Sunlight filtered through the trees and figures moved around him. Nightfall was used to this. He watched the shadows as they moved and as they disappeared - nothing more than specters, ghosts, remnants of memories. Even as the years passed, Nightfall still did not know the meaning of the things he saw. Or rather, they had no meaning. They meant nothing. But being devoid of meaning did not invalidate existence, and they lingered, ghosts in the corners of his life. They were not real. And yet, when a dark figure pushed through the bushes, he looked up.
This one, he knew.
This one was real.
"...Mother"
The mare raised her her head. The flames that licked her body flared up, flickering in the wind. There was no smile on her face, only a sad sort of misery. When her eyes caught on him, they softened, and his name left her mouth like a sigh.
"Nightfall"
And though he had never seen her in this form, and though he did not know of her ascension, and though he had not seen her at all in his dreams - Nightfall knew with certainty that the mare in front of him was his mother. For he had seen it before, many times, the mare on fire.
He knew, before she knew, only he did not know it at the time.
"Why have you come to me," he asked, "after all this time?"
"The swamp led me here. I have come to bless your children."
Children... children meant that a doe he'd slept with had taken with child. Nightfall thought of all the does he had slept with recently. Perhaps the dark one - with blue markings. Yes, probably her. He had to find her. He had to find the children. If they were his, then they would inherit his blood - his mother's blood - and they would need someone to guide them. He would not leave them to stumble through their childhood, burdened by some power they didn't understand.
"I don't need your blessings. Just tell me where they are."
If the rejection hurt, Burning Bush did not show it. She stepped forward towards her son - whom she had last seen as a foal. She had seen him grow in her dreams and had visited his own dreams more than once. But she knew that he would not forgive her for that voyeurism. She leaned forward and pressed her nose against his forehead.
"To the south. May they be safe."
And happy, the mare though, may they be happy and may they be spared the pain you lived through.
Nightfall looked once at his blazing mother, and then he turned south. He did not look back.