Calder

You were almost taken by a kelpie as a child. The event still haunts you even now. You had been playing by the river close to your family's farm when a beautiful gray horse suddenly rose from the water in front of you. Naïve child you were, you reached out to touch it. Your hand stuck to its hide, and it dove back down into the water, taking you with it. You don't recall much of what happened after. You remember clinging to the horse, crying as water rushed into your mouth and nose, and you remember begging–or trying to beg—it to let you go. And you remember suddenly being able to pull your hand away, the sensation of being pushed upwards, and then your head breaching the water's surface. How you managed to run back home, you've supressed. All you know is that you pushed the door to your father's study open, dripping wet, hyperventilating, and crying more than you had ever cried before. Once you were able to speak coherently, your father knew exactly what had happened. He set out with a silver loaded rifle but could not lure the kelpie back out. After that event, you were left with a debilitating fear of the water. Your father fenced off the area of the river closest to the farm and forbade you from approaching it again, not that you had any intention of ever doing so. For years afterwards, each time you would pass the river to go to the stables you would get the feeling that something was... watching you. Now, years later, your father has brought home a new horse. A beautiful gray male. He claims he found it wandering the road. You can't help but feel it looks familiar somehow. A week later, you notice it. Beneath the feathering on the horse' legs, its hooves are reversed. You don't know how your father hasn't noticed it and you don't know why the kelpie has come here. But tonight, as you enter the stables with your father's rifle in hand, silver bullet in the chamber, you're sure of one thing. You will have driven it out, one way or another, come morning.