Before she could venture very far, a multitude of hooves on sod alerted Lothíriel of company. Uncertainty plagued young features like locusts swarming over choice crop; ears danced back and forth, muscles tensed to slow running legs, sliding to an unceremonious halt just as the pair came to view. Though the figures were difficult to discern in the half-light, she could descry a half-grown girl, roan with a white rump and her pale child, who could not be much younger than herself. They came at a steady approach, the older filly's electric green eyes judging her critically, as Mama often did after her day-long romps through the valley. Her own lilac glare watched back daringly, though the roan wondered if she could escape now in time to find her dam's bosom. But before she could gather her wits, fascination shadowed her face (the prospect of a meal was forgotten) as the earthen mare drew nearer, noticing that the little pale form that followed her was not a child at all, but instead a young leggy thing of another species entirely. "What's that?" she wondered, watching it intently, studying the spindly legs and pale fur—it charmed the girl instantly. She thought to the glass-horned bay and his hound, and the bronze-shouldered black and his wolf. Perhaps this pair was bonded in that way too? Mama said that sometimes two souls can be intertwined in such a way that the death of one would leave the other empty and hollow, like a dead tree trunk left to decay and rot in the autumn rain. Lothíriel had then wondered with all her childish whiles, why would you bring that onto yourself? Huyana had laughed at her naivety, hugging the babe close to her chest. Love, she had replied tenderly, lipping the thin hair of her forelock with affection. Your father and I have you.

The appaloosa pushed her face into Lothíriel's, a smile playing on dark lips; Hello little child. Ears flicked backward in a suggestion of contempt, though no other features betrayed the indignity that stirred in her breast. "I am not," she said solemnly, "a little child." Though unshed baby fur and the cotton-pale tuft of her lion's tail said otherwise, her mother and father never treated her as a stupid, useless baby, so Lothíriel would not allow herself to be patronized, with good intentions or not.

Before she could say anything else, the frantic rumble of hooves heralded the arrival of another, hoofbeats like approaching thunder. Suddenly distracted from the green-eyed mare, her face swung in its direction, watching the silvery body chase the evenlight, fleet feet descending a slope. For half a heartbeat, she saw Papa, tall and dark and effortlessly graceful, coming to retrieve his daughter from her evening rollick, but as the body neareds, its features blur into a stranger's: too small, too feminine, too light — his horn is pale, not blue-tipped black. He comes fast and hard, every muscle and tendon and ligament in his body straining to slow his breakneck pace. Lothíriel tossed her head with disquiet, contemplating escape, but the grullo did not trample them, turning just in time to narrowly miss their bodies. A kind smile was offered, and said her name, Lothíriel, in a lilting foreign accent that seemed familiar, if vaguely. His muzzle was offered kindly; uncertainty turned to suspicion in her gut. She let their noses touch for the fraction of a moment (it was the polite thing to do), before wrenching it away, comical wariness rampant in her eyes. "How d'you know my name?" she demanded softly, tilting her head on its axis, eyes boring into his own, studying him closely. "Do you know Mama and Papa?" the query was gentler, if by a fraction. If he did, perhaps he knew where her mother was.

Do you know who I am? "No," she said unsurely; should she know him? The only faces the babe could recall with any certainty were her parents; soft and gentle with rain-washed eyes, and angular and handsome, with sapphire blue. Smiling amber and velvet black did not strike a chord, but perhaps his voice did. Did she hear it in a dream? Déjà vu? Had Mama ever told a story with a benign grullo stallion who knew her name? Lothíriel snorted, dismissing these silly theories as the work of a hunger-addled mind.
Now, he spoke to the blanketed mare, Frost Fyre. Soft ears piqued with interest, "What's your name?" She thought it would be something interesting. You could tell a lot from someone's name.