1. Horses make travel easier
2. Horses are paladins
A good aligned horse can sniff out evil, and laying a hand on its nose will heal you, cure you of disease.
An evil aligned horse can judge the just, and harm those who try to tame it.
A strong horse projects an aura of courage to those around it, giving them the ability to face the most terrifying of foes.
The divining eyes of a horse can guide a lost soul to safety, or a brave man to the mouth of the dragon's lair.
All animals are strange and powerful In the Giant's Eye. Creatures from a place before time. Before the sun.
Horses were always guides and protectors, allying with dogs against the wolves of the waste. Never trusting the cats and their assassin smiles. When the elves came from the woods, it was horses that trusted them first. Some believe this is why most Half-Elves are paladins.
When the humans came from the vents in the ocean, horses stayed away and it wasn't until the dogs bonded with the humans that horses allowed riders and tamers and all that has come since that time.
There are special horses too. Ones that are hidden and must be found. Ones that require drastic means to tame. But even these are paladins at their core...just ones with varying abilities and powers.
The Nox Equorum - They can only appear at night, and must be summoned. When riding, you are hidden by magical Darkness. Any Light-based spell cast at least 5th level will force the Nox Equis to be returned to the Plane of Shadow. To find Nox Equorum, you must remain in a lightless place until it appears and you can see its eyes among the black.
Platinumare - A statuesque horse made of reflective silver metal. It has no head, only a gaping, snapping neck. To dream of it brings misfortune in the form of dire financial depletion. Its true form can devour any object it can pull into its gaping neck. To tame it, you must lose a great fortune, making it irretrievable. Only then will Platinumare escape the dream world and enter reality.
Aqua Dementia - This horse is made entirely of water and acts like water. Blades pass through, arrows do nothing. It cannot be saddled or ridden by normal means. Aqua Dementia can only be tamed by striking it with lightning.
Liquid Light - was created as the sun first shown on a pool of water. This horse moves like lightning and warps and bends like water through the tightest spaces. It grants this to its rider as well. This horse is burning hot to the touch but if you climb inside it, it heals you. The only way to catch it is to look into the sun until blind, then your hands will be able to grasp it.
Night Hag - Like Ichabod Crane's nemesis, this horse terrorizes villages, riding the roads and snatching up children and other innocents. To tame Night Hag, you must offer it a gift as precious to you as your own child.
Ageless – A Pegasus that makes you 10 years old when you ride it. To catch and tame Ageless, you must catch it in the past, during the year you were 10
Xuxh'itra - A steed made of pure madness. It is taken, physically, from the mind of a creature dreaming nightmares of the deep. The steed exists as long as the dreamer remains locked asleep in its nightmare. Riding Xuxh'itra can take the rider through the dreamscape, and an attack from its hooves can knock its target into the dreamer's realm of madness. To catch and tame Xuxh’itra, you must venture into the mind of a person in the thralls of a nightmare. There, among the chaos and unknowable abominations, you can attempt to lure Xuxh’itra back to the waking world with you.
Ghost - An ethereal horse that you must be dead to ride. But riding it allows you to interact with the material world. To tame and ride Ghost, you must be dead, but not just undead, you have to be a ghost.
Smoke– A whispy horse of pale-grey. It's mane is tangible smoke. Breathing it in grants you fire eyes, which allow you to see through any fire in a 5 mile radius. You must be burning alive to be able to tame Smoke.
Frenzy – Frenzy is the steed of Lilith, Goddess of night and lust, corruption and darkness. Wild and crazy, frothing at the mouth, Frenzy is only tamable by climbing onto the wild horse and drinking in the billowing smoke of its mane, getting lost in its dark fire. A ride atop Frenzy is at once both ecstatic and destructive.
