Moonspear Ripcord

It was hard for Floki to breathe as Charon delivered the rest of the news, detailing what they knew about Ness' death. For a moment, he despaired, wondering dramatically if he was doomed to lose anyone and everyone he cared about -- not that he and Ness had had anything romantic, but he had considered her a good friend. He steadied himself, closing his eyes as he inhaled through his nose and composed himself.

"A bear," he repeated, feeling his spine tingle with fear. He was already terrified of the beasts for what they had done to Atreyu and Tevinter, and it only continued to get worse. Nishu had died as a belated result of a bear attack, and now Ness was gone. They needed to rid their mountain of the ursines, but his line of thought mirrored Amekaze's, though he didn't realize it. Now was not the time to wage war.

Forcing himself to focus on Charon's question, Floki shook his head gently. "There's not much out there. It all looks pretty much the same -- the locusts got all of the greenery," he said grimly. He thought briefly of Aria; how had she fared with Lasher? "But there is a lot of unclaimed land to the west. There's only one pack that has settled out there, in a place called Silver Creek. I don't know much else about them, but we met one of their wolves -- his name was Casmir." His lip twitched as he remembered the dark-pelted boy, Aria's former lover.