Al and Devi

Devi had always been a lone mare. She grew up on a farm all alone with no other horses, so she didn't really know how to interact with other horses. She wanted nothing to do with the other horses at Elysian Eventing, especially the stallions.

A few days after she arrived, the trailer pulled into the driveway and off came a tall stallion that looked to be the same age as her. She watched curiously from the pasture as he was unloaded. She had never seen a horse that looked even remotely similar to him. He was incredibly unique. As he backed out of the trailer, he accidentally stepped off the side of the ramp, sending him into an utter panic. He pulled the lead rope out of the hands of the woman helping him and took off. He galloped between two of the pastures, one of which happened to be the one Devi was in. She galloped after him on the other side of the fence trying to catch up. The space between the pastures was coming to an end and she tried to call out to him to get him to stop. At the end of the aisle, he didn't even hesitate and jumped the fence, landing at the back of Devi's pasture. Slowly, he began to settle down in the pasture as he galloped around in there. The whole time Devi watched him from a distance, making sure to stay out of this crazy stallion's way.

After another five minutes of galloping around the pasture, the stallion abruptly stopped and looked around. He exchanged a brief glance with Devi and slowly approached her. Devi immediately backed up and looked for a way out of the interaction. Unfortunately for her, she had been watching him run around earlier while stood in the corner of the pasture so as she backed up, she only managed to corner herself. The stallion came right up to her, disregarding her nervous glances, and began to sniff her flank. This caused Devi to turn around and begin kicking at him, trying her best to get him to back off. The stallion narrowly avoided her flying hooves and wandered off to go eat grass. Devi watched him walk off with curiosity in her eyes and slowly followed after him. She stopped about 20 feet away from him and dropped her head to eat as well.

The woman that had unloaded the stallion was still running around the stable, trying to figure out where the runaway stallion ended up. She ran past the pasture he was in but then doubled back after finally seeing him. She walked up to the fence and laid her arms across the highest beam.

"Well would you look at that," she said to herself. "Devi willingly within the same mile as a stallion? That's new..." She watched the two horses interact with one another in the pasture for a few more minutes. Eventually, Devi found herself grazing right next to the stallion.

"Devi," the woman called out, "meet Al! Seems you two are gonna be friends!"

Devi picked up her head and looked at the stallion known as Al for a moment, then quickly returned to grazing with her new interest.