Sunset Valley I want a heart unbreakable

When she next knew herself, the woman found that she really didn't know at all. She didn't know how she'd gotten here, or when or why, or even where exactly here really was.

Truth be told, she couldn't even remember her own name.

But these things seemed secondary. How could they not? The little silver wolf had woken a mess of congealed blood, bruises and deep cuts, fractured bones in her chest and one of her hinds. It didn't feel like much... but slowly, everything began to ache fiercely. Slowly, the woman realized she might truly die this way.

Even so, she pressed on; inland, unaware that all she loved had always lived by the sea. It'd been lost, like everything else, to the water.

As if a bird had raised her up and dropped her here.

Athens watched from a distance at first. Tentatively danced a step closer and closer when he realized her state was sadder than his own. Various little cuts along his own frame, a figure that had turned pointedly lean.

His teeth clipped against the wind. Vied for her attention now.

He was pale and gilded; a stranger to her, yet he seemed familiar in some nameless way. Marina halted to regard him in silence for a moment. Words were lost to her, at least in these first few seconds. What could she say? Her, a woman who could not even tell her own name.

Do you know what this place is called? She called out finally in a too-soft, wavering voice. It would be obvious, she thought, that she was lost. There was nothing to be done for the admission, not when she knew that there was no hope of being found otherwise.

Small and pale and broken.

Lost and wayward.

It was hawkish eyes that watched her now with an interest. He wanted to know what had left her like this. How had she come to such a sorry state?

A valley, was his unceremonious dry answer. Are you looking for somewhere? He cut their distance and found himself with a small taste of confidence for it.

A valley. Her hackles twitched, eyes sharpening, but Marina spoke none of the biting words which came to mind. Instead she lingered for a moment over his question, reasoning to herself as her agitation cooled that perhaps he had no other answer for her. Maybe he was as lost as her.

If I am, I don't know it. Or I don't remember, rather, The beginnings of a grimace tugged at her mouth as she spoke, but Marina held her emotions at bay. No sense in crying over it. Not while she might die anyway. Are you?

Not knowing and not remembering were wildly different.

He picked up on this little clue and held it in his mind.

No, and it was the truth as far as he was concerned. Done with looking for things, he thought. Yet he wondered how long that would last. The yearn to fill the void within him was always there.

He thought he felt the itch now.

You should settle somewhere. Heal up a little.

Do you have somewhere in mind?

Her question was earnest, but perhaps a hint of challenge lurked in it too. The man was bold to make such a suggestion, presumptuous even. Marina couldn't help but press for some kind of substance behind it, if only to see whether it existed at all.

Words alone meant so little; indolent at best, arrogant at worst. She didn't see arrogance in him, though. Maybe he truly just didn't care to do anything but make inane observations. But why stop her at all, then?

He did not like the question, even if it was very valid.

However he decided this might be his next fix, his newest balm. Do a good deed and feel some small piece of himself as normal again. It never lasted but it was always enough to keep him going.

Yeah, He did not. She did not need to know this. You're going to need to keep walking for a while longer first, though.

Mainly so that he could form an idea.

She also did not need to know that.