Blacktail Deer Plateau familiar faces

it wasn't long before the girl came across another, a stranger who bore the scent of the pack. a new recruit, then, but not one she had met; not that she had made much of an effort to meet. she liked to believe that she was fluid, adaptable to change, and it was true that in many ways she was. but having so many faces of her pack replaced by new ones was more change than she liked, even though she knew it was rude of her. 

the pale sterling girl stopped smoothly, sickness had had no effect on the hunter's grace she had learned well. bronze gaze travelled up and down the new girl, sizing her up. it troubled her that she didn't know exactly how long the woman had been here, her comings and goings, coupled with her illness, making the past few weeks a bit of a haze, punctuated only by a few events she tried not to think about too much. the key to avoiding grief, she had come to realize, was to quickly cast the subject into the very fringes of your mind, and never think about it. ever. 

"Pema" the girl echoed, voice tinged with coarseness, scanning her once more. " you're very new, aren't you?"  her tone was benign, with a note of curiosity, but not overly enthusiastic. she wasn't about to let Pema and other like her replace the faces of the past, no matter how childish that was. she would grow to learn quickly, though, that change in the ranks was always inevitable.