I have always been a peaceful child.

Even the violence that mother displayed was either shunned or unnoticed by my conscious mind, though it can hardly be construed that I was naive to her temperment after these months of being at her side. Still, from the bushes, I watched the display of this foreign body with quiet intrigue. I had been playing hide and seek with Bear only moments before, and then, the ugly racket caused by that pale form stole both of our attention. In the shadows of the trees we watched the display intently. Mother held her head proudly as she talked to the young buck with a serpent's tongue. I found myself disliking someone for the first time.

All of this was even before the stallion began to circle mother like some sort of awful predator, and a great fear grew in my chest. My breath slowed, heart beat like a drum in my chest. I could feel the snow at my feet even as my bicolored eyes widened in shock. His horn sliding through the air, finding its way snaked against my mother's throat. My breath released suddenly in what was an ugly sort of sound, a warrior's cry from such small lungs, but somehow booming as it resonated off of the trees and the pebbles and the twigs. A great rumbling in the earth began before my hooves even set their path.

I was born crooked, but my legs were nearly straight now. My muscles had grown immensely in the months of traveling I had undertaken in my mother's care. The horns, once small, grew in thick spirals which waxed more and more each day. I was not a weak child; I had just never had a reason to reveal my strength before.

My pale mane flew in small tendrils behind me, tail unwinding too, even as the earth began to shake more rapidly with the sound of my angry cry. The bushes ruffled out of my way and I shot liike an arrow, albeit slightly uncoordinated, toward the stallion who thought to hurt my beloved mother. I lowered my ram horns and set my course directly for the stilts he called legs. Either the impact would hit or not, but soon my momentum slowed and I found myself on the opposite side of my mother, whirling around to look vehemently at the cheeky boy who shoved her. "Don't hurt my mother," I say, brutishly, and the earth slowly begins to still. Were it not for the dislodged snow from the dead branches of trees, as well as some of the weaker limbs that had fallen to the ground, the small earthquake might have been a dream.

I look directly at the pale blue eyes of this stallion now, and do not even notice as my mother moves gracefully around, or the speech she gives to him, like chiding a child. It wasn't until he began to stumble to the side that I looked toward her, noticing the intense focus of her face. She was strangling him. Somehow, I knew this, but I dare not question why mother chose to do so. I suppose she was right in doing such, the way he had so casually threatened her. Mother had no need for my protection, but I hers. Still, I couldn't help but look a little saddened, even before the old man stumbled in to the scene.

What was going on here?
""