She awoke with her fur dusted in snow. The last she recalled, the sky had been consumed by dark clouds and warning rumbles of the gods. A brilliant bolt of lightning had torn through the sky.

There was only silence here, and the cold bite of winter. She stood, testing dark limbs; they felt whole and undamaged. She could not remember if they had looked like this before, or if the weight of her own fur was familiar. But her belly snarled with hunger, and she put such questions from her mind.


The first soul she sent across the sea belonged to a rooster. He hadn’t had time to use his spurs. Red blood dripped onto the white snow that filled the crumbling remains of the coop. The hens scattered with frantic clucks, and grew silent.

Consumed by her meal, she did not hear footsteps crunching in snow.