of the
congregation would be granted him on this very special day, though the youthful
creature knew it not.

Izan fidgeted nervously; rubbed his arms as he looked shyly across at Sesan in
his full ceremonial vestments.

Seated curiously in all rows of seating afforded the temple were enough faithful
equines from many miles in all directions.

This was a rare moment; too special to remain hidden from their eyes and downy
attentive ears. It had been thousands of years since a human learned to be an
acolyte of the goddess, and though she tested all of her believers rigorously,
in the end, they were proven worthy in her eyes-and the eyes of their kin.

Sesan hoped Izan would earn these special robes in which he was being presented;
he had the weight of the community upon his shoulders.

"My son. This moment is bittersweet in my heart. I had wished more time to watch
you grow up, and yet, part of me wanted to see this destiny hasten."

Izan barely dared to breath; his body shaking with nervous energy like that of a
racehorse ready to spring from the gate. It could be seen in his eyes-he didn't
know what was going on, but he knew it was important.

"I made a promise to the goddess herself that I would raise you-love you as my
own-and every second it was as though I had been given a great honor."

The stallion turned very slowly with grace and a gentle flick of his tail,
lifting the lid from a wide white plain box........

And laid beautifully inside were the vestments of a journyman of Epona; white
fur glistened like ivory in the glimmer of the dull candles.

"When you wear these robes, there will always be a duty to fulfill to all of
those who helped make them."

Izan looked on as Sesan carefully lifted the clothing from the box and the inner
lining was made up of a mottled mix of many colors of woven hair-

And then Izan was a smart enough child to understand why he hadn't been throwing
away the winter coat sheddings left all over the floor ever since his eighth
birthday.

"The weight of the community is upon you. As long as you wear these robes, their
warmth shall comfort you and always remind you not only of Epona's faith in you,
but theirs as well."

Izan swallowed hard, standing awkwardly in disbelief as Sesan came toward him
with that finely crafted garment. There was great power and love in their
making, and that alone deserved his silent reverence.

"Have you nothing to say son? Perhaps you will be a mute like Hedrich the
speechless." Sesan chided with an amused whinny.

"She watches from these shoulders. Let me be worthy, father."

Sesan smiled with pride, a few tears escaped his eyes. Yes, he would be a good
priest of her way-a man who had her love pouring through his soul like silver
itself.

The breeze blowing through that temple seemed only to sing praise of him that
day-a music strangely absent for hundreds of years. It was a particular song he
was pleased to hear, for she was truly content. If not content with the state of
mankind, then certainly with one in particular who was only too pleased to pray
to her and keep her gentle wisdom to his heart as long as he had breath in his
body.

There was but a few days away from Izan becoming a full acolyte of Epona-then he
would be ready to take over the congregation when Sesan himself retired;
fortunately, he aged slow and that day wouldn't come upon him for decades yet.

No, it wasn't that Izan was almost complete in his teachings that concerned
Sesan. Indeed, Sesan was troubled by undeniable feelings of a more mundane and
earthly sort. The stallion was celibate-not by choice or because She so willed
it; it was simply because he had no drive to pursue any mate or love interest
outside of his main devotion to the goddess.

Sesan had become rather fond of his son-and that is what frightened him
dreadfully. Sinking into him like bot fly larvae and eating his flesh, Sesan
could not reconcile the strange feelings he had for his future replacement.

Feelings that go beyond fondness-feelings and emotions he only dedicated to an
equal.

A mate.

Someone for sexual relations.

Sighing, he went to his bathroom to brush out his tail until it was all nice and
silky like soft silver-dropping tiredly into his bed with not the ease nor the
lack of worry for which comforted him most other days.

Bliss was having answers or having faith that the answers would arrive. That
would not happen if his devotion were at war with his desire; a constant
struggle for his heart and soul.

He didn't even know how to ask his apprentice-Goddess!-his apprentice; it felt
so vile when he thought about it. He didn't even remember if any other follower
of Epona had a relationship with another of the same gender, much less a
different species.

"Goddess!" He screamed pitiously to the night; torn apart and tortured by the
many betraying feelings.

He awoke in the morning to the sweetened smell of roasted oats, smacking his
lips with eyes half closed.

Dragging himself from the bed, he dragged his shorts on and walked sleepily
downstairs toward the kitchen.

It was a nice little two-story house attached to the temple. Almost everything
had been painted in white or swathed in white curtains. It gave the place a nice
comforting glow but Sesan didn't like the idea of how easy it was to stain
something white.

Hot steam from apple tea wafted to his nose and he couldn't help but blush as he
remembered the simple pleasure of drinking it on the many cold rainy nights.

"Izan! Your up early." Sesan stated, not sure how he should behave now that his
lustful feelings had confronted him.

His hooves rang gleefully upon the wooden steps, his tail flicking involuntarily
from side to side as if to keep away flies-or worse things.

Peering into the kitchen, he barely stifled a laugh as he saw Izan covered in
dun-white oat powder and the pot almost boiling over with oozing slime.

"Not early enough for you though." The human remarked, spinning a wooden spoon
in the pot to knock all the oatmeal back down.

"Of course not." Sesan remarked, winking with a bloodshot eye and a laugh. "I'd
have to be a saint to wake up any earlier."

"I hope it was somewhat restful last night for you, father. You sounded
troubled."

"Troubled." Sesan remarked. "This day has only begun and I am troubled. Nay,
child, just a riddle-a choice. Life has many and we need to make one."

Izan yawned, pouring the oat gruel into two bowls and gave it a nice shake of
salt and cinnamon.

"Tell me about it." Izan mused, pouring the tea and went to the small dining
table to set everything up.

Gruel, tea, and sugar crackers. It was a humble breakfast, but more extravegant
fare was unnecessary.

"I need to make a choice." Sesan offered, humming in pleasure as the first drops
of the tea hit his tongue and exploded with mild apple flavor right down his
throat.

He couldn't meet his sons' eyes as he ate and drank breakfast.

"A choice about me."

Sesan nervously shook; dropping his cup to the floor with a crash..."Yes." He
finally managed.

The rest of the meal went along in silence up to the time when he went back to
his room to change in his formal robes.

"I'm going to find an old friend. She'll help me sort it out-I hope."

He found her munching cabbage and shredded carrots from a bowl out in the park,
a vendor nearby giving out all kinds of fresh tidbits for snacks.

"Kilana."

How fortunate it was she had been assigned to the city in her silver years-
middle age.

She looked over with a friendly laugh and a gay shake of her mane from where she
sat upon a stone bench.

"Sesan!" The slightly elderly creature waved him on, the scarlet of her robes
making her look like Epona's own sunset.

He took a seat by her, but could not match her sincere outward friendliness.

She looked at his wrecked weak form, face softening with sympathy.

"I have things on my mind." He remarked, looking at the white and mottled
colored pigeons explore all over the park and pecking for insects or different
crumbs dropped by picnic goers.

Kilana shrugged her withers and flipped out her tail. "Clearly. Feel like
talking about it?"

Sesan sighed; "Is there any greater vocation than to serve Her?"

"Not that I know." Kilana remarked, munching her cabbage bowl. "Are you leaving
the priesthood?"

Sesan sighed, "I don't know. My heart has fractured."

They watched little horses-almost ponies-play in the flowering grasses and roll
in the sand. Foals were always frolicking in this park and forgetting their
cares. Youth was always so full of joy; even Izan was surprisingly spirited in
his upbringing.

Perhaps that was why he liked the child so much-so much love and excitement in
that energetic body.

"I love too much, but there is only room for one." Sesan finally remarked.

Kilana blushed and giggled. "Well, I didn't think you were so troubled over it."
She mused, flirting that beautiful tail and batting her eyelashes.

"What?" Sesan asks, incredulous.

"I'm surprised it took you so long to propose." Kilana nickered out and utterly
tried to attack him with her lips and her arms; her snack tumbling to the grass.

"Lady Kilana!" He snorted out, shocked and utterly repulsed. "I love another.
Another I can NOT love!" He growled out, vexed.

Her eyes widened as she dragged herself off of him. "Huh?"

"Bloody hell, mare! I love my adopted apprentice!" He finally announced.

"Ohhhhhh." Her eyes wandered around in nervousness as the truth came out.

"I can't love Epona and I cannot love Izan both." Sesan finally uttered in a
strangled painful cry. "Who would you choose?"

Kilana snorted and shrugged. "Let me ask someone who knows. No one in the
priesthood has seen something like this for a very long time."

The morning left him empty well into the afternoon. He might sit around in the
park thinking except he had a midday service to prepare for.

He approached his temple with a tickle of breeze messing his mane; leaves and
bits of stuff clinging haplessly on. The wind was strong today; such warranted
only a few reasons-it was HER will that something change today.

Change.

What would she intend to see different in the world?

The wind intensified and he looked on in sheer terror as the tree-a tree which
grew by the temple for hundreds of years-slowly began to tilt until the enormous
weight of it brought the tree down the rest of the way-

And crashed down through the roof of the temple-

Immediately fear shown in his eyes as he uttered a panicked shriek for all to
hear; a scream all horses were familiar for making in times of terror and
uncertainty-uncertainty playing through Sesan's mind of only one thing...

Izan...

His eyes lit up as he realizes a possible inescapable truth. As the roof groans
from the heavy weight and begins to cave inward with a loud moan of aged timber-
the final eruption of noise was accompanying a cloud of dust as the temple
collapsed inward with only two of the walls intact.

"Izan!" He screamed among the resigned crumpling of plaster and debris.

His temple had been devastated and all he could think about was the possibility
his son was dead.

Eyes searched the wreckage-piercing through the wind-blown branches of the side
fallen tree. It was a deep pain; one his heart could not recognise readily. It
felt as if someone had taken him by the hand and let him fall down a cliff to
the dimness far below.

His thoughts were at a standstill-should he go in to try to see if Izan was
alright-or should he wait till others came?

Another fear came into his mind and that was the candles. He didn't know if any
had been lit prior to the accident and was well aware a fire could soon start if
the wind offered the least amount of favor.

A ragged wind smashed through the whole mess, and it looked like it had easily
blown out all the small fires before they could be a serious problem.

"Father!"

Behind came a thud as Sesan turned in time to see the apples and different food
begin to roll from a wicker shopping basket, his apprentice running up a
cobblestone street to see him-

And what happened.

"It's..." He began uncertainly as he appraised the disaster that had been his
home ever since birth it seemed.

"Okay." Sesan remarked, relief flooding his body with a sudden flood of nervous
energy as hope crashed into his face. "It's all okay, son. We can rebuild...just
need to go to the Matriarch to ask for money to fix the temple."

Sesan took only a few hours to fill up two journeyman packs before they began on
a long many-mile trek to the great mare herself; ear to the goddess and mouth-
peice of the divine one.

The road they travelled was unpaved, but it was dusty and well-beaten with
centuries of age and frequent use. Among the twists of this meticulous and
courteous path-a road that twined around the many trees did they travel and
converse of common things for which minor opinions were not vested.

It was through these seemingly innocent and innocuous words that Sesan put the
random question which would allow him to judge his apprentices' thoughts for the
inevitable question that would arise.

"Oh, and another thing I wish to put before you-um..." Sesan struggled with the
weight of the words as much as the burden of his robes.

"Yes, father? I find it disconcerting how one of HER priests finds difficulty in
having the right words to say. Normally, SHE seems to provide you the silver of
the tongue." Izan pointed out, humorfully questioning his mentor's faltering
speech.

Sesan coughed in polite rebuke and found himself about to fail in answering his
acolyte-

When they heard the clearest watery chime of a bell they had ever heard.

"Strange..." Sesan mused, cocking an ear toward the noise.

The forest could easily be a tormented heart with its many complicated twists
and little known trails. So too could the beat of Sesan's relaxed hollow-hooved
equine gait and Izan's heavy thudding feet. The two went on the same road but
sounded as if they went upon different paths.

One such way brought them upon the gleaming scattered bits of a gleewoman's
travelling cart-polished and blackened trinkets and a conniving pair of teal
starry eyes. Much secrecy in that face, Sesan immediately determined.

"Fortunes and charms for weary travellors?" She cackled, an enigmatic strange
sparkle in her eyes.

Having walked for only a few hours, the pair of questing zealots were hardly as
tired as they had been described.

The old mare hunched over her cane, quiet patience in her stance which could
allow her to stand there for years if need required it.

Sesan questioned the value of her many wares just as he did not bide by the
possible dishonesty of her tongue. Despite his reservations of being tricked, he
humored the offer with mirth and decided that he had the money available to
accept her unique offer.

It would soon be an offer he couldn't be refuse by the next scratchy insightful
words from her hoarse throat-vague and veiled, but he knew what she spoke of.

"Your heart faces a troubled stream, ey?" She mused.

Sesan faced her casually; the wind plucking lightly at the loose strands of his
mane. Leaves and pink paper-thin blossoms fluttered to the ground like a dreamy
rain rain of color.

"Yes-um...how much do you want...if you can-can..." He began to utter out
nervously.

She looked around toward Izan and calmly gave a bluster from her nose. "How much
do I want if I solve your problem?"

Sesan simply nodded.

"Nothing. I can give you advice but I can't solve your problem-you and your
acolyte must sort it out with each other." She responded, her eyes tired and
half closed, but the pupils filled with a responsive pool of energy.

The trees creaked from a strong breeze, twigs falling down and getting matted in
their manes and hair. Her cart of pots and metal-wares clinking against each
other like deep hollow bells-howls of steel and abyssmal darkness.

"But it isn't just about me-and him...its about HER." Sesan declared lightly.

She gave a deep blow from her nose. "Then you must ask yourself what SHE would
approve. I think that there is room in the kind heart for dedication to our
goddess and someone else-why else would we have marriage?"

"Marriage?" Izan jumped in, his curiousity aroused. "Do you intend to marry
Kilana? Is that why your so restless?"

Sesan felt plainly annoyed for confusing his apprentice further, taking one last
brief look into the ancestral mare's eyes before departing.

"Expect rain tonight. Expect lots of rain." The gypsy creature warned with an
amused light whinny-

-like a clear bell.

They both turned about to look at her-but there was no sign of the mare or her
cart.

"Strange magic works here. Did we meet a witch or ghost or some other being?"
Sesan wondered aloud.

A damp chorus of clouds fell upon them like howling dogs in the wind and they
knew that at least one part of her prophesy was correct.

"Rain will be on us soon. Let's go find somewhere to escape it." Izan offered,
the glimmer of his eyes faded by the ghastly drenching murk of the overpowering
clouds above as dark as giant wet cotton swathes used to clean out a chimney.

It was nigh on them as night approached on a deep roll of purple curtain above,
flanked by the occasional patch of moon or starlight between a mottled covering
of threatening bleak grey.

Twigs snapped in greater frequency and the occasional deer could be heard
rustling away in the distance. Birds silenced their songs as the giant orange
slipped below the purple haze like a bed of gods.

Soon, they came across a cave as a downpour like a waterfall erupted upon them
unexpectedly; drenching them in miserable wetness as the cold dark mouth
welcomed them inside to an almost inhospitable shelter.

As cold as they were, the cave spared them the direct breeze and flood as they
walked deeper inside and gathered dead leaves from the floor to strike up a
fire.

Sesan shook wildly and removed his robes, setting them down on the floor with
the inner lining facing out so that he had someplace to sit as he peeled out of
his more informal attire just as Izan was digging through their oversized packs
for the oil and flint they kept for the lamp and the occasional candle.

The tiny spark shone in all loneliness as they watched it slowly take up
confidence in the provided tinder-erupting slowly out into a small bonfire like
an orange genie; flanked by an odd arrangement of stones to contain it.

Sesan's eyes flashed like gems in the dull sunset-like glow as his fur had been
enshrouded in a golden cloak of light all over his now bare body.

His clothes had all soaked through, but the horsehair layer from both sets of
formal robe/cloaks managed to stay remarkably dry given the circumstances, just
as his own coat began to easily reject the water with every unevem waft of heat
from the fire.

Izan stood there a little awkward, debating with himself as he stood there in
his ruined clothes. Even for a human raised by a horse, he still lacked that
fluid comfort of nudity which he didn't full understand.

"You going to stand in those wet clothes all night?" Sesan whispers lightly,
staring up at him thoughtfully as he took a pot and began to boil water for tea.

A howl of wind came into the cave with a fresh burst of cold; splattering the
human's back with a wall of rain almost as dire and harsh as a frozen sythe.

"Maybe...maybe I should-but no peeking." Izan offered shyly.

Sesan laughed at the absurdity of that statement; "We're going to be naked all
night and your worried about me wathcing you de-clothe yourself? Strange
creatures, humans, every one!" He declared boisterously with the true booming
whicker of a stallion.

Izan blushed when he realized his silliness, dropping his fine white woolen
shirt like a lump of clay onto the ground, wiping wet long hair from his eyes as
he wiggled out of his pants and kicked them to the side a few feet away.

He stood there somewhat woodenly with a numb look on his face like he didn't
know what was happening nor what do do next.

Sesan rose, testicles and tail bobbing in the air as his lithe feminine muscles
rippled under his skin. His body was that of a runner; it definitely showed.

Not missing a beat by his apprentice's dumbstruck look, he took the others' robe
and set it down on the ground opposite him about the cackling little fire.

Izan gave it no more thought than a ghost as he wearily sat his ass down on the
plush fur in front of the lightly sweet-smelling blaze, acrid smoke flushed into
his lungs somewhat refreshing like the smell of apple wood in a furnace.

The fire rose out of its enclosure to the height of an emaciated foal just
learning to walk his first steps. For the toddling little horse, that was an
amazing four weeks!

For a long moment, his body was saturated by the hot waft of heat against his
skin as eyes fastened on the little flickering flamelets with the curious wonder
of where they were going as they separated from the giant fire itself.

For an eternity, Izan was content to let the fire pacify him with calm warmness
as wind and rain howled outside from an entrance forty or so yards away.

His eyes met gold-the gold of light bronze and the sweet appearance of
butterscotch. It was Sesan; he was elegant and unspoiled by the closeted world
of grey stone, overcast skies, and natural desolation.

And it was eyes that met his equal to no other's gaze. Unmatched stare of a god
incarnate-such wanting and transcendence in that look the longer he stared.
Mystery and wisdom passed into him from one mere concentrated thoughtful glare.

"We're going to be in here for awhile." Sesan remarked, throwing tea leaves into
the water of the roasting pot as dry leaves crackled underneath.

"Yes..." Izan admitted, not even sure where this was going.

Sesan moved himself to the end of his makeshift rug, motioning to his acolyte,
"Why don't you come over here-I'm sure we could think of something."

Izan hesitated, now understanding what was being inferred; "But you love
Kilana...we're travelling to ask HER for guidance-besides, it feels a little
awkward to...to do that with you."

"Is it? Humans tend to make things more complicated than they should be. Have
you not enjoyed a stallion in the role of a mare? I know a young fellow like you
has been experimenting."

Izan blinked-this was more private than he cared admit.

"I'm a stallion first, and a priest second. SHE does not begrudge us our natural
instincts, I've just had no interest in acting on them until recently." Sesan
mused, stirring the pot and sniffing the air with a cute flehmen.

"Then it's true. I have had some thoughts like that. In my free time, I did some
things with friends of both classes."

Sesan poured some tea into a pair of tin cups as he blew out a long calm breath.
The clothes ruffled to firmness nearby as the heat of the fire permeated into
their fine fibers.

It was a conversation on daggers, and Sesan was very close to either making it
across or falling down. The peril soon arrived when the impatience drove itself
into his thoughts like a screaming feral thing-a monster of instinct and he
simply declared what was on his mind.

"I want to mount you."

Izan dropped his cup in surprise as the thickness of the words entered his
brain.

"I-what?!"

The simmering war within himself erupted to the surface into a firefight and
Sesan was uncertain if he could survive the assault.

"I just-I think about you...love you more than you could possibly know." Sesan
slowly remarks, his heart beating faster than the utterance of his words.

Izan bit his lip nervously and turned away, shaking. "I just feel weird about
it. You raised me from a very young time of my life. You became my father, I'm
not sure you can be my lover."

The white stallion downed his tea in one long steaming gulp, trying to hide his
recalcitrance. "Is it your heart whom spurns me, or your humanity? Humanity has
no purpose in matters of the heart; it only gets in the way."

Sesan slowly rose from his robe-turned-mat and sat by his son, calmly facing the
fire and not doing anything else.

"Izan, it is humanity that tells you to be ashamed of your body. It is what
makes the world of Epona and HER herd so awkward to you. You have so much to
learn-to let go of your reason must be as much a burden as having it in the
first place."

Izan stiffened coyly as soft furred fingers raked delicately along his shoulder.

"But does SHE approve?"

Sesan felt along Izan's other shoulder, rubbing his muzzle lightly against the
presented neck with an affection and caution. "It matters not as much as us. Do
YOU approve?"

Izan reached up to feel the silky hand on his arm, leaning his cheek against the
warm head by his.

"Is this how rain feels as it tries to sink into a mountain?" Izan remarks idly,
feeling the hot breath by his nose.

"Rain waits years before it can penetrate the many layers into underground
streams below, and from that waiting, that journey-rainwater is more sweet and
pure than it ever has been before...do you...understand?" Sesan whispered
kindly, licking Izan's neck like it had been coated with sugar.

Lightning thundered behind like whipcracks and exploding fireworks as the rain
beat a heavy downpour of hoofbeats into the pulpy mass of mud encroaching all of
the ground.

Izan reached back carefully, running his fingers over the silk-covered sides of
his mentor as the stallion involuntarily shuddered from the sensation like
electricity had shot through his body.

The human jerked and wiggled in surprise as the stallion seized him and pulled
him down against him, spooning on the fine padded robe underneath as he giggled
at the little nibbles on his ears and the tickling tongue on his cheeks.

Izan blushed as he felt the hotness of the equine sheathe rubbing idly against
his asscheeks as if it had belonged there his whole life. The stallion went
crazy with his affectionate licking and male "hrrr's" and whines of horsie
bliss.

The crack of fire and the warmness of the naked body against his lulled Izan
into an enchantment of passion-slowly woven into a combined tapestry that seemed
to unite them both slowly every moment.

"Are you human or are you dancer, little one? Your heart knows the steps, just
let it lead." Sesan whispers, continuing to lick as his hands explore Izan's
body as innocently as possible; feeling along his chest and back as his over-
endowed crotch warmed against a soft mound of rump as gently as sunrays on a
Spring day.

"I'll dance with you." Izan replied, feeling the hands on his body and slowly
turning himself about to look into the face of his teacher. "I want to be your
partner."

Sesan thoughtfully looked into eyes as curious as wandering stones, his lips
pursed out anticipating a different embrace entirely.

For the human, it was no longer awkward as he let his mouth wander over to the
sweet scented fuzzy muzzle of the white stallion; the pink nares expiring air in
expectation like the billowing of a train.

They melted together in the instant their tongues met, and no longer did it all
seem so weird and reprehensible like they had both thought only hours before
under a shattering hail of rain-now it felt like it was the most beautiful thing
in the world.

Hot breath entered his lungs from his lover, making Izan shudder uncontrollably.
It had been only yesterday that the youth had made the company of any young
stallion friend who wanted to try him out-after all, Epona neither said that
male sex was wrong, nor that a priest couldn't have sex.

This was not sex, they both knew. It was a spectacle, a force, a wave, a rising
crescendo of some phantom they could not even name.

It was love.

Sesan rolled them over, not daring to break the kiss as Izan found himself
straddled over the delicate equine's belly like some awkward giant belt.

Eyes gazed into eyes with wonder and lingering desire as a tiny pink thing began
to poke at Izan's upturned and accessible butt.

A glaze of horse fluids began to squirt out and all over the presented rump like
a tiny geyser; a hot flood of juice that made the human jerk in surprise as he
felt it drip all over his rump.

"May I have this dance?" Sesan thoughtfully remarked, his eyes narrowing in a
hushed pair of coy slits

Izan didn't look back-couldn't look back; his eyes mesmerized on the soft warm
face before him-at the rise and fall of the furred chest, the pert pink nipples
as hard as rocks. He could feel the rising organ against his ass like a rather
hard broom handle, threatening penetration into his body at any moment.

Control left his body as he sank his cheeks over the stiffening rod and closed
his eyes to savor the sensation of that hot long shaft sinking into his body
with every new inch of erectness. It was an unstoppable spear of lust that
pierced into his body-irresistable as the kiss that had awakened his body.

Then he gasped in surprise as it had finally penetrated his body to the sheathe,
hot balls pulsing agains his butt and perineum with tiny bursts of pleasure as
Sesan moaned lightly, anticipating what would come next.

Izan lowered himself against that welcoming white chest, rising and lowering on
the pink cock as slow as he dared while the organ rubbed at his prostate cruelly
with an enormous malice that threatened him to orgasm before the stallion under
him.

He rode on the cock shamelessly, locked in position by affectionate embrace as
the stallion took turns between kissing him deeply or grunting in pleasure as he
was milked like a cow.

Great heat began to overtake his passage from the friction of the lubricated
rubbing as a more personal heat melted into his skin from the stallion and was
in turn expressed through his body with an impression of marish impatience as he
rode the horse as fast as he could; ass rubbed raw with pleasure and filled with
enough pre to make even being mounted by a draft possible.

The human shuddered helplessly as Sesan screamed in a loud feral way, erupting
his fluids into his acolyte as Izan shook intensely from the hot scalding blast
of horse seed coated all through his ass.

Sesan locked into the small body; enjoying the pressure over his spent cock as
his tired body stiffened with cold from both his and Izan's cooling sweat. They
lay stuck to each other under the calm warming force of the bonfire. Even as it
slowly dies out in the course of the night, they never move-kissing and falling
asleep together in the same entangled embrace of passion for what seemed
forever.

The morning greeted Sesan like a soft blast of warm Summer air as the hot naked
body on top of his reminded him of what had transpired the night before. His
cock had already detracted back into his body sometime while he was sleeping,
and he felt the cold sticky puddle of cum all over his sheathe and balls as Izan
leaked sex juice all over him from a well-used ass.

Delicately nudging and nibbling at his lover, Sesan looked outside to see the
fuzzy brightness lingering into the cave as he heard the sound of falling and
crinkling dead leaves outside.

"Wake up, pretty. We have to go now."

Izan slowly awoke, fondly looked into Sesan's eyes, and gave the stallion a
little lick on his fuzzy pink nose.

"Okay...hope our clothes are dry." Izan muses, slowly and temtuously rising from
the horse's chest.

"Probably drier than we are." Sesan remarked mirthfully.

The arrangement that greeted them as they came upon the great chamber of the
Matriarch was one of such surprise. Sesan had never come to this place before,
and the great temple of Epona left him more awed than he could fathom.

Gold candles lit up with occasional red sparks, red silk bannerets billowed in
the wind like elegant ballgowns. A great fountain bubbled up not with silver as
Sesan had expected, but with what seemed a liquified rainbow-somewhat like a
prism or a mixture of paints where each color was distinct and did not mix with
the others.

The throne greeted them from forty or so galloplengths away like a fixture set
apart from everything else. Statues of Epona in many positions and giant
stained-glass portraits of HER flanked the chamber of the Matriarch like a
congregation of angelic messengers; a constant reminder that the temple always
belonged to Epona no matter what high Matriarch sat in the throne.

Sesan approached the old creature with trepidition and nervousness in his body
like that of a high-strung race horse; muscles twitching with energy and
uncertainty.

In their robes, both master and acolyte bowed before her with as much respect as
possible.

"Why do you come before me?" She was so old, her eyes had gone gray with rheumy
fog, but she could still make out the odd features of Izan.

"We come to ask for money to fix our temple. A great tree has fallen on it and
we must rebuild." Sesan declared, deeply humbled with a nervous little twitch in
his voice.

The Matriarch contemplated that a moment before breathing a great sigh from her
nostrils in a long blustery gust. "It is an uncertain foundation that ruins a
temple. Do you have issue with HER?"

"Indeed, I've come to ask of you something." Sesan responded, relieved to
finally ask the greatest authority his most uncertain question.

"Epona does not interfere in matters of love-it is her purpose to guide us when
we need faith and hope." The Matriarch declared, as though it had been a rule
for centuries.

"You know my question?" Sesan asked, rebuked with surprise.

The Matriarchal mare laughed with amusement, cackling with a light whispery
cough, "SHE knows your heart. Drop it, and be at peace, priest-now go to the
coffers for the money you need..."

Just as he was about to leave, he heard her scratchy voice continue; "And enjoy
your acolyte with the burden released from your soul."

Sesan smiled fondly with a nod as he looked into the eyes of Izan and simply
said;

"I do."

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