The corrals are a terrible place full of depression and suppression. Where wild horses are strapped up, caged in and told to deal with it. But wild animals do not deal, they do not disintegrate for something as weak as a man, it really is laughable.

At first.

But then, the food stops coming, and you, an animal of winds and plains and lakes, are barred inside a stall you can't even turn around in for weeks on end.

In order to deal, first the wild horses must dismantle their own selves.

And that is why it is called 'breaking them'.

There is no concerned man to hand you cold melon to ease the pain as you get used to the feel of the bit again. There is no gentle eyed farmer who puts the saddle on loose and for only a moment at a time, tightening it a notch per day and staying it for a minute more.

There is no compassion; it is just strap and whack. God, she had no problem with the tack when it was Satan, she trusted that man, but when its these horse breakers, she just wants with every fibre to reject it all.

Her heart aches for the herd, her herd. How they would run through the rain after her, full of trust, time would cease in those brilliant moments. The whole world grinding to a halt around her, you know those moments? In the rain, a whole herd of powerful mustang's breathing hot, fanning fire down your back, where its feels like your steps are striking gold with every rhythmic pound.

She doesn't expect you to.

In the stinkin' dust baths of the corrals, she learned for the first time how to read a human's signals. Sure she could ride with Satan, but he communicated differently. When they reached a fork in the road, he would shift his weight, anticipating her to turn, and she would read that and respond.

But all this other stuff, she never knew beyond instinctive understanding. Yanking on just one side of your mouth meant to go that side, a whip to the ribs instead of the rump was a spur to go faster instead of punishment, when a rider wraps their legs tight around you and pulls the reigns taunt, that is the cue to gallop like your mother was two seconds off going down rapids to her death, but you were still two miles away.

She liked learning; it invigorated her, the puzzle solving she had to do, completing her drills weeks before the others learned what the humans were trying to get at. She loved working the saddle, instead of the wagon.

But being a lead mare was more challenging still...

Yet, the human's still saw her as a hefty big beast only, a perfect draft horse. And it's not like there is anything wrong or unpleasant about the job, it's just that, she is one of those horses that lives for the wind in the mane and the pounding down the paths.

The wars.

The hunts.

Fighting, leading, charging...

Of course, she already knew all there was to carriage work, so within the month she was deemed ready for sale. At the first hint of sun on the first Friday of the month, she was saddled up and ridden for a horse market. Three other horses were being sold like her, but they had been tethered to a cart and were walking all the way there, from the very wild edge where the corrals were all the way into New York.

She was ridden in front of them at an economical canter. The man riding abreast her back must be in charge of organising the accommodation and spots in the monthly horse markets, for him to be pushing her to ride and get their nearly half a day earlier.

Sometimes she wonders why she doesn't try to escape, and its meet with the assured knowledge that human's always- always- slip up. She had better chance with a new buyer than the horse breakers. Those men don't run like normal ranchers, its a prisoner, its a torture asylum, they are caging and breaking wild horses. They are running a very tight ship, and she knows that the smartest thing to do is get yourself out as soon as possible before you even entertain ideas such as rejoining a beloved herd.

Trotting through the gates into New York, she knew there was no way that she would be able to stand the inner city. Not after so long away. She was freaking out already, chomping and dancing her back legs around at the thought of the cobbled roads, screaming children, tight buildings, people everywhere and you not knowing what to do or where to go. Concrete scrapping your steel shoes with frustrating pain.

Luckily her rider knew this; after all, one does not take a freshly turned mustang into a rattling, spewing, hustling hive. So they kept to the edge, where there is still grass and trees and goats that need to be sidestepped. The horse market was in the North-East of New York, within view of a windmill and the tall masts of the harboured ships.

The man slide off and did confusing, human things, registrations and cards and money. He took her to a long rail and tied her up securely before shedding off her tack and with a jam jar full of white lumpy paint, drew a number onto her dusty brown side.

It was not until he left her, and the day shed into night, and the long, long rails of the huge farming area were filled with other horses in equal predicaments did she realise that, like the ships in the harbour, she too was roped and in her docks, awaiting to sail out. She was barcoded and all.

Dozens of young boys descended upon the full but still filling lines of horses. Promised a dime if they worked for the two days the large market ran for. They watered her and oiled her hooves, brushed her coat shiny and scratched the grit from the corners of her eyes. They touched up her number and put shoe polish on her nose and along the powerful arch of her back to make her look better.

Then the buyers come. God, do they annoy worse than biting flies! Yanking their fingers into her mouth to see how old she was, because while the man will lie and say she was a sprightly two, the teeth always say truth and reveal her grand total of five.

And they check her hooves and legs for wear, her back for sways and face for disease. All in all, she notices quite a lot jotting down her number, making sure they take an interest in this 'two hundred and nineteen' tomorrow.

When the auctioning begins.

The slamming of the hammer and clapping of the crowd started at seven 'o'clock that morning. It is in three hours' time that the call comes for horses two hundred to two hundred and twenty to start being prepared. They leap into action, not the shoe polish boys of yesterday, but the men from the corrals, back at her side, smoothing and shining and feeding a nice bag of oats to keep her in a good mood.

For the difference between fifteen and fifty is just in how many rich buyers' eyes she catches.

And soon, two hundred and eighteen is sold for fourth three coins and is walked out the ring, now owned by the Patriot army, who has people on their behalf in the crowd purchasing platoons of horses for their long drop, sharp stop cause.

At last, the man in the ring comes for her lead and takes her from the hands of the corral men. She swipes her tail as she passes one and manages to get him in the eye; she is more than thankful to be out of their mangy care. They should be charged for theft, she had an owner- she had just been between places really…taking a break…

That's when it hit here. When she escapes, will she be running for Satan or for her herd?

She is lead around the saw dust ring, the auctioneer starting to ramble off.

Satan was the whole reason she was in this mess, she was devoted to him for a reason unknown to even herself. But that had been over a year ago.

A few white cards are flashed.

The herd, they had grown large and strong, brave and just like the mustang's of legend under her care. They would have learnt from her too, they certainly watched her closely enough.

A slam of a hammer.

Satan forgets her, Satan doesn't need her like the herd does...did...

A polite but tired clap and she is lead off.

What does she want? She was raised on the frontier, she realised long ago that she was not the true leader of the herd, just filling in for the right mare to grow into the role. The quick witted white mare would be the one that successes her, and she had no problems with that. At least she was an actual mustang, not some saddled up pet.

What is she? Who is she? What does she want?

She does not know who brought her, but it was for nine.

After all, no amount of polish can hide the bullet hole scars along her left side and the deeper one, because it was at point blank, on her right back thigh. No feather duster can camouflage the years worth of maiming on her back from where infections had crept under her saddle and settled into the burns and tearing underneath it.

She was, all in all, a perfect picture.

Of a destroyed beast.