Blackbeak Bluff wind chaser

Two possibilities shuffle over one another in her mind with increasing speed. To run or to speak. To run or to speak.

I'm Charna, she responds, the set of her mouth reticent and almost unfriendly. There. Now I'm not a stranger.

She examines the woman, whose fur is windswept and coarsened by the briny wind, and approaches her with a slow gait, the walk of a child who is being steered against its own will. Her head hangs low and wary between her shoulders. The overcast sky eliminates all sharp shadows - the ceaseless pewter light fills her with an uneasiness.