my waves meet your shore, ever and evermore;

It isn’t as if her agreement to join the stallion had been selfless. Sure, he’d sung some pretty, sad little tale about his own captive lover, held by a cruel stallion against her will. The cost was a mare or two in return, and Fearne was desperate enough to run from her own poor decisions that it seemed reasonable. Hell, she practically begged him to pick her - she needed to get away before Aries realized what she’d done, had his poor heart broken and her own inability to be kind had her word vomiting that this wasn’t even the first time.

So with leggy, pretty little Fiadh at her side, Fearne fled with the stranger, trading a meltingly hot prison for a frozen wasteland, unsure if it was the smart thing to do. Not smart, perhaps, but the only path forward. There would be another child come spring, and this one she wouldn’t be able to pretend was Aries’ offspring - she hadn’t let him touch her in months, and even given her dalliance with the handsome stranger on the Crossing Isle, she wasn’t willing to let that change. In the end, her choice between moving on or suffering more of his overwhelmingly sweet attention was an easy one.

The blue stallion who brought her away hadn’t said much about this Fell character, other than reassurance that he was strong, able to keep her shielded, and was on Tinuvel - with an entire ocean between them, and hopefully what amounts to a jealous stallion besides, Aries couldn’t find her here, couldn’t look at her with betrayal and heartbreak and make her question her choices.

She emerges from the water alongside the other two with her gold and white speckled daughter behind, shivering from the cold and watching with narrowed blue eyes and half-pinned ears. The stallion who approaches seems the intimidating sort, big and solid-black and deathly silent. He’s a few inches shorter than her, but has bulk enough that she doesn’t worry about his ability to keep them safe.

He gestures for the other mare, the one worth two others’ freedom, and Fearne watches the scene carefully. Finally Fiadh breaks the silence, sneezing so hard she jolts against Fearne’s hip and startles her. “Fiadh,” she scolds, a little breathless from the cold still. “You’ll make a poor impression on our host,”. Fearne offers him a tight smile. What are the chances he was warned this was a two for the price of one deal? Maybe he doesn’t want a mischievous little weanling running around, but Fearne wasn’t about to leave her behind. “I’m Fearne,” she introduces herself, voice light. “And this is my daughter, Fiadh. We’re….grateful to be here.” Perhaps not the full range of her emotions, but discretion is the better part of valor.