Swiftcurrent Creek To Hold and Ocean

His paws wrapped around her rear and each tug brought her closer; then as Tuwawi turned to regard him, she looked a bit shocked. But the expression slid away moments later, as she came to crumble next to him. Her head rested upon his own paws and, this time, the man would be the lookout. Tuwawi drifted off quickly but the pain in Njal's face kept him from doing the same. Instead he took to watching her - monitoring her rhythmic breaths, the rise and fall of her torso. His eyes (or rather, eye, as one was still swollen shut) trailed across the contours of her face and along the ruddy red cape of her spine. Njal's gaze halted at the den mouth, where light continued to glimmer just out of reach. A feeling of dread sparked in the pit of his belly, then. A strange apprehension that made little sense to the weary man. He stared at the particles of dust that drifted there and, somehow, expected something else. Gradually Njal's head began to lower, until he was nestled with his chin against his wife's smooth shoulders; he carefully rooted his face there, folding upon her with a manner of care to prevent waking her, and there he sat. He did not sleep, as the strange sense of being watched refused to budge from his mind. Njal would stay like that for hours until Tuwawi woke again, and the two of them would go on a search for food and herbs.

[finish!]