Set Fire to the Rain

It had been a mistake to be caught out so far from home.

She still wasn't quite sure what had possessed her to travel all the way to the orchard with a storm brewing. To check to see if her new Valhallan acquaintance was there? Stupid of her to have gone, stupid to have worried to begin with. Incredibly stupid to have thought he might be there when any wolf with any sense would have been holed up somewhere safe. Valhalla had territory on the mainland; he was more more likely to be safely there, while here she was wandering around in a hurricane like an idiot.

The Orchard hadn't been bad. Still storming, but not bad. This place, however, was another story entirely. She should have stopped and went to ground an hour ago, but again, stupidly, she had pushed onward in the hopes of reaching home.

Now she was traveling along at a steady clip, head down against the raging wind. Above her branches were whipped around by it like a terrier shaking a rat. Rain lashed down on her, slicking her thin fur down even more. It was wet, it was miserable, and...

CRACK

Above her, the wind had finally succeeded in ripping a branch from one of the trees. A big, heavy thing, it would have been able to withstand the wind had not insects been boring into it's base. Coincidence snapped it from the tree just as Qanik was passing under it. The white wolf, with her head down, could not see the doom hurtling toward her. The crack of breaking wood sounded no different than the thunder cracking far above it, a sound not designed to warn her of danger.
The thick branch struck lengthwise, her shoulders and back taking a good amount of the blow, but the end of the log hit squarely in the back of her head with too much force. There wasn't even a yelp as Qanik crumpled beneath the log. Her forward momentum had her hitting the ground with breathtaking force, but by that time she was already out like a light. Unconscious, which was good because damn that's going to hurt.

Ouch.






speech.