The Horses of the Chronicles

My books - that is, the entity that is Rhiannon Kolareny and just about everyone surrounding her - got their start from roleplaying. This is common knowledge with most of those people who know a lot about the story. Some of those people were even the first to meet Rhia and those surrounding her. What isn't common knowledge is that I didn't start roleplaying with Rhia. In fact, I didn't start with people, period. When I was ten, I discovered a number of chat rooms dedicated to roleplaying as horses. The first name I can remember ever making up for a character is Majik, and he was a big black brute of a Fresian.
In recent reminiscing back on my roots, I remembered something that surprised me. During one of the roleplaying sessions, I revealed that my character - it may or may not have been Majik, that I'm not sure of - had a special bond with a woman who lived in an isolated house a short way from the grazing grounds. For a brief time, the mental image of which is still branded - however blurry - in my mind, a certain young lady made her first appearance in the roleplaying world. Rhia was born that day. At least, the name attatched to a face. Kolareny had yet to be created in my mind, and nothing about who Rhia was had yet to be formed. That came a short while later.
I, somehow, stumbled upon a rp message board - I'm partially sure that I found the link being advertised in a chat. It was there that the name Rhiannon Kolareny came to be. A certain horse made a reappearance, as well, though with a secret in store. Rhia rode into town on Majik, and after meeting a young man named Famij, I revealed that Majik's true form was a dark-skinned, fair-haired, cross young man named Kalvin (Yes, believe it or not, when he first got started, Kalvin was a rather nasty, mean fellow, and that's actually how he is in the books until he meets Jason). Throughout my time on that rpmb, I revealed - not only to Famij's player, but also to myself - a great deal of Rhia's history, how Kalvin got his start, and I also introduced Jason, Lemain, and, most importantly, Tobias. One of Rhia's soon-to-be most famous mentor, Ashira, is also introduced in this rp. I'm sure there are other things, but this was not actually why I began this post, as the title indicates.
This post is about the various horses of the Kolareny Chronicles, those equine companions who become very close to the characters - or, as in the case of Majik, are the characters. Thanks to getting my roleplaying start with horses, it's very difficult for me to think of a character's horse as a prop, and not another character. It's even more difficult for me to think of them as just animals because I've spent a great deal of my life around them. I know for myself that each horse has a personality, and many of them can be very clever, sly, and often times disobedient. But, too, if you've bonded to one, they will save your life, even if it puts their own in danger.
My own respect for these creatures is passed on to my characters, Seth especially. It is true that Rhia is very often seen riding a horse, and she quite often seems to have a deep connection with those horses, however those horses tend not to be horses at all, but rather a person in the shape of a horses - again as in the case of Majik.
Majik was Kalvin.
Zaph (from the Drow word for horse, zaphodiop) was Mirshann (for those of you who haven't gotten used to the name changes, that's Romeo or Guardian. Again, mirshann is the Drow word for angel). Zaph, too, took the shape of a black draft horse, though he was much larger than Majik, who was a Fresian. Zaph was more the size and build of a Clydesdale, not quite as bulky as a Shire.
Then there was Liam. His story is faint in my mind, though a clipping from it is somewhere here on the site. Liam was a boy prince who saved Rhia when she was still young from a trecherous river. He pledged himself to protecting her, and for that was given eternal life and the ability to transform into a horse. The catch was that he must always be at Rhia's side. Should he travel too far from her, he cannot maintain his human form, and his life becomes vulnerable to death by injury. I've yet to decipher the cause of his transformation, or when he disappears from the forefront. He'll also have a different name as a horse - what type of horse, too, is something I haven't decided. He'll most likely be black, to support a myth that will exist within the stories about the "Typhoon".
Rhia, too, had her own horse form. She trained under a shapeshifter, and mastered - that is, became comfortable with - three basic forms, those being a horse, a hawk, and a fox. Her red eyes, one of her most striking features, plays a part in those three forms, which are all red, or red-ish. Her hawk form is a red-tailed hawk, and the fox, of course, is a red fox. Her horse form, which I've just now given the name Thiph (pronounced thief, a joining of the Drow words thir'ku for change and zaphodiop), is an Andalusian, with a hint of strawberry roan - that is, her face, feet, mane, and tail have red hairs mixed in with the gray that's throughout. (On that note, Kalvin shares her ability to shapeshift, and that's where Majik came from. He can also change into a raven, and a black wolf.)
Back to Seth. He spends a great deal of his life seperated from Rhia, especially while he's young. During those times when Rhia is trying to protect him by leaving him somewhere safe, Seth lived his own life. Much of that included getting into trouble, and almost none of it involved making friends. At least, not with humans. Horses, however, found a special place in his heart. They didn't talk, or scold him when he did something wrong, or freak out every time he used a little magick. They loved without question, and asked for little in return outside of a little food and freedom to run.
There are only two of his companions that I've defined through rping thus far. There's Jack, a great big dapple gray war horse with an eye for the ladies and a nose for getting Seth into embarassing situations with said ladies. And then there's Claire, a tall horse, equivelant of a Tennessee Walker in build, a darkly coloured strawberry roan. Her edges (as explained on Thiph) are a deep red, and the rest of her is a lighter pink. That's right, girls. Seth rides a pink horse. She's actually quite pretty, and Seth's madly in love with the sweetheart.