Duskfire Glacier after midnight

the woman was slow.
slow to think, slow to respond. her words were barbed in tone, always, and at the same time sulukinak felt only impatience as she tried to understand. the answers were not forthcoming: she did not know. then why fight? why be so spiteful when there was no claim?

you wish him to be yours, instead?
no. she answers with a lancing tone of her own, quick to refute. ears slanting back across her head, then relaxing in the next moment, pointing like little horns in the dark.
i only prepare for what is to come. for future. but the future she envisions is different from what faust must see. faust having by now offered her darukaal's support and his own teeth against any enemies.
then there is silence, rumination. sulukinak does not often speak in great diatribes, but she bears witness, and she does not know what else to do. to leave the woman here seemed the most pertinent—and maybe leaving darukaal was the best option.

the harvest was coming.

if he wants wife, he should claim you.