I DON'T WORRY, WORRYING DON'T AGREE
THINGS THAT BOTHER YOU, NEVER BOTHER ME!

“What?!” Talya yelped incredulously, snapping upright in absolute alert and staring openly at the stormcloud friend. “You never once hunted even one leaf?” Her pink lips drop open in surprise and she stares as if that’s the weirdest thing she’s heard all day, as if stormcloud friend had just told her she never once took a drink of water in her life. Talya shook her head and adopted a more serious, determined look. “You can’t live in the Forest where prey are abundant and not hunt them. Next thing you know, the leaves will run wild!” She declared, nodding firmly and stepping a little more closely to Mamapapa’s stormcloud pal.

But all thoughts of instructing her exactly how to hunt leaves flew right out the window when she formally introduced herself. Talya blinked, failing to compute the similarity in stormcloud friend’s name and the fact that it was the very name of the island she lived on. “Luthien?” She echoed and blinked, looking at the mare before a crooked grin cracked over her mouth. “Ha-ha!”

Talya, catching sight of movement, whipped her head to look more clearly at what horse was walking slowly from the trees, and she brightened immediately at the sight of Aurora. The way Aurora moved told a piece of her to worry, to pull away her cheerful disposition, hold to seriousness for once and be there for her friend. Something was wrong. But Talya’s need to live in a perfectly happy world was far stronger than her ability to cope healthily, so she pretended as if she couldn’t see how upset Aurora was and simply decided it must be her eyes.

“This is my friend Aurora,” Talya explained to Luthien. “She has eyes that sometimes decide they don’t wanna be eyes.” Talya turned and nickered beckoningly toward Aurora. “We’re going to hunt leaves because Stormcloud Friend needs cheering up. I can help you hunt leaves if you want to hunt them with us.”