Her bones ached.

Hilde's breaths left her with stuttering sighs as she tumbled down the slope, sliding over the frost-laden riverbank and halting by the ice's edge. Hours—days, maybe—had been spent on her limbs. Endlessly, she searched for the familiar face, his warm eyes...

The sentinel rose with a quiet grunt, withers jutting upwards and muscles taut with effort. Her pasterns burned, beseeched her to rest. But she refused. Her paws were planted on the cold, hard ground, claws digging downward against the strewn pebbles. Golden eyes swiftly shot across the fields ahead.

Where... was she?

The woman took tentative steps forward, hobbling with a new ache of a bruise against her shoulder, where she'd landed. Falling, seemingly, from nowhere. Her pink nose twitched, blowing vapor through the cool air.

A modicum of hope sparked in her chest that this was where he'd gone. Perhaps he hadn't left. Merely... disappeared.

Here.

Determination permeated through her mind. She would not halt now. The woman—short in height, yet broad in lean muscle—set off yet again, tail held stiffly over the snow's pristine surface.