Whitefish River I'm gonna getcha

"mom!"
her voice sounds shrill to her own ears, nose to the ground as golden eyes flicker frantically from right to left. sleep has not come to the wolf in a while, though something drives her on, on, on. her head throbs, as if her heart has migrated up her throat and into her skull, and taken violent residence there. 

drool seeps down one side of her muzzle, wicked away every so often by one of the odd, swift flicks of her muzzle. she forges on, hearing somewhere the drone of a river and knowing only that her mother's scent lies thickly here -- a final chance, before inevitably the sickness will come. she needs to see her, needs to say goodbye, even as darker, stranger impulses begin to wrap thorny tendrils around her intent.