Upon a polished round cherry wood base rears rampant a complex figurine of a horse. The horse’s body is a mixed mass of sandstone and jade somehow worked together in a brindle grullo pattern that was then inlaid with a scrimshaw blaze on the horse’s forehead and a solid gold stocking on each slender, perfectly proportioned leg. Each sharp, detail-perfect hoof is stamped in steel. Improbably, the statuette’s mane and tail are both silky faux-hair, a delight to the touch. The figurine is always warm to the touch, and the horse’s pearl eyes seem to follow movement as if the statuette is alive.
Carved into the wooden base is a single word. Kalaj’malana. A name? A spell? Whatever it is, when it is spoken aloud and a thumb run over the time-worn carving, the horse figurine leaves the base and becomes a full-sized mare, tall and broad and proud, strong and elegant as far as her bones are concerned, but her coloration remains… She makes another attempt at that brindle grullo, but the gold stockings remain made of gold, many of her stripes and patterns are outlined in stone and gemstone, and the pearl eyes still betray her as a Sumine.
Sumine or not, Kalaj is strong and she is true, although the combination of personality traits she has inherited from her array of building materials has resulted in something of an interesting creature. The body components of sandstone and jade seem to create a stubborn, willful creature who is nonetheless personable and good fortune to have around. The scrimshaw elements to her seem to give her a certain balanced animal wisdom and perceptivity, as well as the occasional morbid fascination with dead things. She stares at them, as if that will help her understand some higher thing the rest of us will not. Kalaj is also a proud creature, regal, unafraid, and yet the steel in her hooves seems to lend her more of a soldier’s comfort with hierarchy. Thankfully the influence of her eternally-silky mane and tail is merely an aptitude for multitasking, as far as paying attention to goings-on and her master simultaneously, and her pearl eyes...are possibly the offset that keep her plush bits from creating an attention deficit, for that matter, as Kalaj is fully capable of standing still and observing, scrimshaw compounding pearl to make her a fearsomely perceptive and insightful creature, particularly for one that lacks the sapience to speak or act independently.
