She wasn’t smooth. She almost hit a few trees. She jumped a few times when I didn’t think she should’ve. She could’ve gone down, broken an ankle, but she kept going with sheer will. Her face was sideways at times, her body too. She was neighing and whinnying, and sounding terrified as we lumbered to an awkward stop a few inches from the fence line.

Brody and I both lifted our legs so they weren’t crushed, and I shoved Brody off. He jumped to the fence at the end of the field, and she jerked aside.

She was too crazed.

I was running my hand down her neck, but she was beyond listening to me.

She reared up, and I let go.

I fell to the ground—hard—and heard Brody shout, but I rolled with it and went cleanly under the fence. I stood as Shiloh tore back through the woods.

I sighed. “She’s pissed at me.”

I saw people running down from the house, but I didn’t want to waste more time.

I thrust a hand at Brody. “Give me your pack.”

“What?”

I nodded at his sweatshirt tied around his waist. “That too. The girls will need warmth when I find them.”

He didn’t move, so I unclipped his pack from around his shoulders. It fell into my hands, and I started riffling through it.

He had all the essentials, even a lightweight tent and blanket.

I nodded my approval. “This is good. Really good.”

“What are you doing?” His voice rose. He gestured in the direction Shiloh tore off in. “She just took off. You have no fast way to find the girls.”

The people were closing in. They were through the first fence and would be down the field to us in no time. Finn, Abby, Gayle, and another woman I didn’t recognize.

I climbed back over the fence before securing his pack on my back. “What are your niece’s names?”

“Wha—” He cursed and then rubbed a hand over his face. “You aren’t joking, are you?”

“I have to go now. I can’t wait and answer their questions. I only have so long before dark falls. Their names, Brody. I need to know what to call them.”

“Ambrea and Alisma.”

I nodded and moved to step away, but he reached for me.

“Wait! They both have blonde hair. Ambrea’s is almost white, if that helps.”

It did. Any little bit did. “What do they like?”

“Brody!”

“Morgan!”

They were almost to us.

“What do they like, Brody?” I raised my voice.

“Uh—” He looked back at the impending arrival and then snapped back to me. “Unicorns and mermaids. They used to like princesses, but I don’t know if they still do.”

Unicorns. Mermaids.

I could work with that.

“I have to go.”

“Morgan!”

I ignored Finn and started running away.

“Morgan!”

I kept going, and once I was through the first line of trees, I started calling, but I changed my whistle. I kept going. I kept calling, and after I walked a mile, I felt the steps before I saw her coming.

She was walking toward me, among the trees, with her dark eyes and her ethereal white coat. She wasn’t fearful or frantic. She was calm. She was steady. She was coming because I needed her to help me save two little girls the same way she once saved me.

Shoal had come.

Morgan

I made my decision.

As I rode Shoal and she picked her way over the land, I knew this was the first of my last rides with this mare. It was nearing her time when she would go. I knew Shiloh was extra touchy because she would have a foal next summer. It was time. I felt it in my bones, and when he came back and I saw him again, I knew it was my time too.

This had come full circle.

I was the little girl who ran into the woods so long ago.

I was the one they sent a search party to find.

Shoal was the one who took me away then, and it was right that she was the one to go with me to find the girls.

I didn’t know if they would be alive when—or if—I found them, but I felt they would be. I glanced down at Shoal and corrected myself—when she found them. I was trusting her. If she picked up a new scent, she would alert me, but until that time happened, I was near tears.

I loved this mare.

She was my mother in ways, and most of the time, I felt as if my mom was a part of Shoal. Shoal always cared for me. She always watched over me, and after she had Shiloh, she guarded me from a distance. She was content to let Shiloh be my sister. And just like any other sister, Shiloh would forgive me for forcing Brody onto her. It wouldn’t change what I felt coming, though.

Change.

As soon as he stood on that walking path, I knew I would be leaving with him.

She began resisting me then.

After all this was done, I would go and find Shiloh. I would make sure things were okay between us. I needed her, and even if my return trips back to her took longer, I would still need to come.

Shiloh was as much of me as Shoal was . . . as Brody had become.

There was a part of me that would remain wild. But there was a part of me that remembered I was also human, and that was what Brody unleashed before he left.

I didn’t understand it.

I would never understand why it was Brody who brought me back to life any more than I would understand the connection between us. It didn’t make it any less real, and I could no longer live without it.