Bearclaw Valley starving in the belly of a whale

Could be a joining thread, could just be a snoopy old woman. Want her off your lawn? Just let me know. @Nunataq

The need to fill her belly caused the crone to drift south from the grove, but her luck wasn't so great. She spent the night in a forest bordering a moorland that was, she decided, filled with awful smells and grotesque soil the likes of which she would've prefered never to touch. Her faded coat was marred by slick mud and grime from the soggy landscape when she chose to sleep, but could not get herself comfortable. A pain in her hip started up, and Ningiok sullenly resigned herself to a restless night. She would have to keep adjusting her position and occasionally would take herself on short walks to warm the troubled area; by morning she'd crawled her way west of the moor and that was how she ended up discovering the valley.

She was tired. A cranky old bat was one thing, but a tired cranky old bat was an entirely different animal. She found some indication that there were game animals living in the valley and that lured her closer; but then she found the obvious signs of a pack, and had to make herself slow down. Ningiok knew the law of the wolf—she had been a matriarch in her own time, had enforced the same rules and protected her own claim in her youth. If she wanted something to eat, she would have to get beyond this invisible line. 

The woman licked her lips, imagining the taste of warm meat upon her tongue, but did not press her luck. She kept herself a safe distance from the border markings out of respect for whatever family lived deeper in the valley, and busied herself with studying the land and its many smells in case she could find something smaller—a pheasant, or a plump hare, she hoped. Images of pristine white birds and ghostly rabbits danced in her mind and she felt her belly gurgle in response; but the animals here would not look like that, she reminded herself. Maybe the hunting was vastly different in this warm, easy place.