Shay trotted through the grassy land, limping slightly on his healing leg. He'd come here on his way to the north intending to practice hunting with less-than-perfect vision and hearing. His face had just now healed to the point that he felt comfortable opening his jaws in a manner conducive to a killing blow though the muscles around the wound were still not responding quite as well as they had before the accident. Minor paralysis, he'd been told, which was absolutely fine considering that one of the other possible outcomes of falling down the side of a ravine was death.
Autumn was not the optimal time to relearn such an important skill - that would be spring when all the young were born, or summer when they were out on their own for the first time, rather than fall when all the stupid young had been killed off but the old were not yet weakened by winter - but it was what he had to work with and Shay wouldn't waste time and energy complaining about it. He'd spent the whole morning and much of the afternoon at work with no food to show for it, but at least he had learned some very valuable lessons about compensating for his blind eye - particularly after he somehow managed to run into the one lone tree in a wide-open field.
Well, it wasn't the first time he'd gone hungry, and it would hardly be his last unless something catastrophic happened in the next few minutes to end his existence... always a possibility. Having just missed another catch, Shay splayed on his belly, panting lightly, to take a rest before he'd move on. Still getting used to keeping watch with one eye and one working ear, he was probably less alert than he should have been...
