Welcome to Gaia! ::

Lorenna had brought the twins out near the village and had left them a good distance away so that they might play. She had told them that she had business that could take a great deal of time and had presented them with a choice. Naturally the two foals, who had until very recently lived entirely on their own, decided not to join Lorenna on her business. Instead they had raced off with great joy and no small amount of laughter. This was a busy area even at such a distance from the village, so busy that is was what the twins might have considered crowded, but it didn't stop them from their games.

At first they made a sport of running among the other soquili, ducking under their legs or springing over those that lay in the sun, that was until the older soquili began to grow impatient with their antics. Before anyone could truly catch them to give them a good scolding they bolted like their kind were known to do bounding away in a series of long jumps towards the village. It was their hope that they might blend into the crowd or at least find Lorenna, no one would scold them while she was around or they might get scolded themselves.

As they drew nearer they caught sight of the first pointed structure and came to a swift halt. The older of the two, Fletcher he had been recently named, spoke first. "It looks boring down there." he said snootily with a small snort. He had heard this sort of tone from older horses when they discovered that he and his brother were parent-less. Thatcher laughed at his brother's voice. It always made him laugh when Fletcher spoke in such tones and Fletcher knew it. "I don't think we really want to go there. Do we Thatch?" he continued using the same voice.

Thatcher tossed his head joining the game. "No we don't." He said mimicking his twins voice. "We want to go...to the trees!" Fletcher and Thatcher both quite liked playing amidst the trees, it always felt like home to them, so they quickly decided that they would head towards the nearest tree they could which happened to be a large oak. They ran towards it only slowing when they realized that a dark shape they had previously thought was a shadow was actually another horse.

"Oh." Fletcher said as he slowed to a walk. This was almost disappointing, it was a grown horse and that meant they wouldn't understand anything. Thatcher shared his brother's thoughts on the matter but he didn't want to find anything else to do.

"Hey!" Thatcher shouted leaving his brother behind to race towards the mare. "Are you like them?" He asked jerking his head to indicate the other soquili roaming about.

Thatcher watched the mare steadily as he awaited her response. She seemed to be taking an awfully long time with her answer leaving the young colt with a sinking feeling in the depths of his stomach. Then she replied by way of another question. Thatcher blinked at her sudden, foal-like mannerism. He wrinkled his nose not sure if he liked seeing a mare trying to act like them or not. Still, Thatcher could see that she wasn't like the others and therefore she wouldn't try to stop them or yell at them.

He gave the mare an approving nod before turning his attention back to his brother. He pawed at the ground a few times and tossed his head before nodding at Fletcher. Fletcher, who had been watching with some apprehension, got his brother's message loud and clear. With a shake of his head Fletcher bounded over to his brother and the strange mare. He came to a stop at his brother's side and examined the mare.

She was as dark as they were light with hair like the midnight sky that fell in long waves. Her eyes were the color of the sun and all over she wore a strange assortment of things. Neither Fletcher nor Thatcher knew what any of these things were, excepting the feathers, and so that was all they could call them. Things.

"What are those?" Fletcher asked focusing his attention on the cloth around her legs. Thatcher settled by his brother and flicked his eyes between him and the mare every so often as he listened for the mare's reply. She seemed weird enough that they weren't likely to get a scolding but Thatcher was still a bit concerned.

"To keep warm?" Fletcher raised an eyebrow and glanced at his younger brother. Thatcher simply replied by raising his eyebrows, crinkling his nose and pulling his lips into an exaggerated frown in a sort of facial shrug. Neither of the twins knew what a blanket was but keeping warm was a concept that all of their kind understood instinctively. "Well, that's what he's for." The elder of the two continued as he watched the mare tug the piece of cloth off. The way it moved reminded the boys of water and they took an immediate interest in it as it was laid before them.

Together the boys approached it, prancing, and then started sniffing at it and prodding it with their cloven hooves. They were only partially paying attention to the mare but found that they would have to do better than that when she posed a question. Thatcher stopped investigating the cloth and looked up with a frown. For an adult she sure asked a lot of questions, and pointless ones too. "Yes." Thatcher replied sounding rather impatient before returning to the bit of blue fabric. As he was about to flip it over Fletcher suddenly seized the cloth in his teeth and stood up straight and proud. Thatcher gave his brother a sour look that made Fletcher laugh through the material.

The two stood still for a while just staring at each other with Fletcher challenging his brother and Thatcher growing more and more impatient with his twin. Then the duo moved at once. Thatcher lunged at his brother to try and grab the cloth, not knowing or caring about its importance, and Fletcher leaped two feet into the air and landed three feet away from where he had been standing. The game of chase had begun and the mare was suddenly little more than an after thought.

For close to half of an hour Thatcher chased his brother about trying to seize the cloth from him. Fletcher, however, was a bit smarter than his brother and managed to evade all of Thatcher's snatches. The game only came to an end when the twins were both to tired to keep going. Playing chase was easy against other opponents. The twins could work together and take down any challenger. Playing chase or keep-away from each other was exhausting. They knew each other so well that they had to try a lot harder to do anything unexpected.

As their game came to a close Fletcher dropped the leg warmer on the ground and he and his brother looked at it. The sight of it laying there reminded them that they had not started this game alone. Thatcher spun around in a circle quickly to try and figure out where the unusual mare was and then a bit slower when he found that everything passing in a blur yielded no information. He found her precisely where they had left her, laying beneath a tree. "Back over there, Fletcher." He announced before trotting back to the mare finding that he still had some energy left. Fletcher secured the fabric in his mouth again before sauntering off after his younger brother.

They came to a stop in front of the mare with big smiles on their faces. Fletcher dropped her belonging before her. "Those are good play things!" Thatcher proclaimed boldly as Fletcher took a closer look at the mare's leg-warmer. He hadn't noticed it earlier when it had been without its match but seeing it next to the other he could easily see that it was covered in dents from his teeth and saliva from being in his mouth. Fletcher rammed his head into Thatcher's shoulder and nodded at the damaged cloth.

Thatcher looked at it then muttered a hesitant, "Oh." The twins looked to the mare nervously hoping that she wasn't upset. She hadn't seemed to care that they had used it to play or she would have stopped them but Fletcher doubted that she had expected it to get ruined. "We can...get you a new one?" The elder brother offered.
"Bark is durable." Thatcher suggested. It was also everywhere.

Identical faces lit up in hope when she declared that everything was alright. They fell moments later when she revealed that she wanted payment and rose again when she proclaimed that all she wanted was their names. Thatcher wasn't sure about Fletcher's state but his cheeks were getting sore from the quick changes in expression. Fletcher nodded his head in agreement to the terms and after she introduced herself as Alejandra he mimicked her and cleared his throat just as she had.

"Fletcher." The elder brother stated sounding unusually dignified for such a small foal. "And Thatcher." The younger of the two added as he adopted a serious face. "At your service!" They shouted together before bowing their heads. This was the type of introduction the twins had heard Lorenna make a few times. When she did it, however, she didn't end it in a fit of giggles as she straightened like Fletcher and Thatcher were currently doing. They found mimicry to be quite enjoyable and they had just gotten the opportunity to mimic two people in one introduction. Their earlier worries had all but evaporated with this new game.

Once their laughter settled down Fletcher focused on Alejandra again. "Are you sure it's okay?" He inquired nervously, somehow it didn't seem like a balanced trade. Thatcher stared at his brother hard looking like he had just been seriously betrayed. What if she added something? He didn't want to have to do anything else.