Panther Park fish in the sea of galilee

@Coelacanth now and later i’ll tag in @Dakarai :)

The past few days had been a living hell for Olive.

He was antsy to leave; to get home and to be with Oxsana. Despite the memory loss, the elk’s hooves had cut the man deeply and for the health of his wound she convinced him to stay with her. Olive had convinced him that if he left, he would catch a fever and would never make it home to Oxsana — oh, and only Olive knew the medicine to keep him healthy. And so the forlorn druid took to gathering roots and leaves and winter flowers and pressed them to his wounded crown as he had seen so many others do; but she really had no idea what she was doing. Olive could effectively stave off infection and fever, but to rehabilitate one’s lost memories? There was not a poultice in the world that could heal such a wound. 

She felt so helpless.

When Olive wasn’t hurriedly putting on a show for Dakarai, entertaining him, lying to him to keep him from leaving [to prevent this… stranger from absconding off with her husband’s body] she worried incessantly about her own future. This charade could only go one for so long, as the dark knight was growing darker by the day and she feared that soon he would tire of his tiny, ash-and-cream caretaker. She had no plan. Olive knew no way to fix this.  Her life, everything that was so great and good about her existence, had been upheaved and the loss was quite hard for her to handle. It was difficult for her to give up even the smallest semblance of what they once had; she clung to the look in his cerulean eyes as he watched her in her feminine, fecund condition, before he remembered that she was a stranger.

Her sadness was not just about her own, personal loss… but the fate of her family.  Her own children occupied many of her thoughts. There was no way that she could return to Ceannasach, pregnant with a fatherless litter. Dakarai had promised to recruit new members to support their growing family. Would that responsibility now fall on her; and how could she, now that she was going to be a mother? Arturo, so deadpan and immovable; he and Chusi would surely cast her out [a non-hysterical Olive would have mad much more faith in her family, but Olive was long past hysterical]. Perhaps she would never go back. Perhaps she were destined to die, alone in the world, exhausted by trying to care for her bastard young.

That morning, Olive gave Dakarai his space. The hadn’t been able to leave Panther Park since the accident and slept in the same area as before, but never together. He liked his space so she would give it to him, even though it killed her to be away from him for a single instant. Olive lay defeatedly against a rocky outcrop, dusted with snow that had pushed through the tree canopy. Outside Panther Park, the blizzard blew fierce; but inside the forest, it was warm. So Olive laid alone and her rosy tongue caressed the soft down of her belly, whispering to the babies growing within that they should not worry. Mama was there.