Siobhan had come to realize that it wasn't the Ridge that was her home, not truly. She could have been happy anywhere, if anywhere came equipped with her family. Ailill was her security blanket, always ready to soothe away the darkness that had crept in during their months apart. He always knew when her heart was heavy and when it weighed too much for her shoulders to bear, and he was always willing to share the weight without complaint. It was all that she could hope for her children to find partners like him someday.

Even now, as she buried her blazed face into his mane, he cradled around her warmly, assuring her by touch and sound that she was loved. That she was wanted. That she was not a burden. Nothing could ever soothe her as completely as his gentleness did, even if it had not yet proven strong enough to erase the dark parts of her past. It was at least a beacon of light strong enough that she could follow it out of the worst of the darkness.

Zvaid too, brought her joy. She had worried for months that she would hate him for what his blood father had done, but she had found herself incapable of blaming him. He was innocent and beautiful and hers, not his. And not Nyimara's either. Siobhan smiled as her son beamed up at her, happy to see him so content. These trips with Ailill had once been favorites of each generation in turn, although they all seemed to handle them differently. Roisin and Akadi had been bold and wild and playful, only turning to duty when things were a game. Aislinn had even accompanied them sometimes, although the pale painted filly had been independent ever since she was born and had preferred her time alone to time with family. The girls had stopped accompanying Ailill when Siobhan had been taken the first time, but she knew that Roisin still traced these paths when she needed to think.

Saoirse and Naenia had been quieter, with Saoirse forever distracted by some bug or plant or sound or smell. Nothing could ever dampen her curiosity. The two of them were nearly inseparable as if they were simply two halves of a whole. Zvaid was the only one that seemed to take it seriously from the start, and Siobhan knew it was because of her. Because of the night terrors and the fear and the guilt that she wore. No amount of hiding it would ever truly keep it from the family she held so close to her heart. As she felt their pain, they felt hers.

As if reading her line of thinking, Zvaid's face turned to and inquired after his eldest sisters, the two that were farthest from home and therefore forefront in her worries. "Your older sisters, silly," Siobhan answers warmly with a chuckle. Reaching out to pick an errant leaf from his mane, she continues, doing her best to hide the anxiety she felt when she thought of either of her wayward daughters. "Aislinn is painted like you almost," she says, ducking her face away to hide her worry to tickle at his flank with her lips. "She's much older, and she likes to travel on her own."

"And your big sister Akadi, is a warm pinkish gray, like the sunrise when it hits the ocean froth in the mornings." She worried most for Akadi. Her distance from the family had been a direct result of Siobhan's multiple captures, and guilt often constricted her heart when she thought of her. She hoped that her daughter would return, but had also done her best to respect her independence, as best as she could. "She went to live with the mighty mare warriors in the Peak, just like Roisin has been talking about."

In truth, the thought of all of her eldest daughters leaving the nest filled her with a sense of buzzing anxiety, as though a part of herself was missing. She loved all three of them equally, and they occupied separate, cherished niches in her heart, but Roisin had been the one that had healed her heart in the first place. Losing Laoise so many years ago had nearly devastated her, and while she knew it was not the same thing as her girls growing up and leaving home naturally, it still made that queer sort of loss echo in her chest. They were her babies, and if she could keep them at her side forever, she would.

"Tell me, what has your father taught you today? Did you learn where the waves go? Or how to find someone's tracks?" She raised her gaze to Ailill warmly, and stretched over Zvaid again to touch his shoulder, wordlessly attempting to communicate her appreciation for him.