The Sunspire a flower feels the rain and it weeps from its petals down to its roots

There were many rendezvous sites upon the mountain, where the wolves of Sunspire gathered and luxuriated in one another’s company. Olive was not in one of these places.

Instead, the druid had spent the growing hours of daylight seek out a place of solitude and serenity; quietude and seclusion. She desired a place cushioned by darkness, that could safeguard her secrets. A place where, when the time came, she and her babies could reside in an undisturbed sense peace. It would be protected, yet somehow still open, with close access to her garden and a water source. Perhaps it was surrounded by beautiful, hanging vines and springtime blooms — oh, how lovely a place would that be? 

The mother-to-be could picture her whelping den vividly in her mind’s eye, and scoured the mountain’s valley in order to find it.

Her secret was every so steadily not becoming hers any more. Day by day, her form grew more supple and more round as she chugged into her fourth week of pregnancy. Oh, she loved it and her changing figure gave her a sense of pride, so she did nothing really to hide it. Perhaps she only looked as if she ate a big meal, because no pack members had really mentioned it to her. Certainly they had smelled it, or something — she couldn’t be that good at hiding it.  

The small woman with the pelt of ash and bone had spent the better part of the morning searching out her mythical whelping den with the vines and the garden; but when she had found nothing and exhaustion suddenly overcame her, she unceremoniously flopped onto the earth and lay on her side, taking a moment’s respite.