Gerry Broome / AP

Megan Chance and her son Alex visit with Burma. left, and Lulu in Washington, N.C., Jan. 31. Megan rode Burma as a child in New Jersey and planned to bring her to North Carolina where she was starting a new stables. But, after leaving her on a year breeding contract, Burma vanished. For years Megan searched in vain, eventually deciding her horse must be dead. Last summer, Burma was rescued from the "kill pen" at a New Jersey auction and test facility and the two were recently reunited.

Gerry Broome / AP

An old portrait of a young Burma is shown in the home of Megan Chance.

The mare was tall and spirited and a joy to behold, galloping across the pasture with her head high. Everyone thought Burma was a beauty — no one more than Megan Chance. For six years, she and the thoroughbred she received at 16 were inseparable. But after college, Chance needed to board her beloved horse while she went away for a few months. That proved a turning point in Burma's life, which then followed a twisting path from a breeder's barn to an equine medical lab and even to the "kill pen" at a horse auction, from which a Connecticut rescuer spared her just in time, then posted her picture online. "Oh my God, she's alive," exclaimed Chance when a friend sent her the photo. Last month, after years apart, they were reunited in North Carolina. And now, said Chance: "I intend to spoil her and love her and pamper her and watch her grow old."

-- Reported by the Associated Press

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Gerry Broome / AP

Megan Chance rides Burma for the first time since the two were reunited, Jan. 31.