Shadow Mountain what i had once mistaken for death was, instead, a door

back-dated to take place a day or so before this thread which can be edited accordingly if necessary as it's not very far along. :-)

Cyron had ran. Only when he had put a comfortable distance between himself and Blackfeather Woods did he slow to a trot and then a walk as he became acutely aware of the burn of each breath, the rapid beats of his heart in the confines of it's sinew and bone prison, and the pulsing ache in his legs, the smarting soreness in his cracked paw-pads. He is filthy from personal neglect — the abysmal darkness, the feeling of desolation that had swallowed him up like a greedy and hungry mouth tended to do that — sterling fur matted and clumped with dirt and other debris. He is rawboned, ribcage and hips slightly visible through the thick mess of his sterling coat. He is not a skeleton but his malnourishment is evident enough and it is logical to assume that if given more time he would have withered away to his eventual death. In this, Cyron is unwittingly a survivalist that very primal and feral instinct refusing to surrender.

Cyron makes his way towards the nearest stream to take a long, deep drink from the icy cold water. It chills him from the inside out but it brings with it a certain relief. If that is one thing about the chill, it brings with it the promise of a numbness from the pain. A reprieve he can sink into. Just so long as it lasts him long enough to return home. If home was even there anymore — Cyron has lost all concepts of time and is unsure how long he has spent in the bowels of Wolfskull Cave. Weeks? Months? Years? Currently, they don't mean a whole lot to him. He can focus on nothing other than his own survival, the persistent drive to keep his stolen freedom; it is the only thing keeping him afloat.