Arrow Lake The divine radiance of invertebrates

Although small and rather terrible in taste, the morsels nonetheless took the worst edge off her bitter hunger. When she finished off the final squirming bug, she withdrew and sat on her haunches, licking her chops. When her tongue caught a stray insectile leg and drew it backward into her gullet, she almost choked. Somehow, she managed to swallow it, though not without a grimace.

Her squinted eyes rapidly shot open again when she heard someone approaching, from above of all places. Her pale head snapped backward to see a burly white male descending the rocky slope toward her. Although not a particularly cagey creature by nature, Pied felt her hackles prickle slightly as he approached. She remained tense but relaxed somewhat when he made no aggressive overtures and, instead, made a gently sarcastic remark about her choice of sustenance.

Her gray ears flattened somewhat, though Pied took a steadying breath and told herself not to be ashamed. She was in a predicament that was largely out of her control and she was doing her best. If a resentful light had entered her gaze at the stranger's comment, she pushed it back and managed a tight-lipped smile. This expression wasn't difficult solely because of him but because of her situation overall and the fact that she could still taste the foul flavor of arthropods on her tongue.

Before she could come up with some clever rejoinder, another wolf appeared on the scene. Again, Pied stiffened, though the equally large but significantly more colorful—particularly those enchantingly aquamarine eyes—wolf proved just as harmless as the first. He presented himself with a quiet woof and a rather easygoing demeanor, despite his taciturn entrance.

"Hi," Pied said blandly after a moment, ears flicking. What else was she supposed to say? Her two-toned gaze roved from one male to the other. "I'm Pied. And the bugs, by the way, were delightfully crunchy," she added for the pale male's benefit in particular, the tiniest trace of a tired smirk lining her maw.