The climate of Kymry is mild even in winters, but that doesn't make winter a good time of year to be wandering without a home, without a path, without a purpose. Forage is scarce, warmth hard to maintain (if there was anything Cerrynt hated more than her exile, it was being cold), and hunting opportunities limited. With no direction to go other than avoiding the people of her own clan and the clan of the Eagle, she could easily spend time near the rivers where she could fish, at least. But the idea of finding a sheltered spot and settling down like a hermit didn't appeal to her; she was no derudh, and something made her keep moving, even though she had nowhere to go.
Time after time she found herself thinking about the horse. She was a simple creature as all horses were. Ready only to run, quick to take direction from anyone -- though she belonged to a forgoil scout, and they were legendary even amongst the Kymru for their mastery of horses, she was still ready to speed Cerrynt where she wished. But for all that the mare was not fierce, nor smart, only swift, Cerrynt felt sorry for her. She had only done as she was asked, she had done the best she could, and all she got for it was a pointless death, to be made into steaks. Cerrynt had long since stopped being angry at the people who chose to kill the mare, and thus, prevent her from fulfilling the vow they themselves had forced her into. This had all flowed together with everything else that had happened in the last year, to become one unified flood of waste and folly, of the spirits mocking her and abandoning her; and she simply drifted atop that flood, no longer concerned by one or another thing that had contributed to it.
But the horse had been an innocent creature. The man she'd stolen it from, while certainly not innocent, she also felt sorry for. The plan had been to return the horse to him, proving no more than an inconvenience and a firm statement: even today, the forgoil could not rest safe in their homes, sure the Kymru were toothless. Her act's meaning had been changed without her permission and she kept thinking of those she'd unwillingly affected.
Were the forgoil that different from the Kymru, she wondered? Perhaps they could be better called the Ceffyl-lûth, the Horse Clan. How would she feel if someone had delivered to her a murdered otter? But no, it wasn't quite the same, was it? The Dwrgi-lûth might love the otter, might even venerate the otter, but they certainly didn't tame them, nor would they ride them if they were large enough. They even sometimes trapped them for furs. And their allies, the Caru-lûth, certainly did not pass up venison when they could get it. Still, the forgoil venerated their horses, cared for them, loved them. Not even the most hate-filled of the Kymru could deny that. She considered the stories she was told of their reasons for hating them, and she could not refute them, but neither did they seem to mean anything to her heart.
Not that it mattered. As she trod the ways atop the rounded hills of Kymry, the high trails that even her own kin rarely walked (few could climb half as well as she did, or wanted to), she thought about these questions, but also knew they did not matter. Tomorrow, she would have nothing different to do, whatever conclusion she reached about this, but to fish, gather firewood, walk the high paths out of sight of those of the Kymru she no longer trusted, and perhaps find something unusual to attract her attention and hold her interest, like one of the few strangers to tread the roads through Kymry. But most days there was nothing and no one to watch. Neither Kymry, nor the chilly lands of the Algraig to the north, had any more mysteries for her, nor did they offer her any path, to anything or anywhere. Some days she didn’t even remember where she wanted such a path to lead, anymore.
