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My heart eased as I found her exactly where I’d left her a few hours ago, sitting beside Kiu. The fawn fast asleep amongst well-fed pups.
Salak nipped at my forearm, sniffing at the hastily, terribly woven basket carrying food for Runa. He snarled again as he bit at the deer hide that I’d painstakingly scraped and cleaned.
The end result wasn’t perfect, but it was supple and large enough to give Runa the protection she seemed to need. The protection I needed to give her.
“I know the skins are usually left to rot,” I murmured, hoping Runa wouldn’t see me before I had a chance to present my gifts. “But I needed this pelt.”
The alpha huffed and turned his head to look at Runa. I sensed his curiosity as well as his apprehension. I still didn’t understand why he stayed guarded around Runa, but I didn’t have time to find out. I’d already been gone far longer than I wanted. “You’re leaving on patrol?”
He cocked his head and yawned, shedding his worry over the latest member to join his pack. He didn’t care about the fawn. It offered no danger to his wolves, and as long as it had Runa’s and my scent on it, it was family.
When he stood upright, his sharp horns almost touched the cave ceiling. Stretching, he slid his paws forward. His claws dug into cave rock, and his spine rippled with power before he gave me one last judging look and padded toward the exit.
New stars glittered outside, and the cooling air temperature made the hair on my legs stand up, doing their best to trap in my heat. Not that the wolves cared about a small temperature change. Their pelts kept them plenty warm, even on the snowiest of days.
Once the alpha had vanished into the night, I weaved around the other wolves as they left to join him on their nightly hunt and boundary check, making my way to Runa.
She jolted as I loomed over her.
Pressing a hand to her chest, she gasped. “Ah, you scared me. I didn’t hear you.”
“That’s what happens when you share a cave with so many predators. You don’t hear individual noise, merely a collective togetherness.”
She nodded and smiled. Tiredness etched around her amber eyes and her lips were thin with exhaustion.
She needed to rest.
We both did.
“Where did you go?” she asked softly.
Sitting cross-legged beside her, I placed my gifts in front of me. “To get you something to eat.”
She baulked at the deer hide I’d spent so long cleaning away muscle fibres, gristle, and blood. “I-I’m fine. I’ll wait until I return to the Nhil tomorrow.” Panic heightened her voice. “I can’t eat Natim’s mother.”
“Natim?”
With another flinch, she glanced at the round-belied fawn, his fragile legs kicked out, his head resting on the paws of a sated pup. “I named him Natim. It means—”
“Trust,” I murmured. “Natim is the word for trust in our tongue. The language you told me is forbidden and dead.”
She nodded. “He’s the epitome of that word. After everything he’s been through, he’s so resilient and strong. He’s found comfort in the very arms of the ones responsible for him being here.”
“Perhaps that was his Destini,” I said quietly, never taking my eyes off her, studying her every twitch. “Maybe his Karma wasn’t to be raised by his own kind but by the ones he was born to fear. To learn that harmony can be found in the most unlikely of places.”
Her gaze shot to mine. The tension in her spine dispelled. “Once again, you’ve awed me with your wisdom. I must admit, that’s a nice way to think about tragedy. That perhaps this bad thing has happened, not to hurt him, but to deliver things he would never have experienced.”
“Just like we lost our memories so we could find our way back to each other and relive the thrill of knowing exactly where we belong.”
Her nostrils flared. She didn’t look away. An awareness sprang heavily between us, and my blood scalded with need.
The desire to touch her was swiftly becoming painful.
I cleared my throat and looked away, clinging to my self-control.
It took a few heartbeats before she spoke softly, “Perhaps I should make up a name for you too. Keocas, maybe.” She smiled, reaching out to stroke a slumbering wolfling. “I think that would suit you.”
My heart thudded as I laughed under my breath, trying to hide the prickling desperation in my belly. “To allow you to call me the word for wisdom would only swell my own self-importance.” I looked up, my chest tightening as I studied the openness and affection on her face. I didn’t think I’d earn that so soon. “I don’t deserve to be called Keocas.”
“Yet you seem to embody the word, just like Natim the fawn is trust in living form.”
