She thought about trying to run again, especially when the days started to get longer and the loneliness wrapped its painful grip around her heart like a vice. Switch knew her solitude was of her own making, but also that being alone was still preferable to her only other alternative. She did not hate the residents of the Lagoon, but nor was she fond of them. While her interaction with Carbon had not been entirely unpleasant, his story only served to underline how helpless she was now that she was here.

She found, in the silence, more reasons to regret ever honoring Fiero's desire for Fuego to be born here, in the Lagoon, although she could not, even in her most bitter moments, ever regret her son's conception. Even though all evidence pointed to things going badly in her life the moment she decided to follow her sweet and awkward loverboy across the ocean, she loved her son far too much to ever regret the steps that led to his making. On this side of fate, it was easy to speculate how much easier her life would have been if she had simply birthed her darling son on the Crossing proper, or even in the mountainous peaks of the women's herd.

The more she thought about it, the more she realized that all of her problems stemmed - at their heart - from her poor choice in men. Fiero had abandoned her to the bachelors of the Lagoon with a son to raise, but at least he had (she hoped) loved her in the beginning. He had shown since, of course, that such affection was one dimensional, and only existed when they were together. The second she dared to step beyond his line of sight, she might as well cease to exist. Khajiit may not have pretended to love her, but his heart was even colder, she knew. How else could he watch her desperate flight from the Lagoon and then see it in his heart to return her to prison for his own satisfaction?

When the time finally came, and she felt her body preparing for the birth of her second child, she cast one last, longing glance toward the border of the Lagoon and turned away to make her way back to the place she'd selected. Ironically, it was the same place in which she'd delivered Fuego, although she had not been back here since his birth. There was something about sheltering beneath the treen with it's low hanging branches and thick curtains of rampant Spanish moss that made her feel more secure. She no longer feared the bachelors of the Lagoon would come to kill her child, not now that she understood how deeply their entitlement to her body ran. There was a pervasive sentiment to the Lagoon that they owned the mares that resided within the swampy territory, and thereby, any children born into it.

The thought of what may happen if she had a daughter still froze her heart with terror, but she knew that she would expend her dying breath fighting for her children's freedom, if that was what it took.

By the time she surrendered her body to the ground, the process was very nearly over and her daughter lay on the ground with the same look of surprise as her mother. Crooning nonsense in Spanish, Switch lowered her head to clean off the speckled newborn, trying to ignore the way that she wore a coat as loudly splashed with white as her father. Little of herself was evident in the filly, save for the mantle of black that she wore as a cloak over her rump and shoulders, but she adored her without reservation.

"Mi hermosa niña," she murmured into the girl's shoulders as she tousled at the wispy strands of her mane. Unbidden, tears of mixed emotion pooled in her eyes but she held them back as best she could. She would worry later about her girl's future and of the danger she would face as a direct result of being a Lagoon trinket; for now, she resolved, she would only do her best to love her and see her grow. Chuffing softly at the girl, Switch allowed a smile to touch her lips, although it could not erase the furrow of concern on her brow. "Te quiero mucho, Catalina."

Some time later, after her daughter had nursed and napped and nursed again, the sleek black mare - still gaunt and tired from her pre-pregnancy ordeal - ushered the small filly from the shelter of the moss-laden tree. She doubted that anyone would have known to find her here, given that the only two souls that she'd spent time with beneath this particular tree had been well and truly avoided for the majority of her pregnancy, but she was taking no chances. She had already located a new clearing on the northernmost edge of the Lagoon, and she had every intention of sequestering her daughter there until she could find some way of securing a future for her.

But the moment, she stepped from beneath the trees, movement ahead made her body tense and she moved abruptly in front of her infant daughter to shelter her, blinking rapidly against the bright afternoon sun. Despite being unable to see who stood before her, the exhausted black mare's hoarse voice immediately issued a command for space, with both fluted ears pinning against her poll. "¡Irse!Go away!" Beside her, the filly squeaked in protest and shuffled to try and catch her balance before landing in a disgruntled heap a few steps away.

mare // paso fino // black // 14.3hh // lagoon // loveinspired