Sleeping Dragon identity

In the morning Indra led them south. Away from the woods, across the open expanse where she'd spotted large deer that she'd never seen before; they were impressive, but more formidable than the two of them could handle.

By midday they had travelled to the foothills of the Sleeping Dragon. Breakfast had long since passed them by at this point. Neither had eaten, so the promise that Indra had given to @Colt the night before lay stale between them.

She found the scent of clean water and it tempted her onward; she stopped upon the bank of it and lapped a few times, only to pause and look over her shoulder upon hearing the sound of something - or someone - moving nearby.

sooner or later colt would need to get back to natigvik and speak with sadey, maybe even sus out reno. if they were to get gone, it needed to be by the arrival of the snow.
he was hungry and irritated. his steps were rangy, long; he shot several glances at indra as they traveled. she was bright against the terrain and the rising shape of the great mountain.
his ears lifted toward the noise. "coyote," he chuffed, and set off at a killer's slink along the recent trail.

Colt came over the rise and down to where Indra watched, but he moved with determination and showed little interest in her. His claim that it was some pest animal brought some interest out of Indra - her ears forward, her eyes bright.

He went off along the trail and Indra's eyes swept the forest before she moved to follow him, trying to adjust her stride to keep well behind, and low, and quick.

This wasn't the breakfast she'd had in mind but, beggars couldn't be choosers, or something of that effect.

colt hadn't forgotten that this was meant to be her job. but he would not pass up the opportunity for a kill. coyotes often guarded carrion, something he and indra could easily take.
the tree cover thickened, then opened into a small clearing blocked by the high stone face of the mountain on the other side.
a coyote stood there, circling, panting. it turned with a frightened yelp to see the wolves. colt's lips sharpened into a cold grin. "well there. lunch if anythin.'"

When they came upon the scene the coyote was standing there, surprised yes, but just watching them and wheeling about with a shrieking voice. It reminded her of being very young and very frightened, herself. She didn't like the screaming.

Colt said something and it snapped Indra back to herself. He was grinning; she was repulsed, but not because of what must be done. The girl moved hastily towards where the coyote paced and made as if to snap at it, to worry it as she had the doe days ago.

It didn't take kindly to the teeth; baring its own, bristling, so very wolf-like that Indra was taken by surprise a moment and lagged long enough for the coyote to snap near her face, then pull away from the two wolves with its tail tucked.

the mercenary circled closer. "consider this a bit'o battle trainin', girl. don't be afraid to get in there an' take yer licks." as if to demonstrate, colt suddenly lunged, a ragged firepulse in the cool air. his teeth snapped its rump just above the tailbase, and blood welled at once.
the coyote cried out and turned its teeth on the man. he chuckled and pulled away from the desperate jaws, nodding once to indra. strike. and strike again.

This wasn't like hunting a proper meal.

This looked too much like kin, if that were possible at all.

Colt moved, though. He snapped and he drew blood; that was incentive enough for Indra to do as instructed. How easily he cut the skin - and for a moment she saw herself where the coyote was, listening to it snarling and crying.

That'll never be me, she decided immediately.

Forward lunging, seeking an ankle first and then the coyote's face when it turned to defend itself. Quick. Sharp. One after another, strike after strike, the smallest of cuts. Beneath each one a truth Indra had not yet the courage to face: that she was enjoying herself with this game.

death by a thousand little fangmarks.
indra struck. the coyote whirled. colt blocked its escape, backing its bleeding back up against the unrelenting mountain. the creature's eyes were wide and darting, saliva dripping defiantly from its teeth.
its throat pulsed and panted. he stared at it, then back toward the red wolf, wondering if she too saw the opportunity as the coyote weakened.

The creature - she had to think of it that way, as far from wolf, from canine, as she could - scuttled away from them both. Colt cleaved through its path to block its escape and Indra found herself becoming more and more creative with her attacks.

Tugging skin. Slicing through fur. Nibbles that got bloodier with each nip. And then a look from Colt - and a show of the coyote's throat; but Indra hesitated in that moment and lost her chance.

Having enough of the harassment, the coyote stopped countering and tried only to flee - cutting a path close to Colt in the process, as the man was unavoidable.

colt was inexorable. his sure hit was on autopilot. he slammed the creature back against the rock and then pinned its head beneath his forepaw, applying a goodly amount of pressure.
his eyes glinted toward indra.
colt thought of what reno and sadey might say. reno would say she was too young to be one of them, to which colt would point out that all of them came to the gang in boyhood.
and sadey — well she'd think the worst, and he'd have to set her to rights with a genuine no. many things he was but the worst was avoided.
the man waited for indra to deal another blow.

The slam of bodies - then teeth, then skull to stone - was so quick and raucous that Indra's eyes could barely follow, and her ears lanced back upon her head; but then things stilled and Colt was staring at her expectantly.

The coyote was downed. Its head likely split open or its jaw broken. It was pinned to the earth and yet it lived, writhing and pathetic. She saw it for what it was: a sacrifice.

Never me, came the mantra in her mind as she lunged for it. Seeking flesh with her teeth; grabbing a leg as it kicked out at her and pulling, popping a joint; she was a frenzy of tooth and claw and soon the coyote was nothing but a limp mass beneath the pressure of Colt's heel.

colt watched indra kill.
at some point he pulled his foot from the mess, grimacing at the wet shluck it made. his eyes were appraising. approving. the coyote was dead and indra had been its dispatcher.
he watched the heave of her body and the way her eyes were awake with something that lived in him too. colt was suddenly and fiercely very pleased with his own power, to shape her like this, to watch her take form as if she were a stick whittled between his teeth.
the rogue stepped closer to her, eyes flickering. he lowered his muzzle to brush her cheek, to catch on his tongue a droplet of the blood which now stained the side of her face. "very good."

She was a frenzy of red: a phoenix by any other name, stained with blood rather than fire, but rising regardless.

So focused as Indra on dispatching this creature, and in some way culling a piece of herself in the process, she did not notice Colt's lean-in until he spoke his praise; and she turned mid-snap to face him with the same wild air that had possessed her against the beast - nearly cutting him with a tooth.

Recognition came swiftly after that; she was a panting, dripping mess. The shape of her soiled body filled the red of his eye; Indra saw herself there, swimming in red.

"jumpy little thing aintcha?" colt chuckled, but his own tooth shone a moment. she needed to grow more temperate with her responses. pulling away in the sarcastic mien of a man with his hands sardonically in the air, the rogue stretched and gestured at the downed cur.
"might as well eat 'im while the gettin's fresh," he told her.
the drop of blood burned inside his jaw.
"meat is meat."
he demonstrated by cutting into the limp haunch.

She stepped back from the kill as he went for it.

Of course she expected that they would dispose of the body, or maybe return to whatever the coyote had been guarding; that had been the point of killing it, right? But it was Colt who took the first true bite of it.

He stripped meat from its haunch and Indra felt immediately sick to her stomach.

She moved to shake out her shoulders and stretch her stiffening limbs, as both a way to relieve the stress of the fight from her body, as to remind herself where her physical limits existed. It was hard to return to herself after such a detatched moment; perhaps not all of her was returned in the end, for she looked upon the creature's cooling body with its exposed meat, and felt a terrible hunger.

Her eyes lit upon Colt a moment as if for approval, but soon Indra was picking at the creature too.

they were beasts and they eat the flesh of beasts.
indra hesitated until she did not. "eat slow. yer stomach needs t'get adjusted."
he smacked his lips and set down nearby, eyelids closing. "was holed up in a canyon once, when i was quite a bit younger an' dumber'n a shitgoose."
the man lay his head back against the bloodstained spread of stone. "jest about starved. was six days before the coyotes come t'find me there. then it came down to eat or be eaten."
colt opened his eyes and stared at indra with a dark grin lighting his mouth. "so i ate."

As she glut herself on the remains, Colt told his story.

She imagined her own confines when he spoke of a canyon. The word itself meant little to her, but she saw in her mind's eye the pit.

Eat or be eaten. A wolf descending in to that pit, for her.
So I ate.
Running, running, running
until all she could taste was copper.

She'd stopped eating to listen to him, frozen by her own thoughts in conjunction with the tale. She felt his eye upon her and dared move her head, snake-like, to meet it with a faraway look of her own.

Then she resumed, peeling meat from bone.

their eyes met and colt felt that compelling tension in his belly. she'd killed. she'd eaten. she showed that she could shed blood. indra was for all her faults becoming a fine companion, and colt credited himself for it.
he bathed crimson from his jaws in long laps. 
"could teach yew a lot, indra." he looked skyward, through the tangled thick leaves of the bracken woods. "jest about anythin' yew wanna learn."
his own mind was meandering down a travelworn path of thought, surrounded by the haze of brutal and calm memories.

As she ate she turned towards the carcass. That's all it was, empty of life and of self. She didn't think of the coyote beyond its meat, not until she'd eaten her fill of it, and finally realized in some hazy way just what she'd consumed; she expected to feel sick, instead Indra felt full, and warm, and good.

Her madness ebbed gradually. Indra pulled away from the remains. Colt spoke of lessons beyond this and her ears turned to eagerly accept his voice; he often spoke of such things and by now, Indra was content with it, or with the silence they shared as they roamed.

He was quiet a moment after, looking lost in thought.

Why d'you teach me? She wondered aloud, looking pointedly at him now. He'd offered her life, before. Food and safety in numbers, and lessons, when they'd met; but she still could not understand why he bothered at all with her.

there were a half dozen answers for her question. "cuz yew been pickin' up yer part of the slack," he dodged. "when i found yew out there, i figured yew'd starve otherwise. an' good as i am at bein' alone, why not bring yew into the gang? it's how they found me after all, sadey an' reno an' them."
it was the first time he'd spoken their names; colt was happy enough to detail their exploits, but names were not always safe.
today had cemented indra as being worthwhile. "plus, time got a way of givin' yew back yer investment." that was for him; colt chuckled meanly and rolled to his paws. "up an' up. where we headed next, girl?"

This was the first time he'd spoken of others by name, rather than telling stories of people or folks he knew, and Indra was sharp enough not to let those names fade with his breath. She recited them mentally so as not to forget.

Colt was ready to leave. He'd eaten his fill by now, as had Indra, and he was even leaving the choice up to the girl for where they'd go next. She turned her attention away from him to survey the land.

Going north would mean climbing the mountain to the glacier's top. South would be easier, plus - I scented others, maybe a mark, west along the river. She hadn't known it to be a village, nor that Colt had once worked the land and its people over already.

can reply or fade!

colt knew it, and his scarlet eyes grew dark and brazen. "all right."
once he was there he might pull her off. or he might not. sakhmet had a deal with colt, not indra. but sadey was there. either way, getting close to the river pack would serve briggs' own ends.
he jerked his muzzle in that direction and prepared to follow the lead of the scarlet killer. it was an ironic nickname, and maybe she needed one.
"lead on, redbird."