hunger and the need to rest

He dozed as the heat of the springs seemed to absorb into his skin, his muscle, his bone. The meals he had scavenged had cut some of the hunger pains that lanced through his innards from time to time, and the exhaustion of his constant movement was catching up with him. As his body did what it could with the nutrients he had managed to find, it needed to rest— and so the male did not fight the urge to sleep. It was perhaps dangerous, for he might never wake, or another wolf might take advantage of his prone state and take the fight out of him... but if he did not rest, he was similarly at risk. And Dapper, though desperate, was also tenacious. He would not give in to the blackness of death, at least not yet.

His exhaustion was so great that he remained unaware of the stranger that wandered from pool to pool nearby.