Moonspear Undone

There was part of Wildfire—one that had nothing at all to do with recent events—that felt stung by her mate's insistence that a patrol could wait. Not that she had really let on to it most of the time, but Wildfire sometimes felt sad and left behind when Floki insisted on going off to do his duties rather than spend time with her. She had come to accept that this was part of courting a leader, and now being wifed to one. So why, at this particularly critical moment, could a patrol suddenly wait until any old time?

She felt something quite unusual for her: a flicker of anger. Why couldn't he—first Goober, then Floki—just leave her the hell alone? Wildfire felt like there was a wire somewhere inside her gut that grew so tight and tense that it suddenly snapped. And so did she. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Wildfire was dimly aware that she was being more than suspicious—her behavior was probably downright bewildering—but she couldn't care about that right now.

"No," she said what she should have said to Goober, more than just that one piddly, "Don't." "I just—I want to be left alone right now, okay? Don't follow me." With these cold, broken words hovering inexplicably between them, Wildfire turned and began to run on jellylike legs, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. She could have gone out—out into the world, maybe never to come back, now that things with Floki were ruined—but instead, she went up, up, up.