Lilitu had come within sight of the great, red mesa of Akashingo, but she had turned away as quickly as it emerged over the horizon, tail all but tucked between her legs.
And, so, she found herself here.
Wolves had lived here, once. How? Her thoughts were of disgust as she trudged through the cold, dark mire, the eastern swamp of the forest.
Still, it was preferable to being seen again in Akashingo. To find them staring at her grossly changed visage.
Once a beauty; once desired. And now. . .
Her stomach clenched and roiled, audibly gurgling. She'd eaten some meat on the edge of fair and foul, dug from an old cache, and it had tipped toward the latter.
Once upon a time, she had everything she could ever want.
Now, she was perilously close to shitting water in this awful place.
What on earth had happened?
the more he roamed the more there was. not just the sunlit sands, but flowing hills covered in the familiar snow he had grown up with, and run from.
he found his way north until he found a forest. he had never seen so many trees in one place! the earth felt spoiled beneath his touch - rotted and soft where it should have been frozen - and as he had never seen a marsh before, he felt certain this was the truth.
agakiggruk lamented to himself; he saw this forest as the manifestation of the dark he had fled, and thought for certain he had gone too far off-course in this afterlife place. he wished to find the light again, where it was safe.
there was movement low among the weave of shadows - and he stared after this soft-coated marvelous creature that appeared to radiate in the dark.
Once, Lilitu had been coddled and sheltered enough to perhaps startle at the sound. Even in her travels, she'd been with companions, and had never needed to be overly wary. There was always a lookout—someone with ears much keener.
But moons alone with nothing but her thoughts for company had sharpened her instincts, and she hears the man coming long before his ruddy coat emerges from the murky darkness.
You don't live here, do you?
Lilitu asked, only a touch of sarcasm in her voice. His answer, after all, could be an emphatic "yes." I—
A sudden cramp in her gut nearly brought her to her knees, and she sucked in a gasping breath. Then, another. Sorry, 'm sorry,
she mumbled, seizing the last vestiges of her manners before she broke into a plodding trot to hide within some nearby bushes before her bowels got the better of her.
The relief was palpable, but the shame was as horrid as the smell.
What had happened to put her in this place?
he wanted it to be sulukinak! that was the only name that came to mind when he found the scent of the stranger; this woman, who looked more like a sister than a mother. he did not want to think of his mother — or how he had failed her.
it was not her. it was someone else, some stranger lost in the dark the same way he was.
she spoke to him! it had been so long since agakiggruk had experienced a proper conversation, but she saw him, he was there and he was real, and her words sounded so loud to his ears! and then, she was shitting.
he slunk to where she'd hidden herself. if the smell was off-putting he gave no indication.
she was all apologies; he'd latched upon her question and been formulating a response all this time, and said, i don't.
a little too late to make sense, probably. poking his head around the bush where he could see her crumpled legs, maybe make out an ear that had turned back.
its so dark, here.
It's so dark, here.
I know,
Lilitu replied. She began to shift away from the steaming pile, making a wide circle around the man, shivering, shaking herself as if she could rid illness from her the way one shed raindrops from pelt.
I don't like it,
she admitted. I kind of just came in here to get away from somewhere I knew.
She cocked her head, one bright green-yellow eye finding his own face. Why are you here?
No one came to this forest of their own volition—she was sure of it.