Rising Sun Valley And I’ve been pushing steel through a rundown rust belt plant

Atreus slowly mended, physically if not emotionally. Once he could move around a bit more, he went for walkabouts through the hollow, trying to familiarize himself with these wolves and their home. When he came to know its perimeters, he began to do slow, meandering patrols. He decided he would do fifty of them—twice a day if he could manage, daily at the very least—before he considered returning to @Amalia and Brecheliant.

Today, he ranged a bit further than the easternmost border, drawn by the scent of blood. He nosed along the river bend, a smear here or a splatter there leading him ever eastward, though he never did find the source of the blood. The trail went cold suddenly and Atreus heard a strange thumping. Its ever increasing vibrato was so powerful, he could feel it rattling his teeth and drumming in his chest. That and a sudden stinging in his hindquarters were the last things he registered before Atreus—