Snowforest Taiga From a fortune of fisher king

Tulimaq tastes blood. It is not the first time his sparring has been too rough, and hardly the last. It was not his intent to maim the woman warrior. He was testing her, and often in the heat of battle would lose himself to the joy of such a test — but he did not balk at the taste of it either. If anything, he was more animate because of it.

He could not overpower her as easily as he had thought, either. She was heavier set beneath her winter coat, not all plush like many wolves in this region. She took the hit and rolled with it, reaching to grasp for Tulimaq and thrash, defending herself as if this were a fight to the death.

She managed to grab at his chest with her teeth and rake across it, through the thinner fur along his breast bone. The skin punctured with the inital smack of the tooth and then tore as she withdrew, likely to aim another strike.

Tulimaq was briefly winded and backed off from her, stalking and moving endlessly, trailing warm blood that seeped from this wound.

He was smiling.

You fight like you are afraid! Tulimaq taunted the woman. He breathed heavily, finding that his chest pinched with each breath because of the slice she had torn from him. Are your people all this soft? His voice carried for Kukutux to hear, although he never let his eyes stray from his sparring partner.

Before he could hear an answer, he drove himself across the snow and made to feint towards her, aiming first to the wound that he had made by mistake, and then for whatever ended up nearest to him, as Tulimaq expected more defensive posturing from the woman.