The sound of her mother's voice wakes her from the pile of warmth in which she lays, her back pressed skin to skin against her sister. At first, Esme had no intention of rousing from her comfy bed. It is only when a scan of her immediate surroundings shows that her mother is absent that the young girl shifts upright in confusion.

She and Aysu have raced away from their mama before in fits of adventure, but mama has never left them behind. The novelty is enough that she does not wake her sister this time, but rises carefully to her white stockinged feet and tiptoes closer to the faint sound of mama's voice. When she finds her, Esme freezes in confusion, her gaze training immediately on the too-tall stallion that stands next to mama. Who is he?

When her pretty dam offers her name, Esme begins to creep forward, doing her best impression of the sneaky bugs that she never notices until they are right below her noise. They are too-sneaky for her to catch most of the time, but she likes to chase them... and to put them on her sister when mama isn't looking. Only she's clearly not sneaky enough. The too-tall stallion looks right at her, and her gaze immediately goes to her dam. "Mama?"

Without waiting for a response, the tiny filly curls around her dam's shoulder, pressing closely against her and then peering beneath the protective barrier of Feray's neck at the stranger. What was he doing here? She watches suspiciously as he lowers his too-big head toward her and says her name. How did he know her name? Her gaze flicked upward to her mother, trying to read the emotion there so she could better decide how to react to this disturbing turn of events. But the man is moving again, offering his muzzle to her as she'd seen others do to mama in the past.

Esme's ears flick uncertainly atop her head, but she mimics what she has seen, pushing her tiny muzzle up against his and blowing one soft little breath of greeting into his muzzle. Task done, she pulls back quickly and stares avidly at this stranger as he speaks again, calling himself her dad.

Well, she didn't know what this dad business was all about, but mama wasn't acting like there was danger, so she got a little confident and stretched out to touch the strange markings on his chest. They smelled like salt, but she didn't feel brave enough to lick him yet and so just sniffed, her entire body tensed just in case. And Esme was content in her explorations, right up until the too-big man stuck his nose right against her momma. Both too-large ears tip back for the girl as she shoves her muzzle up to push him away; Esme even considers biting him, although she knows that she would get in trouble for that.

Or, she did when she bit Aysu anyway.

Thankfully, the too-big stallion inches away from her very clear threat and Esme nods to herself as if this was perfectly to be expected. She glares defiantly at the stallion with her ear's still tipped back and touches mama's shoulder again as if to cement her position. Mama belonged to Esme and Aysu only.