PISCES





The Voracious Kelpie

What you see before you is at the first glance an anthro stallion of an estimated height of seven feet tall. His hide appears to be, for the greater part, a dark grey with patches of lighter and darker dapples concentrated about his shoulders, hips, along his spine, and partially visible on his flanks when his garment shifts about.

Now, going back up to the top, a closer look shows the expected, long and softly coated ears of any horse, the edges and tips dark from the hide beneath his horse-hair. They flick about and give more away about where his attention lies than any other source to be seen. Going down from there you'd come upon the beginnings of his mane, a light green and grey set of hairs that seem to waver at times even when there is no breeze to be felt. Continuing down one finds one of his more unusual features, his eyes, seemingly too large at first but it's not the size that is off at all. Twin orbs of pure aqua make up his eyes, no pupil nor the slightest bit of white. Occasionally he'll blink, sometimes with a second set of eyelids, a nictitating membrane like a crocodile possesses. His muzzle shows up as a darker color right along it's bridge but towards the nose it again lightens to a softer grey. The nostrils show as wide, darker circles, breathing in the scents around him and the lips are almost white furred with black skin at the point of demarcation. It's here that his smile can be seen to contrast with the darker flesh, two white fangs always protruding from his lips about an inch and if those lips peel back a row of sharp teeth of normal length also can be seen. A thick, broad, pink tongue slides over one fang now and again, like as in this very moment.

Down now along the graceful and simultaneously powerful neck there is the mixed grey, much like a thick fog at night or a cloud in the sky during a storm and then over his dappled shoulders, lithe but sturdy, sometimes tilted at an angle from whichever way he stands or sways, sinuous motions as much a part of him as any. The stallion's chest has some amount of definition but not terribly much, more of a swimmer's build as proves fitting. His arms are not terribly thick but tightly corded in their own right as he moves them one way or another. Five fingered hands with fingers finer than those found on a draft horse are capped with greenish hoof-like tips. His stomach now has the beginnings of lines for his abs but they are occluded with a layer of padding, just enough to mask how much tone is underneath to his belly, but it does not expand to his sides or make him seem wider.

Now at the waist there is a curious bit of clothing, it seems fashioned by hand from reeds and plants, woven and lashed together to provide a loin cloth that covers down to his middle thigh in both front and back. A long greenish-grey tail is freely able to swish and flick in the back, though sometimes the hairs manage to curl about his own leg or around some nearby object in self-twined groups. His rump, despite being jacketed by the overlapping fronds and blades of vegetation, has a round and full shape, muscle and again the small layer of fat filling out the curves pleasantly. His legs are the standard for any equine, strong, muscled and ending in hard hooves. The only abnormality here would be the coloration, once again green as a rock long left in a gentle stream.

Origin of the Kelpie

Kelpie, or water kelpie, is a shape-shifting water spirit inhabiting the lochs and pools of Scotland. It is a Celtic legend; however, analogues exist in other cultures. It is usually described as a black horselike creature, able to adopt human form. Some accounts state that the kelpie retains its hooves when appearing as a human, leading to its association with the Christian idea of Satan as alluded to by Robert Burns in his 1786 poem "Address to the Devil".

Almost every sizeable body of water in Scotland has an associated kelpie story, but the most extensively reported is that of Loch Ness. Parallels to the general Germanic neck or nixie and the Scandinavian bäckahäst have been observed. More widely, the wihwin of Central America and the Australian bunyip have been seen as counterparts. The origin of the belief in malevolent water horses has been proposed as originating in human sacrifices once made to appease gods associated with water, but narratives about the kelpie also served a practical purpose in keeping children away from dangerous stretches of water, and warning young women to be wary of handsome strangers.

Kelpies have been portrayed in their various forms in art and literature, including recently as two 30-metre-high (100 ft) steel sculptures in Falkirk, The Kelpies, completed in October 2013.