---

Hawthorn <3

“Old man?”

She had slept, and slept well, for the first time she could remember. Since before Khun had died. But looking at her companion, she couldn’t say the same for him.

“Still alive?”

She didn’t even know his name, which Yakone meant to rectify. Unless he’d died overnight.

Gods, he’s decrepit.

She’s thin, sure, but at least her bones aren’t snapping apart. Yakone prides herself that the makeup of her ancestral body is strong, the youthful muscles in her runner’s legs and down her spine still supple and warm even in this cruel winter. She moves briskly away, giving ample room for the old hunter to rise.

“You need a moment? Need to do a warm-up, or something?”

“Yeah, yeah. The valley.” Muradoii is already bursting into a youthful lope, the anticipation of a hunt arming her limbs to break heavier drifts. Fel winds scrape down the ridge, carrying crisp odors of slate and pine. Further below, the valley spreads like a pale chalice, mist hanging thick and low in its belly.

From a higher ledge she descends, landing heavily in the powdered sedge and shooting her glittery red challenge back at the old man.

“Just try not to break a hip coming down.”

He’s good at being insufferable.

She is too. Yakone gives him nothing but a hyperbolic eye role before plunging off into the frosted thickets. The day is dim, but clear enough that she can now discern bush from bramble. Claws tear at the earth to release scents, muradoii spurning the scurry of ground squirrels and lesser rodents in favor of something large and more worthy of their hunt.

“Think there’s deer here?”