They called the place Dead Tree. Moselotte and Kierkegaard DeMonte-Sairensu were born beneath a felled and enormous Pacific redcedar in a lush British Columbian forest to an aging traveller, Simha DeMonte-Sairensu, and his enigmatic companion, Isolde Vartaj.

In their youngest, most innocent months, they played and grappled together in the shadow of that massive tree trunk, and when they were just old enough to fend for themselves, they were moved from it and ultimately left with a pack that lived nearby. Neither child would distinctly remember their parents, but they were told stories by the wolves who had taken them in. It seemed that at least one of their parents had a knack for weaving these stories, because they were the only images that the children would ever have, and yet they were marvellously vivid with exquisite detail.

Soon after the two siblings learned to hunt, they left their guardians and set off to travel on their own. Despite the hardships they faced, the two lived out an intrepid mercenary lifestyle together for years, and their largely unspoken bond never wavered. Until it finally did.

The travellers pledged themselves to Ouroboros Spine in Autumn 2014 [1], but Moz quickly became restless and took to scouting often and long enough that her scent faded from the mountain entirely. There was nothing unusual in her behaviour given she was both growing older and in heat.

Weeks later, she was furious to learn that Kierkegaard had found and taken a tiny child. Unable to quell her rage that he would so carelessly jeopardize their livelihood and put both of them at risk even with his injured hock in mind, she took off on her own without a word.

As the rest of her years wore on she did eventually forgive him, albeit quietly and in heart; she never saw him again. Words would never know what he had meant to her.