Heron Lake Plateau [m] What's left for me and my broken heart if I cannot have you?

She missed the gasp of laughter, but if she hadn’t, it would surely have been her—or his—undoing. It would have bean easy to whirl on him, to put everything broken in her right through him. 

But, she found herself not wanting to be alone, even if it was the male she never liked. He reminded her of home, and even though home did not want her, she missed it. Missed her.

Hated her all the same.

She huffed in the silence that followed her as she searched for her pouch, the withdrawal rearing its head again, nausea bubbling in her throat. The dizziness caused her to wobble, her steps unsteady as she returned to the male, unknowingly chewing on less seeds than normal.

He was unconscious, apparently succumbing to the injuries he’d sustained in his fight to save her. She should have thanked him instead of threatening him, she knew, for what he did was nothing short of heroic, and she should be groveling at his feet.

But—she just…couldn’t; at least not with words.

She would thank him by spending the days he remained unconscious tending to him, caring for his wounds in the ways imparted to her by Kukutux, talking to him, and spilling the reasons for what brought her outside their borders and why she was now someone wholly different than the woman he had once known.

She didn’t care what he knew—if he even wanted to know—nor did she care how he felt about it all. Would he have even heard any of it, anyway?

And, coinciding with his healing, would be her own. The amount of seeds ingested would lessen, the dependence would loosen its grip. The nightmares would ease.

The dislike would turn into something different and very, very unexpected.