Lost Creek Hollow a sanguine fog

His eyes were shut. Shut against blows that never came, his ears folded against savage snarls that never sounded. Mordecai spoke, and one eye snapped open to peer at him as he slowly turned his muzzle. There was nothing aggressive in his alpha's posture, or weaved between his syllables. There never was. Luke slackened his tension, giving himself a shake as if he could cast off some of his anxiety, but much was left with him.

"I'm healing," he murmured, his gray gaze resting on the indentations in the snow made by his own paws. It was true, he was healing - his wounds were closed, ugly, but closed, and even the larger ones bore only tiny flecks of scab now. But it was, at its heart, a deflective answer. He did not know what, if anything, Mordecai knew, and did not want to speak on it anyway.