She leads them north of the lake, where laurel and pockmarks of quaking aspen make it feel as though they are far removed from saatsine’s run. Autumn gathers in the trees overhead, spilling russet on the frozen ground and crunching even their hunter’s fleet steps.
The silver does not expect they will be perceived from this position downwind— not when powder dusts their hides and nearby clacks shake litter from branches. For a breath she stills, tasting the air, tuning in odors of imperishable sweat and putrescent wounds.
“ Fa'liya, ” a hush beckons swiftly. She motions the raven-girl closer and flattens against the snowy ridge, pressing her nose through the low cover to carve a small window in the underbrush. “Look.”
Below, ice mists the air, flung up in furious rushes and the knocking aside of bloody tines. A wild fenzy! Several bucks churn in scuffle while more are thrown athwart, sputtering their hot breaths in protests which fill the girded embankment in bugling.
It is an ancient dance, witnessed only once before by Iglux̂ when she was a girl no older than Fa’liya is now.
“The bulls battle for access to cows. They lock each other's antlers together and try to push the other away.”
The silver does not expect they will be perceived from this position downwind— not when powder dusts their hides and nearby clacks shake litter from branches. For a breath she stills, tasting the air, tuning in odors of imperishable sweat and putrescent wounds.
“ Fa'liya, ” a hush beckons swiftly. She motions the raven-girl closer and flattens against the snowy ridge, pressing her nose through the low cover to carve a small window in the underbrush. “Look.”
Below, ice mists the air, flung up in furious rushes and the knocking aside of bloody tines. A wild fenzy! Several bucks churn in scuffle while more are thrown athwart, sputtering their hot breaths in protests which fill the girded embankment in bugling.
It is an ancient dance, witnessed only once before by Iglux̂ when she was a girl no older than Fa’liya is now.
“The bulls battle for access to cows. They lock each other's antlers together and try to push the other away.”
