Synder was actually quite surprised when it was her mother who first approached her. She hadn't expected to find her on the first try, but she let out a happy snort and began to rise before her mother brushed her lips against Synder's face. Feeling like a foal again, the sooty black mare sank happily back into the sand, her eyes drooping.

Eventually she stood up, mostly to reassure Claire (and herself, for that matter) that she was not so exhausted from her swim that she couldn't stand. I'm fine, she wanted to say, but instead reached with her upper lip outstretched to nibble at her mother's shoulder. She was nearly as tall as her pale dam, but as she was only just out of filly-hood, her darkly dappled body was still a bit gangly; she hadn't filled out much yet.

She had been starting to, though. Synder would have been proud to inform her mother of the abundance of food in the Lagoon, and of the stallions who hadn't yet scared her out of eating. In all honesty, the only stallions she had met were Felony and Mason, and the one she didn't like she could avoid. It hadn't occurred to her that she would someday meet worse stallions than Felony.

Well, her ignorance was indeed blissful, in a very watered-down sense of the term. At least she wasn't stressed out of eating.

While she couldn't tell her mom all the news of her life in the Lagoon, she could at least reassure her that she was happy and healthy enough. In a sudden explosion of movement, Synder leaped away from her mother and ran in a circle around her, ears pointed forward and muscles quivering. She darted about, inviting the pale mare to chase her. The tiredness from her swim here from the Crossing was momentarily gone, and what she wanted more than anything was to play like a filly again.