Excited chatter yielded to silent, breathless wonder when the young pair arrived on the stone shelf - the silver black filly leading the way, and the smaller blue boy creeping forward cautiously in her wake. Sciannath had been conceived on the mainland, but born on the Crossing - and in a bid to protect his fragile young mind, he had forgotten most of his life before Rade had found him. Now, the Peak was the only home he’d ever known - but as his gaze hungrily devoured the unfamiliar landscape, the boy received his first taste of a world that was far bigger than he could ever begin to conceive. And part of him - the part that had been heavily influenced by the bright, bold nature of his adoptive sibling, no doubt - wanted to see it all.

But the other part wanted nothing more than to hide here forever in the Peak. Here, where he had never known pain or hunger or fear - beyond the obviously-empty threats that Adelheid sometimes made when she was particularly exasperated with her charges. To Sciannath, the Vulcans’ mountain was more than just the place that he lived. Young and naive though he might be, the roan colt was beginning to understand that he wouldn’t be alive if he had not been brought here - a realization that made gratitude and admiration mingle strangely with the reluctance and yes, fear that he felt when he thought of Rade. Even the strong bonds he shared with Claudya and Adelheid were owed to the palomino stallion.

Perhaps after this journey was over - and enough time had passed to relax the large mare’s vigilance - Sciannath would seek out his sire. If nothing else, Rade might hold the answers to the questions that circled endlessly in his mind.

Speaking of questions, the spotted girl’s inquiry pulled her brother back to the present with an abrupt jerk. Frowning thoughtfully, the colt inched forward carefully until he too could see the gorge. He didn’t see any waterfall, and a dim memory of his own time in the falls implied that they should have been able to hear it even from this distance. “I don’t think so - waterfalls are loud,” he replied, edging backwards a step or two until his small figure was on more comfortably solid ground. “But I bet there’s tree spirits and wolves and maybe even a mountain cat there!” It was strange how the blue boy - who trembled near the precipice and was wary of his own father - could speak of predators with such a fearless voice. But having never encountered a wolf or mountain lion, these were creatures just as mythical - and exciting - to Sciannath as tree spirits, and nevermind the fact that either would happily make a meal of him.

Regardless of the contents their imagination filled the gorge with, however, they were unlikely to be permitted to go and see it for themselves. “I don’t think there’s a way to get down there from here, though. And I don’t think Mom is going to offer to show us the way, either.” As far as adventures went, Sciannath sensed that Adelheid’s tolerance was likely to end here, and that the consequences of their rule-breaking would keep them closer to her side for days. If they were lucky enough to avoid a worse punishment, that is. He still hadn’t forgotten her promise to hand them over to Wasp if they disobeyed again - and though the Peak’s dark leader didn’t scare him, exactly, she seemed even more serious and strict than the Codebreaker. If Wasp was their guardian, she probably wouldn’t even let them go to the creek alone, and certainly wouldn’t let him get close to Rade. He’d overheard her talking to Adelheid once before about how untrustworthy stallions could be, and wondered if she would feel the same way about him once he’d grown up.

For a child, however, time moved too slowly for them to worry about what seemed to be the distant future. And Sciannath still hadn’t forgotten the gratitude he felt for the present - such that when he turned to glance at the tall black mare who had shadowed them here, it welled up within him. Approaching her on spindly legs that he was still growing into, the boy tucked his muzzle briefly into the hollow between Adelheid’s front leg and her body, and exhaled his breath in a gentle, warm sigh. “Thank you,” he said sincerely - not certain, in that moment, if he was expressing gratitude for her unexpected permissiveness today, or for all the care and love that she had shown him so far. Perhaps it was both.

Yes, it was almost certainly both.