Panther Park white winter hymnal

Olive’s turned her head away from the slain elk mother and grimaced. She could not eat! It was like he did not know her anymore [which, he really didn’t]. Everything and anything about this situation was revolting ad turn her stomach...and the clamant woman also did not like what the tainted flesh represented. Sometimes the cosmos needed time to work out their karma; but in this instance, universal reciprocity had worked itself out instantaneously. Taking this life had been wrong and it was all to clear by the god’s voodoo upon her light and love. It had been an affront to nature and life itself, so they deserved none of it. Nothing natural. No life. Never again. 

“You don’t know what I need,” Olive hissed, a sudden wave of frustration and disbelief overtaking her. Dakarai didn’t know her. He didn’t remember her, didn’t want her, didn’t love her. Why was he pretending to care, to know what she needed? The one thing, the only thing she needed he couldn’t give to her. It was all gone, vanished, and any paltry attempt to recreate their loving dynamic was grating and uncomfortable and kind of horrifying.

Then, her strange lover swayed. He steeled himself upon strong, stained forearms, but she could see his head swimming. Dakarai laid his wonderful body against the ground and seemed to be in pain. Suddenly, Olive’s frustration broke and she rushed to his side with an exasperated whine and curled around her unidentifiable husband. The druid canvassed his crown and examined his wounds, gently brushing the blood from his tangled fur with an attentive tongue. Not only was he concussed, but Dakarai stood a real chance of earning a nasty infection it was not taken care of soon. 

Where was Isley?! Why had the red woman left, and why was she not somehow with them now? What had Olive learned from Isley and her mother, and all those stimulating strangers she met on her travels? Suddenly her mind was blank, void of any and all information that she had ever learned about anything. The druid was a naturalist, not a healer after all — but the more she reflected on the subject, the framework began to demystify itself.  Arnica! She would need arnica. The summer plant would not be plentiful this time of the year [and surely not in such squalid conditions], but its properties helped to reduce swelling of the brain. Her mother had nearly force-fed the medicine to one of her brothers after their adventures led to [yet another] unceremonious head injury. Olive needed it. 

“Please stay,” she cooed to him, wishing her voice to be the emollient to his physical and spiritual pains. “I… I will go find medicine. This cannot wait.” Olive dreaded to leave him, but the sooner he the better chance he stood to remember. Olive didn’t want to get her hopes up, but it couldn’t be helped.  “Please, don’t leave.” Olive trusted Dakarai implicitly, but this man… she wasn’t so sure about this new man. Olive half expected that she would come to an empty bed, without even so much as a note to commemorate their exquisite type of love. "Please."