The Heartwood things lost to the flames

He flinched at her touch. She noticed he stopped himself halfway, but he still had flinched. Taken aback, she took a couple of steps in reverse, making a small sound in surprised apology. But she spoke no more of it, instead listening silently to his words about his father and brother.

"When I left about a month or so ago," she began, in answer to his question, "my brother Ichiro--the eldest son--his mate, Taani, my only sister, Tsukiko, and my youngest brother Moro were still alive." She gulped, then, thinking of the two she had lost. Varick may have recoiled from her, but her body warmed from the memory of her younger brothers curled up near her, as pups, when she was a yearling.

"I had two other brothers: Jiro and Saburo. Jiro was a good kid--but pretty unstable, emotionally. Saburo was a terror--but sweet, deep down." She smiled at the memory of the latter's antics, and the former's words of deep wisdom, far beyond his age. The smile left when she saw their bodies again in her mind's eye. "They were the next season's litter after me and Ichiro, so a year younger. When my dad died, they each thought they knew what was best for the family, and decided to challenge Ichiro for leadership."

Miyako shuddered, knowing what came next. "He could have just. . .ran them off, when they decided to fight him. I begged him to let them go. But Jiro struck first, then Saburo. . .and he murdered them both." She bowed her head, silently praying for their souls. "Ichiro was bigger and stronger. Older, more experienced. He could have--he should have--chased them away."

She looked back up at Varick. "My brother had promised me I would be alpha female. But he made his mate alpha instead. . .and honestly, I don't know if I could have stayed after what he did to my family." Letting out a shivering breath, she wrapped up her story with the quick aside, "My mother died in childbirth with her last litter. Only one out of three pups born survived--Moro. It was a hard birth."

Feeling exhausted after voicing her tale aloud for the first time since it had all gone down, she settled onto her haunches, closing her eyes and leaning her weight back, stretching her back muscles. Every emotion she had worked so hard to suppress over the last month was now coursing through her veins like hot blood, and she struggled to keep composed as he had when he had come across her in the forest.

Miyako rolled her head to look at him once more, after a few moments of silence, her face blank. "Shit, I had forgotten that you asked me about trades," she said, breaking into a chuckle. "Uh, no. We didn't really do trades, just sort of pitched in wherever we were needed. I'm a pretty good hunter, and since both of my parents were sort of sketch and wandered off a lot, I raised the younger kids, too."