Phoenix Maplewood Thinking 'bout the last time I saw you smiling

Shreya didn't try to push the point, for which Saena was grateful. She didn't know the older wolf very well, but she had expected something different, like insisting that she eat for the health of her children, or questioning about the situation with Reek. Shreya did neither of those things. Instead, the elderly female offered to share her deer haunch, suggesting both of them could eat, and even though Saena tried to refuse again, a gurgle in her stomach betrayed here.

"Okay," Saena acquiesced quietly, with a sheepish smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. It would be some time before she could smile that genuinely again. "But you get the first pick," she insisted, lowering her haunches carefully to the ground to give the woman time to pick the best parts of the leg. A leg was really just meaty muscle all the way through, but the best parts were near the haunch, and the alpha female did expect Shreya to take from there.

"Not going to lie," she said idly in a tone that was verging on glum, "I didn't think you would stay here." There was an unspoken question there, but out of fear she would drive the kindly, resourceful Shreya away from her and from the pack, Saena didn't voice it.