Lost Creek Hollow There's delays on the planes out of Eastern Montana

the calf stumbled once on uneven earth, a soft misstep, and that was enough. drífa surged.
a flash of muscle beneath her thick coat, the coiled spring of northern blood turned kinetic—silent, lethal. she broke from the brush like a storm loosed from cloud, no sound but the thud of her paws and the startled bleat of a life too young to understand its ending.
the kill was clean.
her fangs sank deep into soft throat, a burst of hot blood against her tongue, and the calf crumpled beneath her weight, its legs twitching in the loam. she held firm until the last breath sighed out in surrender. then stillness.
she did not pant. did not gloat.
drífa rose slow, breath fogging the air as she stood over the still-warm body, chest rising and falling steady beneath the cold. blood speckled her muzzle, sharp against the pale tones of her throat.
then—her eyes cut to the male.
that frostbound stare, flanked in gold and dusk, pinned him in place. she said nothing, but the silence between them spoke. her jaw flexed once. her shoulders rolled back.
he had come. he had watched.