In Contrast

I hate you dA Decided to delete my artists comments when I clicked the 'Submit to deviantart' button

Anyway, this is the second of my halter entries for *TackRack's HS Young Horse Autumn Event. It's BH Lost and Lovedrunk (aka Lolly) being handled by Emily Collins and doing remarkably well for how near to water she is...

I wanted to do something very different to the kind of thing I usually do here, hence the big contrasts and the backlighting. I wanted it to feel painterly, and hopefully it does

Story is pretty short and not that great, but hey
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They were on late in the day, and Lolly was nervous. It was the sea, Emily knew it - they were so close to the sea. The filly was better with water than she had been even a few weeks ago, but still, the huge expanse of water nearby was making the young sport horse extremely nervy. Her ears were flicking all over the shop, and she wasn't her usual friendly self with the other young horses nearby. Even Stella, her pasture-mate and general partner in crime, was getting a cold shoulder - if a slightly frantic cold shoulder that involved shying when a leaf fell from a nearby tree.

Jemima and Stella had been lucky though - they'd had an early slot. Jemima had an early slot in the Gambler's Choice, too. Emily and Lolly were pretty much last in show today and the slight girl hated it. Even if she hadn't been leading a nervous horse in her very first show, she would much rather have gone first and got it all out of the way. It wasn't even as if there were points on the board for her to compare Lolly's chance against - just the judges, watching, raising their eyebrows sometimes, smiling other times, writing notes down on the clipboards, maybe tutting, maybe chatting with each other but all in all being far too intimidating for the shy girl and her spooky filly to approach.

It was with a sick feeling in her stomach that Emily watched the young horse before them being run up and down that sea-side track. A couple of the babies had bucked or spooked at something, but she had no idea what Lolly would do when she was only a few feet away from the sea. The filly might not go completely insane in the rain now, but she still generally bolted for shelter, and she had pretty seriously injured Aaron the last time he'd been walking past her with a turned on hose.

"Lost and Lovedrunk?"

Emily's stomach twisted painfully, but she looked up and smiled as best she could at the judge who'd called Lolly's show name.

"If you could walk her first please."

If other people had butterflies, Emily felt sure she was having wasps.