Qeya River anilaaktuk

Children.

Children trained to move upon a village. The girl who had come with had been a child, trained by Kigipigak of all these things.

Her tongue felt heavy in her mouth.

There were no words for this kind of thing. Her husband bringing home a child that had been fit for war. For a long, silent moment, she wondered what the girl was like. There had been no glimpse of a personality in the chaotic moments.

Buried in the tinted fur of her husband, she could not see their remaining son.

I love you. I cannot let you ever leave again.

She confessed, in a breathless and burned way.

His absence had made a beast of her.