Bitterroot Valley I waited for you

There were still many foxes in the valley. Angel didn't mind them there, but when she caught them sneaking from the caches, she took it upon herself to hunt them down. This one had put up a bit of a fight, and her muzzle was scored from its flashing little teeth — but the tiny beast was now dead, and halfway stripped of its skin by Angel's careful teeth.

She did this work in the grasses, underneath the weak winter sun. Blood stained her chest and paws from the messiness of the work, and the pelt was currently redder than it was orange. But it had been a large fox, and she thought it would make a fine pelt when it was done. She worked carefully to keep her cuts clean, even if her own ruddy pelt suffered for it.

She hummed while she worked — as song from her girlhood, back before everything had gone wrong. Those were sacred times to her. Times she'd kept locked up safe in her chest for a long, long time. But she was beginning to feel that she'd gone back there. Back to a place where everything was as it should be.

Still. It was a little lonely here, even though the valley was beginning to bustle. When she was done working, she promised herself, she'd go and find someone to speak with.

sega found her by scent first— fox-blood copper on winter air— then by the quiet hum threading through the grass.

he stepped from the slope above, a fresh badger skin draped over his shoulder, still thick with its own heat. he'd taken it that morning. not yet cured. not yet ready. but worn with the quiet pride of a hunter returning to his people.

angel, he greeted, voice low, warm. his eyes drifted over her work, the neat peel of fox hide at her feet, the small cuts on her muzzle she pretended not to mind. good pelt. you make clean cuts.

he shifted, the badger skin sliding slightly down his flank. he adjusted it with a huff.

i bring this for cure later, he said, nodding to the hide. you… maybe show me better way? a faint, rare smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. i not so gentle as you.

She was not surprised when he found her, though a quiet thrill rushed through her when he appeared. She admired the cut of him against the skyline, her tail whisking in the dry grasses behind her. The pelt especially made him look wild and strong — and something wild and strong surged in her veins as if in answer.

"Sega," she replied, warmth, or something warmth-adjacent, in her own voice.

She invited him closer, snipping once or twice more at the pelt as he spoke. She paused, though, to study the badger skin, looking for signs it had been harvested incorrectly. It seemed perfectly salvageable to her — and she wondered if he sought her help simply to spend time with her. Perhaps she hoped so.

Still. She did have her methods.

"The best pelts are stripped of all fat and meat, and then bathed in brain tissue," she replied, sitting up and stretching when she felt a crick in her neck and tension between her shoulder blades.

"Let me see it?" she asked, sauntering closer to touch the pelt with her nose, asking permission to take it — and breathing in the scent of blood and Sega, which stirred something in her once more.

he stepped forward without hesitation, lowering his head so the pelt brushed against her muzzle.

here, he murmured, the word soft in his rough-edged common.

up close, her scent tangled with the iron of blood and the musk of the fresh kill. something primal tugged at him, but he kept his posture steady, offering the hide for her inspection.

i take quick, he told her, as though apologizing for its unfinished state. you make better.

she spoke of fat and brains and the old ways of curing, and he listened, eyes warm with quiet pride. she knew these things. she carried them well.

when her nose grazed the hide—and then him—his breath caught, a faint flicker of a smile tugging at his jaw.

angel, he said, her name almost an exhale, you show me. i watch.

She was astounded by her own daring. Made giddy by it, though only a bright smile betrayed this. She snagged the pelt and pulled it away from him, laying it pink-side-up in the grass. Her own fox carcass lay forgotten for the moment — she was eager to please, and faintly disgusted with herself for that fact.

"Better unfinished than damaged," she assured him, clawing at a few far deposits to check their thickness. It needed quite a bit of cleaning, but she didn't mind that. Not the work, anyway.

"I'll show you," she told him, lifting her eyes back to his handsome face. Her breath caught, but her own gaze was faintly calculating. The smile that followed carried a hint of running behind her usual teasing nature. "But you will bring all your pelts to me from now on. The ones you don't finish yourself, only I will cure for you."

She lifted her chin, daring him to deny her this. It was not a power play, exactly. She did not say it for the sole purpose of commanding him. It was just that she could not stoop to requesting these rights — and if they were courting, truly courting, then she would not suffer another woman attempting to dress him.

sega watched her claim the pelt with that sure, deft confidence that stirred something low in his chest. she bent to inspect it, spoke of thickness and cleaning, and he found himself listening the way a hunter listens for the first crack of a caribou’s hoof—intent, fixed, unable to look away.

his tail gave a slow sway. almost a smile tugged at his mouth.

good, he said, voice low, warm. i want that.

he stepped closer, close enough that their shoulders nearly brushed as he looked down at the pelt she’d claimed.

no other woman touch my hides, he added. not ravah. not any.

then his gaze slid back to her, steady and unflinching.

you cure for me. only you.

a soft tsk followed, mirroring her earlier daring.

you say this like i ever bring pelt to someone else.

She did not avert her gaze or duck her head as he moved closer, as she had in the past. It hurt, just a little, to look at him like this. So close, so close, touching — she didn't understand the burn of it in her chest or the squeeze of it low in her belly or the way that her nerve endings prickled down her spine and in her toes. A fanged set of jaws seemed to grab hold of her heart and wrench it forward, almost bringing her along with it, so that they might touch all the more —

But she held steady, the only signs of her distress her rabbiting heart and a soft but shuddering exhale.

He was teasing her, she knew. But when he spoke, it was again with words of intention. This time, Angel felt the promise was more concrete. She could no longer wonder if they were dancing around what she thought. Either he wanted to marry her, or he was a liar.

"A woman must make her expectations known," she replied, her eyes sparkling. She would take him at his word until forced to do otherwise. "Besides — how am I to know what you got up to while I was away?"

She was only teasing. She'd had a spy here, after all, and Elowyn had reported no unsettling developments.

he stood still, close enough that her shiver brushed his whiskers.

woman right, he murmured, voice low, roughened by something he didn't name. must say what heart want.

her sparkle, her challenge, drew the faintest crook of a smile onto his muzzle. she was bold today. bolder than before. he liked it—more than he should.

when she teased him, he gave a soft scoff.

what i do? he leaned in a fraction, enough that his pelt brushed hers. hunt. teach. keep valley safe.

then, with a tilt of his head, eyes narrowing in mock suspicion—

and angel think i chase other girl?

a beat. a quiet rumble of amusement.

hn. no. i keep promise. wait for you.

his gaze softened, not losing its weight or seriousness.