As she most often did when anyone looked like they were about to approach her, Isla raised her head and pinned her ears against her pink neck. The tight purse of her mouth and the flinty gleam in her eye would leave no illusions as to just how much she didn't want company, and the spotted colt was no exception. As he drew nearer to her, Isla would bear her teeth and slash her tangled, mud-matted tail across her hind legs in irritation, though she did not yield from her spot.

She had found that running invited chasing, and she no longer wanted to be chased.

"And ye have nowt between the ears," she snapped back, glaring at the insolent colt. He looked younger than her son, which was a realization that was staggering and disheartening all at once. When had she become the old, unwanted spinster instead of the carefree maiden, wandering the isles as if they were all her own personal playground?

"It hasna' mattered yet who I am, so what does it matter now?" She continued on in the same vitriolic vein, ignoring his pretend-nice ears. Isla abandoned her attempt to graze now, shifting preemptively away from the young male. He might not be as large as the draftish brute that had forced her into captivity, but she'd learned the hard way that sometimes the younger stallions had as much if not more that they felt they needed to prove.