Shadowwyn Moor moulin rouge

It was a mixture of optimism and willful naïveté that convinced Bhreac most of her family was still alive, just in pieces. She'd certainly never for an instant thought that Eshe of all of them had been killed. So she'd stayed with the pack that had cannibalized hers, out of equal parts stubbornness and hope that others would return. She was strong and had useful knowledge of the lands, and so they'd accepted her well enough, even if the whole thing had made her skin crawl. Kowtowing to the wolves who'd stormed into her life and scattered her family to the wind, or worse, had felt like constantly scraping an open wound against concrete.

Still, she wasn't one to dwell. She'd left, and she was with Eshe. All things considered, this was a best possible scenario.

"I'm insulted you'd think otherwise," Bhreac said, feigning offense. "There were what, a dozen of them? I could take them." Her voice got thinner toward the end of the sentence, rawer than she'd have liked; she was kidding, because although stronger than some and bolder than most, she wasn't particularly large, and still only one wolf besides. Logically she understood there was nothing she — nor anybody, really — could've done, but it still stung her sense of duty to have been unable to stop bad things from happening to those she loved. And if she were being honest, which she didn't particularly plan to be, it stung a bit that she was one of the only ones who stayed behind.