Judah

Judah is the one nobody called about.

NarroWay lost Blue on September 9, 2025, after 13 years on our stage. *Lord of Light* was coming, and the show needed a white horse, one who could come onto a dark stage through fog and moving light with loud music and sword combat around him. Animal care director Lora McCoy remembered a sponsorship for NarroWay's annual golf tournament from Lakewood Farm in Smyrna, South Carolina. She pulled up the website, saw horses, and called to ask about a white one.

Wanda Wood answered. After some thought she said she had two brothers who had never been separated, and one of them was white. If NarroWay would take both, she would give them to us.

So Judah came as part of the arrangement, and then earned his place in his own right.

He is a chestnut gelding with four white stockings. The sales video Lakewood made when the brothers were colts called him a flashy chestnut with four stockings, and that is still the first thing anyone says about him. He and Asher share a sire, LW Bellagios Legacy, and their grandsire was QR Excel, an Italian National Champion and a US and Canadian Reserve National Champion Stallion. The half-brothers were born on the same day, April 28, 2011, and have never been separated. Together they are the last of Wanda Wood's breeding program.

Neither had been in training for several years. Arabians are known for their fire, and two untested ones at once was a great deal to take on for a show opening in a matter of weeks. But Wanda had recently hired trainer Lindsey DuChaine, who arrived from Colorado with 18 years of experience, to work with some of her other horses, and after NarroWay's call she put DuChaine on the brothers at the next session. DuChaine got the white horse ready. She got the chestnut ready too.

Judah and Asher arrived at NarroWay on September 18, 2025. Sixteen days later, on October 4, both walked out for the opening of *Lord of Light*. Two horses in one production was something we had never done. Asher came as the white horse of Revelation, the horse who comes with Jesus. Judah came as the red horse, announcing destruction, which is a fitting first assignment for a horse with his temperament.

"These boys were meant for such a time as this," NarroWay co-founder Yvonne H. Clark said. "It's a lot for an animal to handle, but they embraced it beautifully."

Judah was not his name when he got here. In Scripture, when God changed someone's purpose, He often gave them a new name. These horses came to NarroWay for a new purpose, so with Wanda's approval, we renamed them. Judah means praise, or praised. We had lost a horse we loved and found ourselves with two, and there is no accounting for that except to say God took our grief and returned a double blessing.

Judah is the leader of the herd. From the smallest animal in the barn lot to the tallest, when Judah gives an instruction, the others follow. He is the higher-spirited of the brothers and the quicker to react, and he takes a little longer than Asher to work something out. But when Judah gets something, he truly gets it.

He has a tickle spot on his neck. Scratch it and he will stretch his neck out as far as it will go. Like his brother, he works for carrots, and after a training session the two of them will stand around waiting to be paid for a good day. In the lot they are usually together, although Asher finishes breakfast first and goes to stand in the shade while Judah takes his time. They let the donkeys keep company with them, and the camels, who occasionally wear on their patience.

Judah did not come from a hard past either. He was bred, raised, and loved, and when NarroWay had a need, the Wood family offered him for something bigger than a pasture. "I was thrilled for the boys to have a purpose," Wanda said, "especially this purpose."

Since the brothers arrived, we have put both of them in every production we can. When a show calls for only one horse, Asher and Judah alternate the part. Out in Wanda's field they were eye candy. They are a great deal more than that now.