Yearlings. He could not believe it, even as he looked upon his daughters. For a year they had shadowed him. He had watched them grow from wobbly-legged, uncertain, curious newborns into young, headstrong girls each with a personality different from the next. One more year and they could choose to leave him. His heart tightened at the thought. A defiance. He was a protective father, perhaps overly so, and he’d grown so accustom to their presence and their love that he could not envision them leaving his shores.

“Dad, you’re staring again.” Mariael said, and Nephilim blinked. Maziel giggled and stepped toward him, nostrils flared, ears pricked forward. She was testing where he was – how he was standing – using all the senses she had in order to paint a picture of sorts in her mind. She reached up and knocked him gently on the jaw with her muzzle.

“Well I wasn’t going to say anything, but you have grass stuck to your chin.” He said with a grin before turning to gently tap Maziel back along her neck.

Mariael squinted at him before taking a few steps toward the stream – a stream which was actually flowing and not covered thick in ice. “I do not!” She said, throwing an indignant look over her shoulder.

Nephilim cracked a grin and Maziel giggled. He looked down fondly onto his daughter, such a multitude of colors, but all browns and whites and tans, much like the tundra she was born into. They were both of Tinuvel, he thought, looking to Mariael who was a touch of creams broken by patches of white. When the world was a blanket of white during the winter he’d swore he could lose Marial even if she stood right in front of him.

Mariael whipped her head, suddenly, ears pointed; alert. Nephilim’s smile fell away, his head jerking upright, nostrils testing the air, ears forward, too. Maziel sensed the change in the atmosphere and began twitching her ears, sniffing in soft little whuffs, trying to gauge what it was which had caught her family’s attention.

At first, Nephilim heard nothing. “Mariael, what do you –” He broke off. He heard it. Soft sounds, loud enough to be something in the trees, something large. An elk? A moose? “Mariael, stay back.” He ordered, voice firm, and started walking to move past her, carefully picking a path through the shallow bit of the water, its freezing temperature stinging at his fetlocks. Maziel walked quietly up to stand by her sister as Nephilim pushed into the cropping of forest, becoming swallowed whole by the treets.

“Come on, Maziel.” Said Mariael.

“But Dad said…”

“He said ‘stay back’ not, ‘don’t follow’.” Mariael made her point and started following the path he had. “Careful over the rocks. They’re a little slippery.” She waited in the water until Maziel had a muzzle to her hip. They crossed and followed after their father quietly.

Nephilim was surprised on what he had intruded on and stopped the moment he realized what it was. A mare, vaguely familiar (one of Pagan’s, if he remembered correctly) and two fuzzy little newborn foals. He glanced back at her tense body, and drew a full step back, lowering his head and giving a soft, rumbling nicker. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude.”

“Dad? What is it?” Whispered Mariael from somewhere behind him, coming up on one side while Maziel came up on the other. Both girls stopped short. “Oh…” Said Mariael, looking from the mare to the two foals.