it's burning through the bloodline

Her thoughts drifted as she scanned for motion beyond the ripple of the windswept grass. This boundary between pack and freedom marked an end to another journey, and if Mordecai didn't show, a journey as fruitless as the last. In truth, Andalusia didn't know where she would go if no one heeded her call. Her meeting with the Caldera girl had left her with a strong conviction her loyalties stood with her bloodline alone. She needed to settle, but if none of her kin remained here, she could only move on until she found them again. And as far as she knew, Mordecai was the last of the Ostregas in these Wilds. Wherever her siblings had wandered, she wasn't able to find them again. They were drifters as much as she.

A beckon snapped Andalusia back to the present and she rose to her feet. Her chest tightened when she locked her eyes on the approaching form of Mordecai, and her stare of neutrality broke to a grin and a wash of relief. In presence she remained as distant as their prior encounter, but her stance held little of the tension she'd displayed when meeting Zoratto, and she waved her tail in response. But she found she could do little more than that. Just seeing him approach her alive, like she used to imagine her parents doing just after they'd died, lifted the weight she had harboured since watching the fire burn his home. She could be dreaming, but everything felt too real and solid for that. Mordecai was alive - his presence now sealed that - and Andalusia could only release a sigh that deflated what doubts remained.