Sun Mote Copse the little streams of alcohol come trickling down the rocks

All welcome!

NOTE: Each of the traveling threads is a day apart. ♥ This is day nine, March 29, 2017.

Whenever she could, Lotte waded in the river as Arturo led the pack south. The feeling of weightlessness was infinitely preferable to the ache that no longer seemed to have a beginning or an end — it was just a grueling, omnipresent force that put agonizing pressure on her joints, her back, her paws. Surefooted despite the heavy swelling of her absurdly rounded abdomen, the soot-stockinged rogue decided that risking a slip or two on the mossy riverbed was far better than having to call stops every half hour. It got harder to get up and get moving every single time, and the cramps were only getting worse. Often now they took her breath away, forcing her to stop in her tracks as she bit back the petulant whimpers and guttural groans that churned unspoken and curdled in her throat. The last one had been so sharp and painful that she’d bitten her lip, drawing blood. Panting raggedly, she hung her head as her Family trudged on, snapping weakly at the nearest wolf who showed concern. Over the past day or so she’d become volatile, as feral and non-communicative as Declan could be — a pain response that hadn’t reared its ugly head when the Donnelaith fires had chewed her up and spit her back out. The air whistled back into her lungs as she began moving again, whipping her head around to stare pointedly at her swollen sides from time to time. Her lips curled back, contorting into a grimace of discomfort as another cramp ripped through her. I want to stop, she gasped to herself, her ears flat against her head, and then: I am a soturi. Gathering up what shreds of dignity she could, she lifted her head proudly as she navigated the river that ran through the gold dust copse.