Shadewood qairulik ☄

there must be some mistake, kukutux decided, when epic spoke so happily of love between herself and the shaman. a sinking feeling began to replace her joy, but the girl was determined not to allow her dejection to become visible. to the boy's questions she moved, fighting the tightness that had risen in her throat.

"cry found me far from here, across the mountains," kukutux revealed, gesturing toward the teeth of the mountain range that separated the hinterlands from the rest of the teekon. "since he gave me a place here, i have done what i can to make it home." it would never be home, not truly; the isle called in her blood, beckoned when she could not sleep at night. but this would be where she would reside, for the remainder of her years, if the spirits willed it.