Dear sweet child [Atka]

Atka's steps were sure and purposeful as she jogged across the range, intent on returning to her somewhat distant home after a hunt. At nearly a year old she was quickly becoming competent at hunting for herself, stalking partridge through the snow-laden grasses that disguised her pale pelt so well. She had already fed, and another partridge dangled from her jaws, a gift to the woman she knew as her mother, who had seemed down as of late, and to her father who still recovered though no doubt Soliloquy and Othello were keeping him fed.

Unexpectedly something impacted solidly in the girl's side, throwing her into the snow. The bird dropped from her mouth, and black-marked face turned to face her attacker with intense scrutiny. For an attacker it was, a much bigger brown-coated female who stood over her aggressively. She made no attempt to rise from her prone position, nor did her posture show any aggression of her own, merely a certain passive curiosity. What had she done to this woman to be thrown? "If you want the bird you can have it," she offered... though truly the female should have simply asked for it if she was so hungry. Atka would have given it to her without a question - she could always catch another.

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