Neverwinter Forest lxxiii. when my working day is over

Heralded with music and coaxed into acceptance by the low hymn, a celestial seraph chose its mortal coil.

The life of a wolf did not seem so bad -- even though it would be born alone.

And as the essence and body metamorphosed into a singular being, it's perfection remained suspended, like Schrödinger's cat, until the moment stinging air hit their lungs for the first time and fused them together forever. Spirit and vessel. Heart and mind. Survived and complete, without a single flaw.

If just for a moment, grief and anxiety fled the densite when Fjall was born. His gasp a beacon. His shuddering a blessed thing. He cried out, blind and unsure of the unfamiliar sensations, attempting to communicate as he experienced the newfound will of his nervous system.

His body felt an absence where there had always been a twin pressed against him; and where there was once perpetual warmth, there was now shocking, everlasting cold. The vibrations of his mother's heartbeat were gone as well, leaving only utter strangeness in the lack of a ceaseless tempo.

All of this newness, this loneliness, was quite overwhelming. But he discovered a dewy comfort in suckling -- taking to the teat with a healthy vigor -- desperate for relief or distraction. Sleep was pleasant, too, he would soon find, as he fell quickly unconscious, thoroughly vanquished by all the activity.