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Rabia Gale

alchemical fantasy

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of kelpies and killer unicorns

of kelpies and killer unicorns

On Twitter, Thea van Diepen and I had a long conversation about fantasy & supernatural races.

And I realized something.

I’m all about vicious equine races (shh, don’t tell my daughter). Killer unicorns. Kelpies. Nightmares that are shadowy horse shapes of terror. Innocent-looking horses that suddenly bare their very sharp, very canine teeth.

I love Maggie Stiefvater’s The Scorpio Races. When I came across Diana Peterfreund’s Rampant, my reaction was, “Gimme!”

My own version of a kelpie is a way horse. Lives on a far-future Earth with a dying, cooling sun. In roads. Smells like tar and fresh asphalt and burning–all those lovely smells that assault your nose as you’re driving past a construction zone on the highway with the windows down. When they materialize out of the highway, crumbs of rock are tangled in their manes. Their hides are hot and sticky.

Like water horses, way horses will drag people down into their element. That’s bad news, because we can’t live in road anymore than we can live in water.

Are you familiar with Dragonflight? There’s a scene in which F’lar is teaching Lessa and Ramoth to go between. He talks about the important of visualization and about finding a young rider and dragon entombed in rock from a fatal, long-ago accident. Yeah, way horses will take you down into their murky, gooey subterranean worlds. As long as you’re holding on, you’ll be all right, thanks to their inter-dimensional magic.

But then they leave you. In rock. Not pretty.*shudders* Have I mentioned that being buried alive is one of my big fears? Now you know.

Sometimes, when you’re driving, you see a patch of road shimmer ahead of you. It’s hot, so you think it’s a heat mirage. Or it’s been raining, so you think it’s slick, wet patch.

Nope. That’s the sign of a way horse, swimming just below the surface.

Filed Under: creativity, inspiration, worldbuilding

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Liana Mir says

    September 21, 2015 at 8:47 am

    I love this sooo much.

    Reply
    • Rabia says

      September 21, 2015 at 9:03 am

      Thank you!

      I admit that talking about them has made me even more excited about way horses. Now I’m imagining the way they sound, squealing like tires on roads and rumbling like a rocks under wheels on a dirt road.

      Reply
      • Liana Mir says

        September 21, 2015 at 7:07 pm

        Oooh. Fun. :grins:

        I totally forgot the main reason I love LJ. Comment reply notifications. If I ever forget to check for a reply, I forgot. That’s all.

        Reply
        • Rabia says

          September 21, 2015 at 7:10 pm

          πŸ™‚ It has it’s good points for sure. πŸ™‚

          Reply
  2. miquela says

    September 21, 2015 at 12:49 pm

    Google has failed me. I have perhaps seen way horses here in Egypt! I would have loved to share a photo with you, but I can’t find one. If I take my camera next time we go out…

    Reply
    • Rabia says

      September 21, 2015 at 1:13 pm

      I’d be ecstatic if you captured a glimpse of a way horse in the wild on camera!

      Reply
      • Rabia says

        September 21, 2015 at 7:11 pm

        LOL. That sentence has a lot of prepositional phrases!

        Reply

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