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There are many creatures that have come under Kohelet's care in her fourteen years of life. Some by choice, some by accident, some by luck. She has never been a perfect mare, but there has never been a child that she has not loved.
The mare before her now bears little resemblance to the knock-kneed, wild-eyed, wilder-hearted girl that had been dumped on the Bay's shores, but her heart knows. It eases Kohelet's surprise at her approach before the tobiano mare is quiet sure why and she offers a soft smile that broadens as recognition dawns.
Mazikeen.
Not hers by blood, though she might as well be. It was Mazikeen, not Rethe, that had accompanied her to the Badlands. And it was Mazikeen, not Rethe, who had watched Kohelet struggle to come to terms with the truth. Mazikeen, who - perhaps unknowingly - is one of the few creatures left on these isles that has seen the good and the bad in the tobiano mare.
As Mazikeen offers her muzzle, Koh does the same, drinking deeply of the spotted mare. She smells of Salem, and old dread curls in the tobiano's stomach. Not all of her memories of Salem are bad, but most of them are. Mazikeen is one of the very few, very rare bright spots.
"It has," she echoed, tears of pride and joy prickling at her yes.
"You've grown up, Mazikeen." Her voice is playfully chiding, hiding the anxiety she feels at the rewoken memories. As Mazikeen turns toward the current day, Kohelet's gaze dips away briefly, her forehead furrowing.
"Nyimara is back." She says quietly, her voice taut with tension.
"I smelled her on the Cove's borders."
In truth, Kohelet likely has little to fear from the silver-haired mare, but she still represents a period of stress and captivity. Nyimara had been the one to displace them from the Cove, and then from the Desert, before ultimately capturing Kohelet in her clutches to force Solomon's hand. The memories the silver-haired witch represented were dark, and when combined with the other upheaval on Tinuvel - a non-relatives claiming and holding both the Cove and the Arch - Kohelet struggled to find reason to stay.
Fell was gone.
Her family was gone.
"There isn't really anything left for me in the Bay," she admits. Nothing but painful memories that kept her trapped as she relived each beautiful moment with Fell. The first moments with her babies. Even some of Mazikeen's firsts rank up there in her memories.
"But what are you doing here?" She asks with a soft laugh, pushing aside her worries. The last she'd heard or smelled of Mazikeen, the girl had been in the Cove and Kohelet had been making plans to go see her until that scent, too, had gone cold.