As the warmth of his chosen sleeping spot slowly dug into his skin, making the world seem like a rather alright place, the boy continued to sleep on whilst his mother retreated further into the trees. She had her worries, that something or someone could snatch the boy before she had returned, but then she also had some sort of faith that in a land where the only other living animals were birds and squirrels, her boy would survive her short escape.

When Thiesan slept, he dreamt of a familiar place, where the gentle thumping of a heartbeat was the only thing to keep him company, and where the sky was always a soft, subtle red. In that home, he had never been cold and he had never gone hungry- but here was much, much different. Resting in a small pile of leaves that insulated him from the ground, the boy knew nothing of the gentle rustling of footsteps approaching him, a soft sound that he appeared to already be familiar with. As the stranger's shadow falls upon his small body, the boy twitches in his sleep, not really moving until he felt the gentle prod of her nose.

Being softly jostled awake, the boy sits in compliance as the woman runs her tongue across his skin, his eyes lazily closed as he is groomed by what he assumes is his mother. Little did he know, that the dark woman, upon returning, had spotted the other female crowding tenderly over her son and disappeared once more, this time in desperation to escape what would be ill-mannered jests and nasty remarks. So, as Thiesan enjoys his bath, he eventually sniffs inwardly, greeted by a smell that is nothing at all like the sweet, soft smell of the woman that had been his first and only companion in life thus far, and open his eyes. Staring up in wonderment at the bay, the colt looks confused, thinking it strange that his dark-skinned mother should be able to change appearance.

Certainly this had to be his mother, standing over him so carefully and being so gentle with him.