Sunbeam Lair calling out mayday

The rat devoured, the rattlesnake cleaned her jaws with a flickering tongue.

Her eyes caught the pale figure beside her stomach, still wrapped in sacrificial blood, sleeping quite soundly.

What is my name? She asked the dark. It did not answer. Her ears flattened, her mouth curled into a hissing snarl.

What is my name?! She bellowed to the dark, only to hear her own voice return to her. Viciously, she wrenched her head to look at the boy.

I named him! I named him! What is my name?! Finally, they came to her, soothing and loving, their spiked nails digging into her chest and her jaw. She felt like a bug, pinned to a cork board, her breaths turning to wheezes.

What is my name? She tried one more time, but the words were gargled. As if the curved talons of a great owl had wrapped around her neck.

You are as you have always been, we do not change that. He is ours, his name is just a skin he will wear. A bolt of pure fear shot from her ears to the very tip of her paws.

My name?

is?

Lonesome Dove closed her eyes, let her head fall to her paws, and cast her mind very far away from the child she had borne and the gods who retracted their talons and patted her head like a child.