Big Salmon Lake [BWP P4 Prey Opportunity] katatonia

Sorry if this is terrible lol D:

The stranger fled, and as Merrit watched the poor brute run, Merrit felt a crawling disgust. Not at Nightstar, but at himself. The slightest curl of his lip was all that revealed the faintest strain of shame. When he turned to Hydra, his eyes had again hardened to bullets of stone.

He was not Merrit who had left Easthollow; that man was a ghost still dwelling on the plains, wrapped up in misery, and placing stone after stone after futile stone upon the ground leading out from the Circle, in the vain and wishful hope his lost family might see and come running back home. And he was not Stark. No -- he was not -- never, no, never again. He shifted his eyes. "I'm afraid I've lost my name," he murmured; there was something hidden in the pitch of his voice, a strain that would betray him, and he hardly cared.

Yet when @Hydra mentioned children, his head lifted, and he understood what had led to the ferocity in her advance. Of course, and of course, mother would have done the same. His thoughts roamed to his siblings back home -- and to Valette, her loyalty to the blood of her offspring -- and he found himself nodding along. "We have very little prey, and we, too, have young and hungry mouths to feed..." but with this he glanced at the moose, and sighed. "I had hoped to bring at least a leg back to feed them, but the mountains... the travel will take many days, and I realize now the meat will spoil before I reach them. Perhaps -- "

But he never finished his thought; the call of a dark stranger distracted him momentarily -- not calling for him, but for a kin of Moonspear, Dirge -- and Merrit felt himself stiffen with the heightened sense of danger which cut through the air. His sharp eyes turned toward the wolves of Moonspear, and he surveyed them shortly before returning a questioning look to their queen.