Mommy Issues [Open]

[Fel]

The Golden Ghost was out here somewhere. Her dam. Kelsk knew the gold was elusive—the word hardly seemed even sufficient—but forsk it, she hated never seeing her. What sort of mother abandoned her daughter anyway? Kelsk would never abandon any of her own eggs. The handlers she thought could be trusted with her offspring might leave and go elsewhere, traitors that they were, but she would never leave them.

So where was the Ghost?

The bulky garnet sighed, lumbering through a snowbank as she ascended a ridge. Keltin was a tight ball of worry over her absence in the back of her mind, but she shut them out ruthlessly. She loved her handler. She also needed time and space to be a sharding wher sometimes. And they had no real duties in the depths of winter. There was no danger of Thread, and though the flying wings drilled there was little for those more ground-bound to do.

The snowpack smelled clean, undisturbed by anything more than the animals that couldn't be bothered to sensibly hibernate. Lazy things. Maybe lazy enough to be a snack. Kelsk put her nose to the ground, snuffling for the trail of anything interesting. Snow didn't take a scent well, but most animals were unintelligent. The would urinate and defecate wherever they happened to be, rather than sensibly eliminating somewhere safer from predators. Predators like her. Catching the scent of alpine feces, she stalked up the slope.

Maybe she couldn't find the Ghost, but she could catch herself a consolation meal.