Blackfeather Woods divine timing

good hunting took her down below. where she ran through fields without cares. she had tasted much blood but none of them could fall beneath her own teeth alone.

it had inspired something wild and reckless.

maybe it was knowing that the shadow ridge would always be safe with muskrat there and that since hex returned, things might not be so grim. there was the girl too. quick growing and training hard.

the royal eagle could satisfy her needs down here before she returned.

only the scent grew from something prey to something...divine. it should not be here. her heart hammered so strong that it set off something within her. auto-pilot instructed her to follow, but makono did not feel her flesh anymore. her body was not her own, guided by something larger than her.

you are too close, were the warnings within her.

you are so close! were the chants of her spirit.

it could not be. her flesh refused it but her Ka yearned for it. something ancient waking and stirring within her. blood burned and roared, something up ahead rippled the waters and she looked with her one good eye. terrified of what she might see across the way. begging to see who it was. she had very scarcely been this conflicted before — maybe once, maybe twice.

her skin burned with holy fire.

she had thought she might have a many grand thing to say. that she might come with a million treasures and trinkets to show her devotion to the young woman who would always be princess toula to her.

"i will always think of you."

the surge of emotions felt far too much to hold in. the inside of her cheeks were chewed like fat.

"i love you. do you know this?"

and it had not changed when she had learned that she had been replaced. for it was the right thing to do and it had been such a grand choice. maybe it had been for the best, anyway, somehow.

for toula looked every bit Divine Pharaoh while makono was nothing more than a windswept warrior now. too struck by her own flood of feelings to say anything.