Sulukinak pressed forward, low and fluid, paws finding the thinnest crust where snow had drifted shallow against buried rock. The hare-scent thickened with every stride—warm, sharp, laced with the faint musk of fear-sweat and crushed pine needles. Fresh. Minutes old, no more. The trail curved west along a narrow gully where wind had scoured the snow to ice in patches, leaving dark streaks like veins across white bone.

She dropped to her belly without breaking stride, ears pinned forward, eyes locked on the faint depressions ahead: small, even prints, the telltale scuff of hind legs kicking snow as the hare bounded. She crept, shadow-silent, the scar along her belly brushing cold crust without complaint. Behind her, Bogart followed—lower now, head down, trying to match her rhythm.
His bulk made the snow complain under every shift of weight, but he moved slower, deliberate. The effort registered in the hollow inside her: not useless. Not yet.

The trail led them to a cluster of wind-bent spruce, branches heavy and low, forming a natural screen. Sulukinak froze at the edge, nostrils flaring. The hare was there—crouched beneath the lowest boughs, ears flat, body pressed to frozen earth. White-on-white camouflage, but the scent betrayed it: pulse racing, breath quick and shallow.

The hare bolted.

Not toward her. Not toward him. It exploded from cover in a white blur, zigzagging between trunks, hind legs kicking snow in frantic arcs.

Rune Discovery : 「 Failure」 

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Yours is an alliance of convenience and instinct both. A test in sharing, something that will prove whether cooperation is meant to bring another day with a full belly, or one more step closer to cold starvation.

It matters. It means something. But today, only the wind and the snow bear witness.