Thinking back to the force of the wind that had tried to push her back to shore and the unrelenting torrent of rain that had fallen from the sky, she could not imagine how the storm could get any worse. With each passing moment though, it seems to do just that. The wind picked up another notch and howled past the entrance of the cave. She could feel the chilly draft penetrating the air around them. Flashes of lightning and the rumble of thunder were almost simultaneous and signified that the storm was still directly overhead. Given the direction of the wind, at least the herd would miss the worst of it. She hoped the old adage that lightning never strikes in the same place twice would hold true.

When Dögun made the joking suggestion that eating saxifrage just might be frowned upon by the gods, but not by him, the roan mare gave a snort. ”Then you will not be displeased when I continue to bring their wrath”. There was very little on this earth that could keep Sigrún away from her food, let alone a little storm. She swivelled an ear in Dögun’s direction, listening as he explains his worries. She never normally went too far despite the wandering she did, looking for better grazing.

For a while, silence settles between them as she thinks over his words. He had been worried. He left the herd to find her and might even have risked his own life in the process. This was an odd notion for Sigrún to process. In her experience, while the individual members of the herd were vastly important, they would never take precedence over the herd as group. To have the lead stallion leave the assembled herd to find one mare did not compute. She was from a harsher world, understanding a new land was hard. She frowned. ”I do not understand.”