Honeyed Pasture ◊

"stupid, foolish boy!" elk charm snapped to herself as she stepped into a patch of bear droppings left amid this golden field. 
grey cloud had run away, because of course he had. elk charm stifled a shout of frustrated anger, forced to wipe her feet on the golden grass.
she was hungry, tired, and irritable. her paws hurt, her back hurt, and all for what? a stubborn stupid brother too foolish to understand that leaving beyond the glacier put him at the mercy of lanzadoii and muradoii alike!
incensed, elk charm continued to stalk, head held high as night threatened a whipping storm and a full deluge.

the field whispered beneath him—grass bent, not broken, wet with the scent of rot and rain to come. geirmundr did not follow the woman for sport. he followed because she moved. because something about her, all fire and spit in a storm’s mouth, reminded him of younger things. harsher things.
his coat—shadowed and scar-lined—shifted with his steps, silent but felt, like the heavy presence of something older than the land. when she hissed in her strange tongue, he stopped. just once. ears twitching.
a flick.
a grunt.
his breath curled from between his teeth, thick with heat and salt. she smelled of frustration and road dust, of lightning not yet fallen. alive.
he said nothing. only moved again, until the wind could carry his scent close enough to be known.

elk charm was being followed.
the life of a sharadoii woman was defined by men. a passive patriarchy, if she would be allowed to call it so. men hunted the glacier, and sometimes they crossed it to run with the lanzadoii caribou hunters for a time. but their wives did not follow, and certainly not their daughters.
sharadoii women were far too fair for the muddy eyes of those wild men.
their deep green valley with its sure-footed sheep and the wooden-homes; yes. it was where she had stayed, waiting to help the women butcher what the men brought back on return.
but there was no father here, no mother. no wooden-home. only elk charm in the open air and a stranger behind her. blood bear had acted like that — once. more than once.
she walked faster, blood pounding in her ears.

geirmundr moved like water through stone—slow, cold, inevitable.
he said nothing at first, only watched the way her gait shifted, the sudden rush in her stride. the flicker in her limbs betrayed her fear more than her eyes ever could. she was running.
from him?
he blinked once, expression unreadable beneath the rough lines of his face, the ancient stillness of his breath. his steps angled left, a quiet deviation, then again—until her path was no longer hers alone.
the woman was small, dark as night, and full of noise.
his shadow slipped into her way like a curtain drawn sudden. no snarl. no flash of teeth. only voice, deep and guttural, rolling out like old rock breaking loose from the cliffside.
hví skriker du so høyt?
his head tilted slightly, blood-dark eyes steady. he did not lunge. did not loom. but the earth between them felt held.

he was muradoii, yes? yes! oh; he was terrible to look at, and elk charm felt her gorge rise in fear.
the words were nothing she had heard before, and logic might have had its voice a moment ago; that sound was nothing like any caribou hunter tongue or pidgin elk charm had ever heard before.
but the girl had been reared upon tales of monsters, and as the man persisted, calling out, terror struck conscious thought. 
she flung a look over her shoulder, dark blue stretched wide with fear, before speed churned her limbs into a blur.
logic, too, might have pointed out that the sea was not close.
muradoii could not live so far from the salt.

geirmundr watched her run.
she was all dark limbs and flared nostrils, the whites of her eyes flashing like a spooked doe. fear bled off her in waves—raw, animal, thick in the air like rot before rain. he stood where she left him, broad and still, breath curling from his nostrils in slow huffs as he listened to the pound of her paws fade into distance.
he did not follow.
chh, a dry sound escaped his throat—disgust, maybe. or indifference.
his head turned, slow, a lazy tilt of muscle and bone. he spat to the side, shoulders twitching in a half-shrug, half-stretch.
ikke værd det.
he did not want her blood. he did not want her body. she was no prize—only a story trembling in the wail of birds, one that would run itself breathless long before he gave chase.
and so he turned, silent again, vanishing back into the brush like a beast that didn’t need to bite to leave its mark.

in her flight, elk charm could not see that he had never chased and did not follow. all her veneer of harsh older sister had vanished at this first challenge; instinct could only be grateful that her weakness was witnessed by spring and then summer. she had seasons to learn.
for now the sharadoii girl only ran in the flighty way of those ruminants hunted by her kith for their fine yellow skins; ran in the maddened, thoughtless manner of prey stricken to utter blankness.
muradoii thought would wear the face of that great, thunderous man.