Nova Peak Capulet

She made haste through the trees, travelling in the dusky hours when the weather was not too brisk. The rain that fell was easy enough to traipse through; it dampened her pelt but not her spirits, and puddled in her steps when she was lazy enough to let them slide deep within the mud. By the time she had reached the edge of the forest, where the brackish woodland gave way to a swath of valley, the girl was tired. She would not let her budding exhaustion to dampen her any further than she already was - and in distancing herself from the forest within the dead gray of night, she saw the outline of a mountain.

The mountain's silhouette loomed in the distance, and it called to her. Seregryn wound her way across the valley in fits and starts, pausing when a curious scent passed her by, or the wind shifted. She found nothing to indicate life aside from the new growths of spring - and time passed. The earth grew dense and impassible by her nimble paws, accustomed as they were to a life within Trigeda and not upon the hillside. Still, though, Seregryn wasn't going to be diminished by this challenge. She paused and watched the mountain, standing among the shale, and narrowed her crimson gaze at the immense shape of it; a spiteful thing, that look, filled with malice and defiance.

By morning, she vowed silently to reach the peak. Not many things played out the way the child wished, however, and this was one of them. Seregryn may have had faith in herself — as her tutors did — but faith was nothing compared to true skill. She was breathing heavily, tongue lolling out of one side of her pointed face, by the time she was made to collapse; the mountain would not win in the long run, but it was succeeding in proving itself to her now.