Golden Glade I think I'm moving but I go nowhere

Tags are for reference! *boops @Phox*

Getting a chance to catch up with loved ones was a welcome distraction for Wildfire; it filled an aching void inside her. There was something particularly soothing about simply sitting with @Raven for hours on end, listening as her sister caught her up on current events. When the caregiver finally covered everything and looked into her eyes, gently urging her to explain her departure from Drageda, Wildfire hesitated for only a breath.

She explained the difficulties of being left behind while her mate went off to war, gone indefinitely while Wildfire struggled—and failed—to raise their youngest four. When Bat had gone missing, something had really broken inside Wildfire. She'd come to realize that she couldn't face Heda when she returned. At least, it had started off like that: simple heartbreak and crushing guilt. Over time, Wildfire's feelings had metamorphosed until she found herself blaming Thuringwethil for putting her in that position, for causing Bat's flight, for letting her have children despite her doubts. Wildfire had always been highly emotional and all those terrible feelings had amalgamated into a potent nuclear cocktail.

To avoid the fallout, she'd made the decision to leave. It wasn't easy or fair. Leaving @Silkie and @Tux—who were understandably upset at losing another parent—behind was the worst part. "But then it led me to Bat," she concluded, eyes shining as she regarded her sister's dark features, her own yellow gaze soft. "And it's not like every doubt or bad feeling magically vanished but it's like..." Wildfire didn't know how to describe it and she shrugged helplessly. She knew Raven understood, being a mother herself. "And I feel like that bomb inside me has been defused, most importantly."

When the sun began to set, the two women parted to tend to their respective children. Wildfire went searching for @Kiwi, Bat or @Sequoia—who'd become more like a daughter than a niece over the past few days especially—and it was Bat's trail she found first. The trapper followed it away from the plateau, toward the glowing forest that edged it to the east. She didn't find the young traveler there and she decided against pursuing her, instead folding slim red haunches and winding her black tail around her hips like a wrap. She smiled faintly to herself, happy that Bat had apparently come alive here, following in her mother's own rangy footsteps.

While she sat there in the gathering gloom of dusk, Wildfire closed her eyes, let her mind empty and other senses wake. Even at this time of day, despite the chill of autumn's final weeks, the forest was alive around her. When her chestnut eyes sprang open a few moments later, they glistered fiercely in the dark, brimming with carnivorous lust. She swept silently to her feet to follow the sounds and smells of small prey scuttling about in the night.