Bearclaw Valley those lions are coming, oh they're coming.

merrick had been dragged aside by the bear spirit in a current of ripples. he had even spent long swathes of tme without astara at his side, preferring solitude in which he might converse with the bit of ursine in his soul. presumably she was angry, for everything she did not understand seemed to anger astara.
merrick was so prideful indeed, to comprehend that he had never seen the way she communed with others, the dance of it; he had only ever seen astara filled with protective fury over those demons he had brought on himself.
her ire was righteous, but merrick, compelled by arrogance, saw only how she had wrapped her jealousy around him.
but never once did the boy question the loyalty of his shadow, never once did he query her love for he or his for she. 
and this swelled in his breast when at last he broke his hypnosis to wend in search of her, and found her, the grim of the valley, guarding with solemn pleasure a broken old woman for whom his heart swelled and broke.
"mommy," merrick mumbled low in his throat, choking off the boyish voice as eyes burst with tears and he ran down to stand above her gnarled frame. she had aged so in the time he had seen her; the dogs-reek of death poured from her pores, but merrick did not stop in his embrace, nor his low moans of agony to see caiaphas brought so low.