Ankyra Sound hold our skin over the light to hold the heat

Forward dated a bit <3 for @Noctaryn

All companionship forsaken, Marina faced each grey day alone. Old habit, perhaps, or some sharper tang of salt in the blood had drawn her to the seaside. It was no idyll she'd chosen, this stark cold strand of shoreline, but the ocean commanded its own wild beauty against the drab beach. She grew fond of the place, though the winds of fate threatened each day to carry her elsewhere.

Her belly had swelled only enough to take her own notice. If she kept to the waters, washing her own scent away in the sea as often as she could, she could almost hide it from the eyes of others. Never from herself.

Survival was nearly a secondary goal in the constancy of her fishing and hunting efforts; this served most usefully as a distraction. Marina emerged from shallow waters clutching a fish, the second she'd caught that morning, and moved into the faint shadows of the treeline to rest and enjoy her meal. The fish still twitched in her jaws as she walked, now and then thrashing with a spurt of false hope. When she passed beneath the trees she dropped it.

Marina reclined a few feet away, one ear swiveling toward where the fish renewed its dying struggle. Otherwise she ignored the little spectacle. She bent to groom the saltwater from her fur.