Asla tried to spend time with both of her children individually. She had taken Arc hunting, so she would spend today solely with Satira. They could do whatever the girl wished. Not going too far from the Armada, Asla and her daughter moved through the thick, misty pathways of the Soulless Forest that she was so familiar with. Asla really liked it here and found such beauty in the hazy, eerie atmosphere. Perhaps they would work on some fight training when the pair of ladies took a little break.

Placing Tira in the hollow of a tree, Aslatiel meandered off into the fog to catch them some lunch. Knowing this place, it didn't take her long to hold a fat hare between her jaws. With a pull of her head to the girl in the hollow, she led her floppy eared daughter to her favorite place in the forest; her tree.

The pair entered the clearing where the old, gnarled tree stood. It's roots were thick and winding. Aslatiel had been collecting bones here since she was the same age as her daughter. There were piles of skulls all around the tree and there were other bones and things hanging from the branches. In addition to the bones, there was a thick awning made of waterproof hide. A gift from Naiche for her birthday.

Settling down within the embrace of old, familiar roots, Asla tore open the belly of the hare and placed it before Tira, letting the girl eat her fill first. "Are you enjoying our girls day, my love?" She questioned the child, a look of amusement glittering in her deep, purple eyes.

"Aslatiel Fatalis"

Any day that Satira could spend with her mother was a day well spent in her book! The little tan pup, growing to look more like her mother every day, gazed around the mist-veiled forest they entered with tiny coos of awe and eyes wide with wonder. Just like her brother, Satira was fearless—she just showed it in a much less outwardly reckless way. She gazed around at the mossy tree limbs and hazy air. She rode on her mother's back through the woods, still perched atop her from when they left the Armada lands. It wasn't that Tira was incapable of walking herself, but traveling over long distances with such short legs did prove to be a time consuming challenge. Plus this way, she'd get to cuddle with her mama every step of the way, os this really was a win-win!

Tira blinked in surprise when Asla scooped her up and set her into the hollow of a tree, peering out from her little hideaway in the tree while her mother wandered off to fetch them food. While she was gone, Tira bravely defeated a spider that had been in the hollow as well, squishing the creepy thing with two paws and a triumphant growl. Not long after, she saw Asla return with the fattest hare she'd ever seen in her life! Satira stared at the rabbit, salivating while her stomach growled. Tira carefully jumped down from the hollow to the ground and eagerly pranced after her mother, her ears bobbing with every bouncing step she took. After a short walk, Satira saw where her mother was leading her to: a large, gnarled tree that looked like it had been here for centuries. Satira gaped at the collection of bones all over the place, the piles of skulls and assorted bones hanging from the twisting branches.

The smell of fresh blood tore Satira's attention way from her fascination with the dismantled skeletons and back to where Asla lay, ripping into the hare. Giggling with excitement, Tira went bounding over to snuggle with her mother, nestling between her paws while she tore happily into the guts of the hare. The prey animal was virtually the same size as her, so Tira was in awe at the amount of food and her mother's hunting prowess! Asla was just an incredible wolf and someone Tira wanted to be just like when he grew up. Her mother was so strong, so dauntless, so driven. Satira glanced up at her mother with red staining her muzzle, paws, and chest as she had all but dove into the open stomach of the hare to eat. "It's the best day ever! Thanks, Mom!" She flashed her teeth up to Asla in a sweet, bloody smile and batted her bright blue eyes. "Is this your tree?" she asked as he ate, glancing around at the things Asla had collected over her lifetime, mulching down a mouthful of hare. "Wha do oo haf sho money buns?"

"Satira Fatalis"

The eagerness with which the sweet girl tore into the dead hare was very reminiscent of Asla when she was a child. It was uncanny how much her children had taken after her. Perhaps she was simply the stronger influence between herself and their fathers, but she felt as though some part of her personality had been passed onto them both. For that, she was glad. One father was timid while the other had issues with emotion. She wanted badly for both of her children to have the utmost confidence. She wanted them to be strong and proud and oh so smart. She wanted them to be able to handle themselves in any situation, just like their mom.

Satira ate and Aslatiel slid down to lay on her stomach, forelegs on either side of the girl. As the girl filled her belly, Asla straightened a few locks of the girl's silken fur. Tira thanked her, then moved on to asking questions, to which the woman laughed softly. "Yes, this is my tree, and there are so many bones because I've collected them for quite a while. I like bones." Absently, she reached out, rummaged through the pile, and came back with a painted skull. It had been painted long ago and the rain and winter snows had dulled the color upon it, but it was still obviously painted. She held the fox skull upon her raised paw and eyed the paint. It brought no emotion now, but she had painted this skull for her 'dead' brother Azure long ago. Asla tossed the skull away and it clattered back into the pile.

That was when she heard it.

The clattering didn't end. In fact, it got louder. A low hiss of scales across bone brought Aslatiel instantly to her paws. Both paws scooped beneath Satira and the woman literally threw her daughter away from the tree. Just in time, too. A massive snake erupted from the pile, striking out at Aslatiel's backpedaling form. One set of claws extended as she batted reflexively at the snake's face, claws catching on scales. The reptile retracted, but only for a moment. It's big, big body soon slithered out of the pile of bones and into the clearing where the two wolves had just been resting. Asla placed herself between her daughter and the snake. She was ready.

The coiled snake struck again and Asla ran to the left, drawing the snake's attention away from the child. Coming up behind the snake, Asla sank her teeth into one of the coils, her head thrashing back and forth. Blood flowed into her mouth and she spat out a scale or two, but a bite didn't do much damage to a snake. You had to cut off the head. The reptile slithered fast, coiling again as it faced the woman. It was ready to strike once more. Asla squared off with it, hoping that Satira would be smart enough to stay out of its way. She couldn't spare a glance for the girl right now.

"Aslatiel Fatalis"

Her mother laughed while she explained that this was her tree and that she had collected all of these bones. Satira gazed around at the collection of bones with wide-eyed wonder, her meal mostly forgotten when Asla reached into a pile and produced a weathered fox skull. Tira, face covered in bloody splotches, lifted herself up on her back legs to rest her tiny paws on the skull, marveling at its smooth surfaces. She looked over the delicate curves that shaped the bone, wondering if this was what everything looked like on the inside. She giggled when Asla tossed the skull away with a clatter and had been about to ask her mother why she liked bones so much when a much louder clattering of bones took both wolves' attention.

The next thing Satira knew, she was being hurled away by her mother, squealing in shocked fright as she tumbled to the ground, unharmed but definitely taken by surprise. She heard the hiss, but her young brain didn't make the connection between the sound and the creature until she saw the giant snake lunging for her snarling mother. Tira watched with huge, fearful eyes while Asla dodged and ducked the snake's lightning fast strikes, sinking her teeth into the reptile that aimed to make them both its lunch. The snake repositioned itself and her mother moved between her and the snake, taking its attention while she danced around it. Satira desperately looked around for something to do. She could back up, run and hide, let her mother protect them both. But something inside her nagged at her, chiding her for wanting to give in to fear. She was a Fatalis, dammit! Fatalis wolves didn't run.

Steeling herself with a point glare, Satira sprung to her paws and ran backwards around the snake while her mother distracted it. The head was dangerous with those sharp teeth and gaping maw. So instead, Tira ran for the snake's thick tail, growling as she lunged for the fleshy end of the snake's body. Tiny needles of puppy teeth bit at the snake's skin, but were unable to pierce the dense scales protecting the snake, and Tira ended up just gnawing uselessly at the reptile's tail. Unfortunately for the little girl the snake was highly perceptive, and as soon as it felt the nibbling at its tail, the snake moved with motions so fast that within the blink of an eye, the giant snake had darted around in a loop and surrounded Satira's small body in a tight coil before turning back to face off with Asla.

Satira gave a squeal of fright, but the sound was immediately cut off when the snake's muscular body squeezed the puppy within its coils so tight that she was totally immobilized. Trapped in the reptilian death grip, Tira was startled to find she couldn't breathe at all, her chest compressed to the point where she couldn't inflate her lungs and the pressure of the snake's squeezes constricting her tiny body so hard that it was impossible for her heart to keep beating properly. Satira felt frozen, staring blankly up at the dense canopy of leaves overhead while she asphyxiated, her vision a swirl of color and starting to go black rapidly, her body struggling with all its might to hold onto consciousness and not give in to death. She wanted to cry for help, to scream for her mother, but all she could do was quietly watch as her vision blacked out and her body began to shut down in the snake's lethal embrace.

"Satira Fatalis"

The intent had been to lead the snake away from the tree, then cut back around, collect Tira, and go home. Most of the time, plans didn't turn out how you wanted them to. Today was ono different. In true Fatalis fashion, the girl rushed in blindly. She sank her tiny teeth into the tail of the reptile but wouldn't yet have the jaw strength to do anything but pinch. Reflexively, the snake contracted, pulling away from where Asla had been holding its attention. A moment later, her world stopped. One giant coil looped round Satira and began to squeeze her tight. Asla could see by the expression on the girl's face that she was going to die. That was, if her mother failed in doing her job. Cold fury took hold of the striped woman and she surged into action. Cat claws extended, she used their grip to help launch herself towards the snake. Hind legs pushed off of the ground and she was airborne. Time slowed as forelegs extended, jaws opened. There was no time for thought, but they managed to happen anyway. She had to succeed. There was no room for failure. If Asla couldn't protect her child from danger so close to home, how could she expect to protect them from danger out in the wilds on her own? If Satira died, falling victim to this predator so much larger than both of them, Aslatiel would die as well. NO. There was no time for this. No time for the 'what-ifs'. She had a snake to kill. Jaws, already wide, bit into the wide scales below the snakes head. It had struck again, coming to meet her, but Aslatiel had met it first with claws that dug in between the green, black and russet scales. Those claws and the outstretched limbs that they were attached to had kept the snapping jaws of the snake just a hairsbreadth away from Aslatiel's face. It had been a hard gamble, but it had paid off. With her teeth sinking into the reptile's throat, Aslatiel used hind and front claws to dig repeatedly into the neck and belly of the snake, seeking to do as much damage as she possibly could. Aslatiel was rewarded with blood. The pain of the early stages of evisceration shook the snake's confidence. In its new panic, it released the girl and tried slither away, but Asla refused to let go. This fuck had threatened her child, there was no other option than for it to pay with its life. "Speech"

Satira had never known there could be emotions as strong as the heart-stopping fear she was currently experiencing. Or maybe that was the crushing pressure of the constricting snake keeping her chest from expanding. The little girl was completely unaware of anything happening outside of her head right now, oblivious to her mother’s renewed violent efforts to free her from her reptilian death sentence. Her head was pounding and her ears were ringing as her heartbeat fluctuated between a weak, rapid flurry to nonexistent depending on how tight the snake wanted to squeeze her. The reptile could have killed her instantly by squeezing just a bit harder until her tiny body popped, but the snake was a bastard, toying with the pup’s life while it fought with her mother. Blackness had fully overtaken her vision by now and a faint blue hue came over the girl’s cheeks as she suffocated. How long had she been in the snake’s deadly coils? A minute? Two? Death felt so painfully slow and also so incredibly quick.

But Asla intervened in the nick of time, defying that fate. The woman’s sharp teeth and deadly claws found purchase in the snake’s body, and before her heart could beat its last, the snake relaxed its muscles and dropped the tan girl to the ground. Satira gasped hard, sucking a deep breath into her greedy, aching lungs and immediately began coughing. She tried to get back to her paws, stumbling away with a final desperate parting swipe to the flailing snake’s tail. Her oxygen deprived body felt like jelly while she tried to put as much distance between her and the snake as possible. The air smelled thick with blood and the feral sounds of fury from her mother barely registered as the snake was butchered alive by the Reaper. Tira ended up collapsing only a few feet away in a coughing fit, her lungs hurting every time they inflated. Her vision returned, spinning and swirling while she recovered from her near-death experience. She wanted to get back up, to go help her mother fight off the snake instead of lying on the ground wheezing like she was asthmatic.

Satira lay across the cold ground, fighting to catch her breath while her senses began to gradually reactivate. She fortunately hadn’t been suffocated long enough to cause any lasting damage, but her confidence had definitely been shattered. Once the world had gone quiet and Satira could get enough breath in her bruised chest, she let out a couple weak whines for Asla, the scared little pup calling for her mother. The possibility that Asla might not have won the fight didn’t even occur to the girl, or that the snake might be coming to eat her again. In her mind, Asla could never be beaten, and she just wanted the comforting protection of her mother to remind her that she was safe and make her feel less like a failure.

"Satira Fatalis"

Teeth and claws ripped through reptilian flesh like water. The snake's offense quickly turned into defense and it began to curl in on itself. Asla fought harder than she'd ever fought before. No one hurt her children. No one. Blood and chunks of meat and scales caked the woman's face and chest. She didn't know when the snake released Satira because her face and eyes were covered in blood as well. She could feel the reptile going slack, but never once stopped the biting, tearing onslaught. Aslatiel only stopped when the anaconda's head was separated from its body. It had made a grievous mistake and nothing short of its death would pay the price for harming her daughter. When the snake's struggles stopped, only then did Asla take a moment to breathe and wipe the gore from her face. The weak, pleading whines of Satira told her that the girl was alive. Rushing to the child, Asla snatched her up into a fierce embrace, pressing Satira against her chest as though she would never let go. "Are you alright?" She questioned softly, though her voice wavered slightly with the buildup of emotion. Tears filled the woman's eyes as she nuzzled into the top of the small girl's head. Thrusting the emotion far into the back of her mind, Aslatiel sniffled once and was done. "Let's get you back home," she said softly. "We could probably both use a bath first, I think." Both fawn colored ladies were red with blood and little pink flakes of snake meat. Shakily, Asla rose to her paws and prompted Satira to do the same. Only then did she scoop the girl onto her back and move away from her tree and the snake that made a mistake. "Speech"

It didn't take long for Satira to feel the strong paws of her mother scoop her up into a comforting and secure embrace, the little pup instantly snuggling into the safety of Asla's fur like she could disappear from the world. Her heart was still pounding with fear and adrenaline was rushing through her veins, wide blue eyes showing the terror she'd felt at that moment. Death wasn't a foreign concept to the girl, but this was the only time she'd ever felt truly vulnerable to it, the sudden sense of mortality shaking her to her core. Satira trembled in her mother's hold, giving tiny whimpers as she tried and failed to hold back tears from spilling down her face. She felt like such a failure, so stupid for trying to stand up to a creature more than ten times her size! But her mother had done it, and she wanted to help. All her efforts had done though was put herself in danger.

Satira peered up at Asla's worried expression while her mother nuzzled her head, still unable to form words to tell her how she felt. In that moment between blacking out and death, Satira had been so afraid—afraid that she'd let her mother down, that she'd never get to snuggle with her again, never get to play with Arcturus or run through the Armada grasslands or splash in the sea. "I'm okay. My chest hurts," she said after a moment, her voice hoarse while she held back a few more coughs from her spasming lungs. She didn't mention the terror she felt, but that would have been obvious to Asla. The poor darling was still shaking like a leaf and her breathing was a shallow panting at best. She didn't resist when Asla mentioned bringing her home and having a bath. During their hug, Tira had gotten plenty of the snake's sticky blood all over herself as well.

The pup said nothing as Asla scooped her up and placed her on her back, Tira's tiny paws clinging to her mother's scruff like her life depended on it. She risked peering back at the decapitated snake, unable to look at it without envisioning herself coiled up in its long, thick body, moments away from being crushed to death. Still quivering, Satira buried her face into her mother's scruff and cried. "I'm sorry, Mom," she whimpered softly. What was she sorry for? Satira didn't really know. She just felt this deep guilt for... something. Maybe it was getting in the way and putting herself in danger? Maybe it was because she felt she'd failed and let her mother down? Who really knew how the mind of a scared child worked.

"Satira Fatalis"

Satira said that her chest hurt and Asla believed that completely. She'd been crushed between coils of pure muscle. "We'll go see your father. He'll be able to help." Mojito would know what to do to help the girl. He would be able to look at her and fell if anything was broken. Just the thought that Asla had brought about this injury infuriated her. Had she not taken the tiny girl so far away from the pack, this wouldn't have happened. Perhaps it was a good thing that her father convinced her to stay until spring. And then the girl apologized from atop her mother's back. Aslatiel's heart clenched and she stopped in her tracks. Gently, she extracted the tiny child from her ruff and once again held Satira against her chest. "You have no reason to be sorry, my love." Aslatiel peppered little kisses across her daughter's crown. "I'm sorry. I should have been faster." Gently, Asla stroked the back of the cream colored girl's head. "I didn't protect you." Again that self loathing struck at her like the snake that had just tried to kill her child. She had failed Satira and had almost lost her because of it. Asla should have known that there was a snake. She should have seen it and hurried Satira away. Again she kissed her daughters brow as tears filled her amaranthine eyes. "I'm sorry, love. You're safe now." She tried to be reassuring, but inside she felt like a failure. "Speech"

Satira's ears folded back to her head, embarrassment warming her cheeks as she stifled another cough from her aching lungs. Great, now her dad had to find out she'd almost been eaten by a snake too? This wasn't how Tira wanted her mother-daughter day to go at all. Everything had gone wrong and it was all her fault. She shouldn't have been so stupid and reckless! Her mother would never have done anything as dumb as that! Guilt sank Satira's shoulders while she slumped against her mother's nape, but it wasn't to last as she felt Asla come to a sudden stop, and then her world was shifting as she was pulled from the larger fae's neck and into her loving embrace.

Bright blue eyes blinked in surprise while she tried to peer up at her mother, but a flurry of soft kisses across her forehead made that difficult. In shocking fashion, Asla began to apologize to her instead, explaining that she should have been faster and that she didn't protect her. Satira looked up into her mother's tear-glistening amethyst eyes with a scrunched expression of confusion. Her mother hadn't failed to protect her, she had done exactly that. She was still alive because her mother had protected her, and the opinionated little girl said as such. "But you did protect me, Mom. You saved me, and I didn't..." Get eaten. A little cough punctuated her words, but Satira nuzzled into her mother's chest fur all the same, surrounding herself in familiar warmth and love. The warmth and love she had almost lost forever in the blink of an eye.

Satira couldn't help but begin to cry as well when her mother did, the hot tears falling from bleary blue eyes as the gravity of what had happened finally became a reality in her mind. Seeing her mother so emotional, so vulnerable, it really made her realize and appreciate how close to death she had been. Satira was feeling... small, weak, fragile. Her invincible bravado of being a Fatalis had been shattered and her mortality was suddenly acutely obvious. Tiny paws clutched at her mother's chest, wanting to disappear into her fur where nothing could hurt her. "I love you, Mom..." she murmured between choking sobs, only able to repeat those words as the terror held her hostage. Asla may have felt like a failure, but she would always be Satira's hero, even more now than ever before. "I love you... I love you..."

"Satira"

Aslatiel realized that her rise of emotion was igniting the rise of emotion in Satira and the woman worked to tamp it down. Brushing her liver colored pads over the tears on her daughters cheeks, Asla forced a smile down upon the child. "We both learned something today, right?" Again she brushed the girl's cheeks. "Don't tangle with an angry mom." Asla kissed the top of Satira's head right between her sweet little ears and pulled the girl against her chest. "I will always protect you, Satira. Always." Releasing the girl, Asla gave her a quick kiss on the head. "Now let's go home. We'll have your father look at you to make sure that everything is okay, which it will be because you're tough." The pain in Satira's chest would fade and she would be right as rain before too long. Asla was determined to work with her until she could outmaneuver any beast, be it furred or scaled. Just because Satira was small didn't mean that she couldn't be powerful, agile, smart. Just like her momma. "Speech"