Shattered

He padded quietly along the path to the lake, eyes cast down to the soil ahead of his paws. His plant seemed to be working. The orange mint from the other day had perked up after enough time in the ground with water soaked into the soil he’d packed about the base. He’d taken pains to border the hole with flat stones before filling it in, knowing how heartily mints could grow if they liked their home.

Today, he was on the hunt for Meadow-sweet, and he’d brought the gathering hides with him, draped across his back. The plants grew well on water edges, but he thought that he might be able to pull off adding them to his beginnings of a medicine garden.

He would be lying to himself if he’d said the icy anger hadn’t left him yet. Every time he checked on the wounds of the wolves that had defended the territory from Talis, it hissed through his veins. Even thinking about it now hardened the jeweled colors of his eyes to glittering ice before he turned his thoughts away to the other worries, and faint spark of hope.

Kavdaya had eaten more today than usual. And, perhaps it was a desperate hope only and he was just imagining it, but there seemed to be a faint, dim light of awareness in those amethyst flecked sapphire eyes. But part of him feared her return to clarity. What would learning about her mate do to her? What if she retreated back into the cold, distant place she’d escaped to in her mind, and they lost her for good?

He spotted the signs of the Meadow-sweet and veered from the path, pressing gently through the lakeside undergrowth to the herbs he sought and sliding a hide from his back and spreading it upon the ground before facing the herbs again. This would be a useful addition to his garden.