What is ‘home’ to you? Where do you go when the adventure is done, and who is there with you? Are you a surface-dweller, or have you adapted completely to the dungeons?

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Hillcrest can’t remember their parents faces.

No matter how hard they might try, the Coursers’ muzzles are completely blurred, to the point the piebald can’t even tell apart their coat colours apart. They’re like ghosts of their past, haunting him in his deepest nightmares, or whenever they can’t find themselves falling asleep deep into the night.

They feel the choking scent of smoke and sound of rocks falling, crashing. It wakes them up from their slumber, makes cold sweat dampen their mane. The nightmare makes their breathing quicken, and Hillcrest doesn’t feel like it’s only a nightmare anymore, the deeply buried memories crawling back up onto the surface, like a Courser coming back from the dungeon.

They look to their side, where in a small distance Cithis sleeps peacefully.

Hillcrest was alone for as long as they could remember.

They watch how Cithis’ sides raise and fall whenever she takes calm breaths in during her slumber, how her body twitches from time to time – she doesn’t have nightmares, and as much as they could tell, her dreams used to be rather pleasant. Hillcrest could be sure that right now, she was sweetly dreaming about slaying huge dragons with only a flick of her hoof. A soft snort of laughter leaves their nostrils.

The piebald Courser quietly stands up from their resting spot and walk outside – the small village is mostly quiet this late into the night, their more or less known to them companions already having decided to head in for the night. When they didn’t have a family, this village was everything that Hillcrest had after their parents departed.

They knew what must have happened. Whenever they think about their parents, the disgusting scent of smoke and crimson intertwined together, like a snake choking its prey to devour them right after. Hillcrest knows, yet keeps the thought locked away, maybe they had already come to term with what happened.

Or maybe they never did.

Hillcrest takes a deep breath of the cold, outside air. A walk would help, but even now the Courser kept looking back at the village, at the window where Cithis’ lamp burned, keeping their home illuminated.

Home.

They can’t be sure whether they ever felt at home. Most of their young life they got by, they got by themselves. They descended into the dungeons, came back up to the surface with loot and traded with nearby merchants, but never stayed for longer, always travelling, always gazing up at the starry sky.

But now, when Hillcrest gazes up at the sky, they can see there’s one more star, shining the brightest along the dark blue velvet spread over the sky.

A small star, that currently was soundly sleeping in their shared home.

Hillcrest learned what home was.

They can still remember the feisty – or what they first called her, spicy – foal, that through rain, storms, mud or heat, would descend day after day into the dungeon. She’d come back with cuts, messy mane that had bits of slime entangled in it, half of her tail bit off…

“Ya goin’ to the dungeon, too?” the little Courser would then call out to Hillcrest in a chirpy tone, their deep brown eyes innocently staring into their own hazel ones.

Hillcrest never had siblings, never had a closer friend, that they would consider one. But in that moment, something clicked in their heart.

From then on, the piebald Courser would continue to descend into the dungeon with the foal – as she introduced herself as Cithis – at first, just to keep her company and keep her out of trouble… to learn more about her.

“Oh, I’m an orphan!” she cheerfully announced one day, when Hillcrest asked about her parents. Dumbfounded, they would then blink a few times, narrowing their eyes.

She was like them.

Although Cithis was definitely way more happy and enthusiastic than they were, and it seemed her muzzle was always adorned with a wide smile. Whenever she’d get cut, bruised, she never cried, instead bursting out in laughter and saying that it was the dungeon’s way of toughening her up.

“The dungeon is our home!” she’d sing.

If the dungeon is the Coursers’ home, why did it smell so much of smoke and THEIR blood?

It took quite some time before dungeons once again were fun for Hillcrest, and not just a place of past trauma and a way of getting rich to survive on the surface. The dungeon didn’t smell of bad things anymore, well, it mostly smelled of Cithis’ burnt ends of her mane, whenever she held her primitive – made by herself! – torch, holding it a little bit too close to her hair again, and there was no more uncomfortable ringing in Hillcrest’s ears, replaced by the grullo’s joyous laughter.

That one day, Hillcrest laughed again for the first time in many, many days.

That day was also the day they extended their invitation to the young foal.

“Come with me.” Hillcrest said, their voice calm and collected, although thinly laced with a crumb of nervousness’s. “I’ll show you what home is.”

Since then, Hillcrest couldn’t remember what loneliness was.

Cithis got to know the village, her new home, her new friends. Jumping around, she took every chance to be helpful around the area; collecting crops, learning to read scrolls, promising to be more careful in the dungeons from now on… Neither hers or Hillcrest’s dives into the dungeon were lonely since then – Cithis showed them all the tricks around the dungeon, her experience with checking out traps and disabling them, while Hillcrest taught her about the more philosophical aspects of the debris of the Ruined Kingdom, collecting scrolls for her to learn from, to know her past and how their predecessors explored the various caves of the dungeon or even what animals, as well various creatures resided there.

She gained everything, and so did Hillcrest. It wasn’t spoken out loud, but calling each other siblings came naturally. As naturally, as the calling of the Ruined Kingdom in every Courser’s heart.

That day, two starts lightened up on the starry sky.

“Mmm, ya were out again, I knew it.” Cithis’ voice greeted Hillcrest as soon as they came back home, and a small smile graced their muzzle.

“Sorry… Had to catch a bit of fresh air. You know how it is at my old age.” Hillcrest hummed jokingly at the end, coming back to their resting spot. They weren’t that much older than Cithis herself… but with how much they nagged her and worried about her, it won’t be long before they get first gray hairs in their mane.

They glanced at Cithis one last time, as the younger Courser fell asleep again easily, letting out a last neigh of amusement, undisturbed by Hillcrest’s movement when they walked back in into the room after their time outside in the middle of the night. They remember the first time she fell asleep in her new home – she was so excited, so full of life the whole day and she swore she wouldn’t fall asleep the very first second she lays down… and she was out like a light immediately, soft snores leaving her mouth as it laid open mid-word that she never got out before falling asleep.

Hillcrest, too, finally had a home of their own.