[private] and its harder than you think

[Nashua]

Perhaps it was because Bolder was just recently so close to the heavens, but he feels an ache in his young chest. It had been exhilarating up there, with nothing but shadow and starlight surrounding him. His father had explained the dangers of flying at night - and the importance of learning how to read the constellations - but his excited mind doesn't regard the caution or the risk in it.

The evening air had felt free, and for a boy who had been raised underneath the dense Taigan canopy, it was the closest he had come to dreaming.

Bolder steps back, allowing Ryatah to extend her wing wider and the yearling dips his head as he watches the stardust come glittering from her gilded feathers. "I didn't get that close," the young pegasus laments. The stars had been silent, twinkling things far above even the heights that they had flown. He glances back to his father, who had taken a step closer to the pair, and catches the surprise on his face. "I am," he admits, and then drops his gaze down to Bolder who peers curiously up at them both.

He doesn't know how to explain the disappearance of Lilliana or his brother, and so the chestnut stallion gives a practiced smile until she mentions Noel. His expression changes visibly, and Nash suddenly understands why the dark eyes of the other mare seem so soul-stirring. He knows who she is before she speaks her name, but the Freyr softens regardless. "I do," he replies back to her, with a hint of his old daredevil smile.

The one that had coaxed Noel to follow him that day into the clouds.

"Bolder," he tells the younger pegasus, "this is your grandmother." The North was built on the principle of family, and Nashua felt grateful that those bonds continued to extend beyond their borders. He recalls that Noel had been born in Nerine, but last she had told him, Ryatah had long moved on. "Are you still in Hyaline?" Nashua asks while cocking a hindleg, curious as to what brought her out to the Common Lands.

As Northerners, they rarely left their own country.

"Do you know Aunt Maze?" Bolder interjects, excited to make the connection and beams up at his angelic relation. "Or Uncle Gale?"

@Ryatah