I was now three weeks old when Dan didn't come to our box to pick us up in the morning as usual. He came an hour later than usual and this time he brought two halters. He opened the stall door and put the halter on my mother. She let it happen and didn't move until it was on her head.Now Dan came to me with the second halter. It was much smaller than my mother's and had the color dark green. I sniffed it. It smelled like another horse and like a stable. Carefully, Dan put a strap around my nose, but left the rest still dangling in his hand. I recoiled for a moment as it felt a bit like he was capturing my mouth, but when he put it over my nose a second time and I yawned profusely at that moment, I knew it was not.

Dan practiced putting the halter on with me every day until he dared to put it all the way over my head. Once that was accomplished, we now practiced walking beside him day after day. I was not allowed to walk in front of him and always had to keep my shoulder next to him. I was also not allowed to tug on the rope in the direction I wanted to go. I learned very quickly and I also enjoyed working with him, even though he sometimes threw a few suspicious glances at my star and mumbled something to himself that I couldn't understand.

Time passed and one morning not only Dan was standing in front of our box, but also a second man. When I looked closely, I realized that it was the man who had come when Bendit died. This made me a little nervous, but I stood still because my mother was doing the same. The man pushed open the door and spoke something to Dan. "Is that Cinderella?" he asked. Dan nodded.

"A magnificent broodmare," he commented.

"Oh, yes," Dan agreed with him. Then he stroked my mother's nostrils briefly, but then walked toward me. He eyed me briefly but insistently. "This is Nakitor?" It was more a statement than a question, "Beautiful, too. Who is his father?"

"I'm right there with you. I had Cinder covered by Naestor last year. This year, though, I'm thinking Furio might be a better fit. Look at his markings. I'm not sure it's not too big. Naestor also just barely got the award. Even though he has such a nice pedigree.

"The other just shrugged. "If he doesn't make it, give him to me and I'll give him to my sister. She has horse therapy, after all, and doesn't care about purebreds and perfect breeding."

"Let's not worry about that yet. It will be quite a while before we get there." The other nodded and flipped open the suitcase he had brought with him. He produced a small thing with a pointed needle covering a cap from a bag. He took the cap off and walked over to my hindquarters. "Hold it, please," he said.

Dan, who had put a halter on me in the meantime while they had been talking, now held it tightly so that I could almost not move my head now. Suddenly the syringe drove into my back and a stabbing pain drove into my hindquarters, so that I jerked up my head at the halter, blew my nostrils and straightened my ears in panic. A loud whinny escaped me. What had that been? Nervously I pranced back and forth and wanted to flee to the other side of my mother, but Dan held me tight. I stamped out with my hoof. 

"Maybe Percy, would be better suited as a therapy horse after all." said Dan"Oh by the way, we sent a genetic sample of him to the lab and now we know what is wrong with his color".

Dan let go of me and talking they left the barn. For today I did not come to the pasture anymore.

Over the next few days, my hindquarters still hurt a little bit when I moved frantically, but the pain quickly subsided. And when I told Sylvett and Darice about it, they said they also got this shot and their mothers called it "deworming".

Cassiopeia was now no longer with us in the pasture. She was now in the meadow across from us, where the young mares who were not expecting a foal this year or were covered for next year stood. Bendit was only her second foal, so Cassiopeia was only six years old. In the meadow where she stayed, there was also Estelle, the young Haflinger mare who was not very talkative. Often she stood at the fence of the paddock and looked, as it seemed, longingly into the distance. Sometimes Cassiopeia or other horses would come up to her, but she would just lower her head and walk away in silence. She was never seen galloping across the meadow, as young horses sometimes did. She preferred to lower her head into the grass and began to eat silently, by herself. 

Once I asked my mother about Estelle, but she didn't know exactly either. But what she knew, she did not want to tell me. She said it would still be too painful for my little foal ears.

Since then it interested me even more and I didn't want to let go, but my mother was as stubborn as I was and didn't give in to telling me.

At some point she just ignored the question and talked to the other mares or grazed with Heaven or Salvia. Soon I forgot about the question too and the days were getting warmer now. I was already two months old and Dan sometimes led us to the grooming area first and rubbed us down before we came back to the box in the evening. That was good, because I was usually sweating when I romped across the meadow with my friends. But I still liked Darice best. The others were nice too, but she was the first one I got to know of the other foals and she also understood when enough was enough and I needed a break or was hungry and didn't spur me on to play during that time, unlike Sylvett.Darice was really the best friend you could wish for.