the exhaustion that overcame her slowly wears off and she settles into a deep sleep… she dreams of the prairie, the only place she had ever known, and how the grasses look like waves when the wind blows its gentle breath. she sees the vague shapes of her herd mates in the distance, unaware of her disappearance. the last thing she sees is the small lost looking form of her sister, standing at the shoreline, looking across the waves for her. she wants to call out and tell her it will be okay, but she has no body… no voice. she can only watch as her twin paces the sandy shore anxiously and the day turns to dusk until everything fades from view.

she doesn’t wake at the sound of hooves in the sand, so deep is her slumber. it isn’t until she feels the gentle brush of a muzzle on her leg that she stirs. the first thing she realizes, before her deep brown eyes even open, is the strange smell of the air. it is warmer here, and more humid. there is no hint of the crisp coolness that the mornings in the prairie had offered lately. when her eyes do open she looks up in confusion at the figure standing over her. his scent warns her of his masculinity but she doesn’t feel as if she should be afraid. she gazes up, looking at him with directness and an intensity she had inherited from her mother. a pale golden ear twitches forward, catching his foreign words, and she tips her head at him in curiosity. in another moment she pulls herself easily to her hooves, taking her eyes off him only to study her surroundings just as acutely. given the season and the gender of the stranger it would make sense for her to be wary but in her naiveté all she feels is curiosity.

she reaches out her muzzle, unembarrassed by her defect (a slight wry nose,) to exchange breaths with him. for a moment she feels guilty, having left her twin behind and without explanation, but then she is grateful. she can hear the chatter of waves on the rocks, the songs of birds she had never heard before, and not the continuous banter her twin felt the need to engage in. dahlia had never been one to talk much and even now, lost as she obviously was and in the presence of an unfamiliar stallion, she didn’t feel the need to speak. she observes him with a nubile grace and stillness, the same unearthly presence her mother sometimes has, and basks in the face of her new adventure.