Blackfeather Woods I don't usually give in to peer pressure

He didn't feel right. Beyond the pain in his rear-end, Sobek was beginning to feel dizzy and dulled by the blood loss. His wounds had begun to coagulate though, which was a good sign; they weren't bad enough to require intensive care and would scab over in the coming days. But he did ache, and he wanted to be on his feet, and he wanted—well, none of that mattered. He tried to stand up and wobbled, then fell back down.

Around his second attempt to get up on his feet, he heard the rustling of movement in the forest and tensed, losing his balance almost immediately; his mind told him, the coyote has come back for you! And yet there was no terror in his eyes, no fear. He looked to Rowan in a lethargic manner, like he had just woken up from a nap—and then, out of the dark came Moonshadow. He recognized her as the woman who told him about the stars.

Her body moved in close to Rowan and she looked him over first, and when she came to Sobek he murmured something unintelligible—and then tried a third time to get to his paws, feeling his limbs shake. There was a coyote! Rowan hurt it. He said, beaming a crooked, dopey smile at the mother-son pair as if nothing went wrong at all.