"Jay," Rhadra repeats with a smile. "Of course you will. You must," she continues as she turns to begin the journey up the slopes, giving her limpet-like daughter a nudge with her nose to coax her into movement. "You'll like it up there. The wind blows free and fast, and sometimes the clouds come so close it feels like you could touch them. Watch the edge, children," she adds, moving to put herself between them and the steep drop-off to their right.
Izzy turns almost blindly at her mother's touch and moves stiffly, almost mechanically until her muscles register they are moving further up the mountain. Then her head lifts, ears coming forward and a familiar brightness returning to her eyes unrelated to the earlier tears she has said. The higher they climb, the less she sniffles, until finally all traces of her fright and sadness seem to have disappeared. She makes a game of jogging a few steps ahead of her mother, then lagging until Rhadra's even tread carries the black mare close before she bounds ahead again. They travel this way for awhile, long enough that even Izzy tires of the inconsistent pace she has set for herself against the steep upward climb and is forced to walk more slowly and progress with the group. Eventually their trail turns, so that they are no longer walking on a mostly bare slope on the edge of the mountain but instead wander between a loose copse of trees. Here, where they are no longer surrounded by so much sky, the ground flattens a little and grants a reprieve to their hike.
"It's mostly just us by the lake, but it never feels lonely. Sometimes a stallion named Collision joins us, so don't be alarmed if you see him when we arrive; he's very kind," Rhadra says, then adds with a smile, "You and he have similar coats." Izzy's ears perk at the mention of the only stallion she's ever known, and the bay girl bounds ahead a few steps. "Collision is the best," she tells Jay over her shoulder. "He knows every story and can answer everything! He knows about birds and fish and flowers and trees and wind and rain and the sun and the mountain and even bugs!" She's beaming as she extols the knowledge of their friend, and Rhadra chuckles to see her again so animated. They're close now, as evidence by the thinning trees and the distant glint of water. Izzy picks her pace up again to a trot and the ground begins to slope downward until the trees break and a generous meadow leads the way to a lake cupped in the bowl of the mountain.
Izzy steps into a run the moment the sun hits her face, throwing up clods of dirt behind her sparsely feathered hooves as she races toward the lake. Rhadra follows more sedately. "There it is," she tells Jay as they step out of the trees, regarding him with a warm but contemplative glance. The curly-eared colt seems older than a boy his age should be, one whose life has held more experience in less years than most, and still she wonders about his mother. She speaks to him then, adult to adult, sympathetic but not coddling as they move through the mountain meadow: "My mother passed soon after I was born. It was my sister who raised me, but she was older and of the age to have children of her own. She had very little patience for me, and while the days passed just fine it was nights that were the loneliest. Everyone else had a dam to cuddle up to. I want you to know you're among family here, Jay, and if you need anything —anything— you let me know." She reaches over to nose his crest, blowing lightly on his multi-colored mane as she would often do to Izzy. Pulling back, she meets his eyes to ensure he knows she's serious, then smiles and tosses her nose toward the lake where Izzy is already splashing in the shallows. "Shall we join her?"
rhadra