Silvertip Mountain Let's trade shoes, just to see what it'd be like

All the time since Dad had whispered the words to him, Mason had been thinking on what he could get Steady as a gift. He really liked his Uncle, and spent as much time with him as he could. It was akin to having a big brother he really respected. Little did he know that Fitz and Zaria had been planning to make him a real big brother, but perhaps his admission of feelings had dampened their goals.

Mason pressed forwards in the early morning light, just enough to see by as the sun’s pale rays reverberated off the snow that now littered the ground all around. The only places to find shelter were in the glass caves, hollows, or deep beneath the shelter of clusters of trees – and even there you tended to find snow dripping and slipping from the high branches onto your nose or tail. Today, speckles of white floated serenely down from the sky to nestle upon his coat and make it a paler version of its usual plasterboard-grey. Mason shook his fur, but couldn’t manage to dislodge most of the snow so put it off as a bad job. He would just become a snow monster. Maybe Uncle Steady would like that?

The ground glistened with ice, and Mason slipped, dashing his socked paw against sharp rock as he came to a skidding halt. Raising his voice to swear loudly, Mason flumped down on the floor and turned the inside of his paw towards him. Blood welled in the wound, which was quite a large tear on the inner-underside of his leathery pads, between two of his toes. With tears glistening in his eyes, he peered at the wound, and realised that part of the rock had lodged itself into his skin.

With all of the thought of a carnal, wounded animal Mason began to try and rip the stone out with his teeth, yelping with pain as he touched the fresh cut.