This was originally written as an entry for the Worldbuilding Alliance's January writing context, but I missed the deadline and never finished it. I got all this down on the plane from Stockholm to Manchester. Gotta love those long dull flights...

A fire burned dull in its pit, the sky above it filled with swarming, swirling embers that carried the sent of arama root roasting over the gently glowing wood. Darkness stretched away in every direction, overwatched by the bright half moon that filled the land with black, stretching shadows against the dark ground, leaving only a tiny circle of light around the fire. The light was enough that Sonwabile could see the fire, the stick beneath his hooves and the hooves of his cousin Lubabalo to the right, but little more.

He poked at the fire, raising a fresh stream of embers and momentarily raising the light around. Two more Zebra sat across from him, both watching the fire with complacent eyes, as they had done every night on this journey into the wilderness. This soul journey.

The larger of the two stirred and tilted his head and gestured at the rowning roots. "Be careful with the flame, Sonwabile. They will burn if you rush them."

"They burn all they want anyway," the other Zebra replied from the shadow. he leaned forward in the light, a wizened face leering at Sonwabile, made hideous by the flickering orange light. "You worry too much Mkhokeli. You see danger in everything."

"Is it not my chosen course, Sidima? Did not my journey bring me that responsibility with my name?"

"Your journey? Hah." Sidima kicked at the loose soil before the fire, scattering it into the flames with a loud hiss. "Your path is chosen by your spirit. The journey simply shows you what your heart already knows."

"That I was a leader."

"That you were a worrying mare, Mkhokeli! I remember your birth name, Thukile. Your dam held you to the sky when you were born and said you beheld the world with the shock of one who would never be at peace until he had ordered every last grain of sand. So Thukile you were, and Thukile you are!"

The old stallion laughed and kicked the dirt again, to Mkhokeli's disgust. He snorted and tugged at a water skin around his neck. "You scatter dirt on our food, old one."

"Like I said. Besides, it adds flavour. Doesn't it, Sonwabile?"

The colt glanced at his cousin and then Mkhokeli. He shrugged. "I have no idea. Dirt was not something I ever chose to eat."

"You'll eat plenty of it by the time you're my age, young colt. Dirt is good. It's healthy!" He kicked at the dirt a third time, scattering it far and wide and laughed raucously. "Dirt. Heh."

"The soil is our life," Lwazi said quietly. "It is not seemly to disrespect it so."

"Hah! Hark at him, so soon after his tribe mark appears and he's already setting himself up as the keeper. Lwazi, your name was well chosen. You should keep it."

Lwazi shifted uncomfortably, though his face didn't show it. He looked away toward the dark horizon and refused to meet Sidima's eyes. "I would be a warrior, as are my uncles and my sister."

"Would you now? Then still you are well-named, if you know what you are to be so easily. What else do you know? Tell us a story boy, while we wait for these roots to burn and ruin in the fire." Sidima nudged Mkhokeli and nodded at the flames. "You can keep watch if you like."

Mkhokeli raised his chin and deliberately looked away from the flame, prompting another gurgling laugh from Sidima. The old stallion stomped the ground and laughed again as Mkhokeli closed his eyes.

"Old one, you should set a better example."

"Why should I? They're not going to be my herdcolts! If anything they'll be yours, oh leader of the clans, which means it's my duty to ruin them completely before they become as stuffy and uptight as you." He laughed again, nudging the younger stallion in his side and casting exaggerated, knowing looks at the two cousins. When Mkhokeli refused to rise to his bait Sidima sighed, shaking his head, and shuffled toward the fire. "Tell us your story, Lwazi."

"I- I don't know which-"

"How about the story of Savuri and the bull?"

"Oh you would like that one, you dirty old goat," Mkhokeli shot back. Sidima laughed again, rocking back on his haunches. Lwazi blushed and looked away. The story wasn't as lewd as he seemed to think, but perhaps he was just embarrassed for not knowing it. Or perhaps he'd heard a version Sonwabile hadn't.

"You want a story to tell," Sidima said quietly, "you could always tell the one about the Celestian and the Zebra."

"That's no story! That's your dirty lust after that foreign Star-witch!"

More laughter rolled about the fire as they remembered the tale Sidima had spun about a pony he'd met in his youth. The "Star-witch" with her two stone-like hooves that could crush a stallion's life from his body, and the Halflight One, with the tongue like a scorpion's tail and eyes like the sky. As Sidima told it, he'd seduced the Celestians the first day they had arrived and several times thereafter, earning their undying love and gratitude, for Celestians were said to be never satisfied by their mates. But as Mkhokeli described it later, Sidima had followed the pair like a starving jackal and suffered the lash of their tongue more than any others of the tribe.

Sonwabile poked at the fire again, careful to avoid raising another round of embers. "What about the story of Madoda?"

Sidima rocked back again and grinned. He contemplated Lwazi for a moment, eyes roving over the reluctant colt's face. "Yes, what about it? Any knower or priest worth his feed sould know the story of Madoda."

"I told you, old goat, I am to be a warrior, like-"

"Yes yes," Sidima said, waving his hoof. "Just tell the story. And make it good, I've not heard this one told well for years."

Lwazi huffed and sighed. "Very well. Madoda."

"Don't leave out the part with the-" A glance from Lwani cut off Sidima's demand. He chuckled and bowed his head.

"Madoda," Lwani repeated, as the fire cast its embers to the sky once again. He looked up to the stars and took a breath.

* * *

At the beginning of all things, the plains were empty and nothing grew, except the old Baobab in the middle of a great empty valley.

[ and then some shit happened and the world was made ]

* * *

"Well?"

Lwani looked around the fire. His face was a little flushed and his eyes seemed to be watering, but he had a triumphant grin in his face. He shared it with Sonwabile and then looked at Mkhokeli for the elder's approval. The Stallion nodded stiffly and cast an uncomfortable glance to his side.

"It was good. Well spoken."

Lwani smiled again. "My thanks. Perhaps I-"

A snore interrupted him. All three looked to Mkhokeli's side, where Sidima rocked gently on his haunches, his head nodding to a rhythm all of its own as his body fought the urge to fall forward. It lost. Slowly, almost magically, Sidima slid forward until he flopped to the ground, raising a cloud of dust. He snored again.

"Old goat," Mkhokeli grunted, but he was smiling again.

Sonwabile couldn't help chuckling at the sight either, until a peculiar sent reached his nose. It seemed to reach Mkhokeli's at the same time; his eyes darted to the fire just as Sonwabile yanked away the spited roots. The colt held the spit up and sighed.

"I told you," Mkhokeli said. And the he laughed and tugged one of the roots free with his teeth.