The Heartwood ego

as the wraith, made sluggish and bloated with the now-obvious signs of pregnancy, steps over the jagged stump, she pauses. she wavers a moment there, made difficult by her ever-shift center of balance. she imagines the short-lived joy that would come with collapsing onto it, ending definitively that lives that used her as host. 

the woman lusted, above all, for control. power was often affiliated with that, yes, and thus far she'd made the right choices, carved out the perfect path. but with what had been nothing but a half-hearted attempt at rattling the hierarchy, she'd effectively and suddenly lost all control. her body was no longer her own, the man she'd taken interest in had been murdered, and a child claimed what should have been hers. branded with titles she'd never wanted, pregnant, and mother. 

but despite her sharp-edged hatred for those she carries, the desire to see their end, she will not sacrifice her own life for what she so desperately desires. she will be patient. and so, with only hesitation to hint at her thoughts, the woman moves on.

Though spring had already put it's foot in the doorway, food was not easy to find for a lone wolf like Norah. This stunted her progress in travelling further North and made her criscross the valley between the two mountains. She had found shelter for the night in Heartwood and had slept soundly, when shuffling footsteps of someone heavy nearby woke her up. Norah lied still, listened intently for the longest time and then made the decision to reveal herself and see at the same time, who the unexpected visitor was. 

She climbed on the log, under which she had found a dug-out hole and chosen for sleeping spot a day earlier, and caught sight of a pregnant she-wolf. Norah sat down and then called out to the stranger: "Guten Morgen, Madame! Warum sind sie hier allein?" The stranger did not reply and, since Norah was not the person, who asked twice, she went in the opposite direction, looking for lunch.