Lost Creek Hollow steam rising from the belly of the beast

Minutes went by unnoticed and slowly, he had begun to lull himself back to partial rest. His eye half-lidded, he had been on the verge of giving in and going back to sleep when the scattering of leaf litter roused him. It was not a leisure waking either; Mordecai had gone alert as though he had never been anything but awake. The figure that emerged was neither that of Harlyn or another predator in their midst, but the startling white of the blue-nosed Luke.

Silently, he let out a breath as he saw him, attention settling on his stature and the gift he clutched between his jaws. His discomfort was palpable and it rose a cord of tension in Mordecai to hear him speak. His stomach twisted knots for the briefest of moments, hungry, and he reached for the rabbit before answering. His grip on it wasn't the best and prompted him to adjust to compensate, but he drug it closer to him in spite of the poor gauge of perception.

"It could have happened to any of us," he stated, finding a tone of reassurance. "We were lucky... I was lucky." He didn't think Luke had anything to be sorry for — they had learned a valueable lesson.