Ashfeather marveled at the majesty of the Trap. "Why isn't there a herd here already?" she asked. Mossfire replied, folding his wings on his back. "The Trap is dangerous. I've been finding dying things al over. The Trap will not live forever. There are also lots of poisonous plants here." Stormflight interjected, saying, "How could we live here if the forest is dying?" Mossfire replied, "We can save the forest. We could find the root of it and cut it off." Graystripe looked at Mossfire. "Or we could find another place to settle, maybe get a herd to accept us." Mossfire sighed. "It was worth a try. We could leave for Sun Herd in the morning." Ashfeather nodded in agreement, and Mossfire led the other weanlings to a hollow log in the canter of the Trap. The foals slept there, cozy until they heard a twig snap outside. Ashfeather lifted her head, frozen for a second, then peeked outside the log. A wolf looked back at her. Ashfeather screamed, waking the others, and then she kicked at the wolf. It did no harm because her hooves weren't sharpened, and Mossfire leaped in front of her. The wolf struck Mossfire's wooded wings, sending a shock through the colt's body, but otherwise unharming him. The four foals flew past the tree, leaving the wolf behind. They flew over the trees, barely looking at their surroundings until they were sure that they had lost the predator. They landed on a bed of moss. "Where are we, Mossfire?" Ashfeather asked. Mossfire looked around. "I don't know," he said. "We're lost."

Mossfire flew up to greet the three incoming pegasi. Stormflight and Graystripe balked at the sight of Mossfire's wooden wings, just able to let the weanling carried by them fly. But Ashfeather kept her position, willing to be the spokesperson for her group. "Who are you?" She asked. "I'm Mossfire," Mossfire answered. "I live here. Do you want to be part of my herd?" Ashfeather looked skeptical. "What's up with your wings?" The answer tumbled out of Mossfire's mouth. He didn't even know it until he said it. "The Trap is my sire," Mossfire said. At this, Stormflight and Graystripe retreated even further away from Mossfire. Seeing her friends' discomfort, with some embarrassment, Ashfeather nodded her neck in affirmation. "We'll join your herd," she said. "What is it called?" Mossfire thought about this a little. Finally, he decided. "We are Forest Herd," he said.

Mossfire soared through the jetstream until he arrived at the Trap, making a clean, instinctive exit out of the jetstream. He dropped down on a patch of moss, spreading his wooden wings wide. A few birds came to land on him, and he made the Trap his home. Mossfire never had a mare to feed him milk, so he weaned himself, grazing on grass in clearings. He was six moons old now, at about the age that normal pegasi would be weaned. He would wander the Trap every day, finding good places to graze, and he'd settle in some hollow log every night. He occasionally strayed to the borders of Snow Herd lands, become more of a local legend than his mom had been. He was called the Wooden Pegasus. Ashfeather was a weanling in Snow Herd. Her dam was a mare named Grasscloud, her sire was the overstallion, Coldwing, and she liked to play with other weanlings. One day, she and her best friends, Stormflight and Graystripe, decided to play a prank on Coldwing. They found some red berries in the woods, and, laughing, put them in a patch of grass reserved for Coldwing, hiding them in a way that they were sure that he would eat them. "This'll be our best prank yet," Ashfeather said to her friends. They watched in excitement as Coldwing ate in his special patch. They saw the red juice on his muzzle, and they also saw when Coldwing started to collapse, shaking, in the throes of death. Grasscloud came up to Ashfeather, shaking her wings in anger. She knew her filly's pranks when she saw them. "What have you done?" Grasscloud said. "We fed Coldwing some berries, hoping he would taste the bitterness." "You did more than that, you awful filly. You fed Coldwing deathberries. You killed your sire." "No!" "You are banished from your herd, Ashfeather, along with your friends." In anger, Grasscloud walked away. Ashfeather and her friends, left with no choice, flew off to the Trap. Mossfire watched them come, giddy with excitement. He could start his own herd now.