Firefly Glen Shut me up

Decay

An inevitable process.

For all, even the infallible.

Maggots diving in and out of every orifice, eating away. The stench of rot hanging in the air, even one so depraved as her could scarce stand the overwhelming mist of death. There was a terrible dread that permeated through her skin, icy tendrils grasping at her heart, begging her instincts to take heed.

Kovictus, dead and ripped to pieces when she'd found him, and if such a large formidable man could've been so easily dispatched, what could happen to her? @Lorcan's warnings only now seemed to find a place in her mind, the seeds of doubt taking sprout. She feels a deep guilt for her departure, but soon it swirls with all her other guilts and fades into the silence.

She was such a stupid thing, blinded by sweet promises and honeyed whispers. She chastises herself while she walks, mutterings of self-deprecation rolling from a tongue whose sharpness was once reserved for others.

It is fine. She is a survivor. Terribly lonely as it made her to be one.

Wretched silver finds a tall, bare tree and crouches beneath it, jaws of hers finding the pearly white of thin forelimbs and gnawing at the skin, her teeth chatter and click, and soon the taste of iron soaks her tongue.

Why is it that she can only find peace of mind in the tearing of sinews and the warm taste of life? She does not know. It's not even something she's aware she's doing until the fronts of each leg are stained with hues of scarlet, the droplets drip drip dripping down to the soil. She lays her head flat to the ground to watch it.

Her tail curls closer to her hide protectively, and in her eyes is nothing but an empty, contemplative stare.

Death and decay were the end of all creature. An inevitability bound to beings that so greatly feared it. Even when one's end meant the beginning and persistence of another.

The dead fed the scavengers, their bones the soil. In turn, the soil bears the plants and feeds the prey. The prey feeds the wolf, and the wolf dies once they can feed no more.

Both cyclical and web-like in nature, the balance of life and death. The survival of one was often earned at the death of another.

Hawthornn too feared the end; his own end. As was the nature of a beast.

So it was his nose he followed, as the rancid tang of iron dispersed on the air. His hope for a meal benefited by the misfortune of another.

It was misfortune he found, but no meal.

The silvered huntress he had met in the cedar forest. The white fur of her limbs stained with crimson. Her scarlet eyes empty and despondent.

"Who did this to you?" Was a thought that came to mind, but Hawthornn knew the answer. He could see the stain upon her chin. 

The young Goldenwoode's approach is made openly. No skulking behind the bend or stalking through the trees. He makes to join her at her tree, but stops a few strides short.

His voice is level, but tempered by gentleness, as he asks, Do you need help?