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Gazleene stood in her cavern, her white coat decorated with the red symbols of fertility. Her mane and tail are a shiny black, both braided with gold chains attached to pearls. A bouquet of foot long iridescent blue-green feathers is stuck into the top of her tail braid, fanned slightly like a long yet narrow chinese fan, while more feathers hang at intervals from her pearl studded gold face mask. Thick pirlhide stockings cover her legs from hooves to upper legs just below her belly. The hide is leather-like, and water proof. The feet of the stockings are encased in bronze almost two inches thick, thinning at the top for the holes through which pirlhide strips are threaded to bind them to the stockings. Gazleene follows her mute baboon handmaiden a huge inner cavern empty of all except for six mares dressed in nearly identical garb. The main difference between herself and the other six is the materials, hers are of the finest gold, while theirs are of a pretty, but common silver. One slightly overweight mare had a scar near the column of her throat, visible even from this distance. Gazleene knew from her classes that this creature would receive a far lower class mate than the rest, and that the mate chosen for herself would be so much higher the other mare would never again share quarters with her. The baboon signaled to her that she was not to speak, not a word. She also signaled that the water trough and the pile of fresh, good grain were off-limits. In other words, she could not eat nor drink. With that, the baboon departed, leaving Gazleene on her own. None of the other mares looked particularly welcoming nor friendly, so Gazleene kept to herself.She dozed for over two hours, waking only when she was given a tiny bucket of honey-ed milk to drink. Three hours after the honeyed milk, she awoke to a darkened cavern lit only by the flickering light of several small fires concealed behind metal grates. Gazleene could smell fear, and hear the distant echoing of copper covered bootings clicking against the stone floor. The absent scents of the six other mares made her nervous, for they were hours old, and there were more than a dozen clashing scents of stallions. She feels the waited for touch of a stallion's nose on her shoulder and nearly blindly follows the sounds of a stallion's throaty breathing to a darkened but slightly brighter cavern off a ways from the main one she had been in just minutes before. She knows what is expected of her at this time, and knows the strict rules governing this ritual by heart. Yet, Gazleene wants to KNOW who fathers her first foal, despite the rules that say all stallions are the fathers of all foals, and that every mare is the mother of every foal. Every mare is raised to auto-respond to maternal terms, no matter which foal utters it, who birthed the speaking foal, or even the fact that they may never have birthed a foal themselves. In a herd of over twenty thousand mares and over seven thousand foals there are always about ten hundred mares and fillies dreamt of as the best to mate with. A record is kept of the parents and offspring for each mare, although the father's status rarely is necessary, it too is included.The unseen fathers pay for their foal to be carried for nine months, and the money goes to either the mare's brothers, her uncles if she has none, or is saved in a bank for her first male offspring in the event the two former do not exist. Any unclaimed payment is used to see to the mare's comfort once she reaches an age. Gazleene feels the warm breath of her buyer on her neck, and shivers delicately. The stallion smells familiar, and the way he walks is familiar as well, but as hard as she tries, Gazleene cannot picture this almost familiar stallion in her mind's eye. "Gazleene, I presume?", asks the stallion in the husky, throaty voice she had heard described but never heard with her own ears before.She swallows a lump in her throat as she prepares to make the ancient response to the High Class Naming by their mating stallion. A warm muzzle nibbles her throat lightly, encouraging her to speak. "Yes, my Liege, 'tis my given name. But, I prefer to be called Leene...my Liege." She adds in a reckless rush. She mentally hung her head. Now came the part where she was rejected for not answering properly the ancient and sacred ritual. To her surprise, the response was not the one she had been dreading. "How well do I know that fact, my naughty, disobedient filly" came the low, husky, half laughing response. The familiar response, the tone of voice, everything was familiar, yet, try as she might, she could not bring him to her mind's eye.

The mating took place shortly after the exchange of words. Without quite knowing why, Gazleene memorized every feeling, every touch, every sound, and treasured them thru the months that were to come. The next nine months she would spend in luxurious seclusion, where she could not possibly risk any injury to her or the foal she carried. The cavern was huge, the walls a pearlescent shiny white, the furs soft, supple and deep, the food rich and nutritious, but inevitably, she was completely and utterly, alone.