The Teekon wilderness had been ravaged. Once lush and beautiful, Kierkegaard found himself wondering how long it had taken to fall to chaos. The locusts had littered the land. The trees were stripped bare by the wicked insects. The famine that followed was ravaging the wolves who called it home. The ashen nomad could not determine how long he would allow himself to stay under such conditions. He had survived on his own for the vast majority of his life, and he knew enough of starvation to understand that it would only bring death to those around it.
 
The coast had offered him shore-washed fish that tasted of bile and brine, but he had found that hunger would drive him to eat nearly anything. And since arrival, the ghostly figure had spent his time teetering near the borders of Caiaphas’ pack. In spite of this, Kierkegaard was not a beast of the water. When he was not scrounging for scraps of food, the ashen male lurked along the cliffs.
 
Standing on a jutting crag of rock, the Sairensu male cast curious golden eyes to the honey-hued woman. She seemed to have come to the same conclusion that he had; locusts could not drive animals from the sea. Still, as curious as he was, the ragged creature kept his distance and watched.