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The Blood War

Chapter Ten

Outlander shot into an alert position, immediatly greeted with the stinging fire of a thousand barbs setting in her neck. A whimper escaped her snout and she dropped to the ground again, her strength vanishing in an instant. "Well that wasn't very smart," chuckled a gravely voice from behind her. She tried to turn her head, but the pain became too much to bear so she turned it back with tears filling her eyes. A shadow crawled across the ground slowly until a large brown and sand colored wolf was sitting in front of her. His fur had started to fade into grey in some areas, and one of his eyes was shut tightly.

"So you're the half-bread that stood up to death, hm?" Outlander winced, straining her eyes up yo see the wolf clearly. A sour scent was becoming more apparent, stinging her nose. The soil around her was stained a dirty red shade. "What happened?" She murmered in slurred speech. "What's that smell?"

"Well, it's nice to meet you too?" He chuckled, "I'm Winks. And that smell," he said, nodding to the ground, "Would be your blood."

She looked at the wide stain around her, noticing the side of her neck and the fur around her belly was caked in dry, red liquid. "I ... lost this much blood?" She couldn't put any emotion behind the words. She was tired, and her eyes threatened to shut; it was taking all of her energy just to stay awake. Winks nodded, "You can cheat death, but there are consequences." He stood and padded somewhere behind her again. He shouted something back to her, but the sound of her own, sluggish heartbeat was drowning everything out.

Sleep. Just a few more minutes.

"Hey!" Pebbles and dirt flew into her face, causing her to jump a bit. Winks was standing next to her. "Eyes open. You've got to keep fighting if you want to live. Now, can you sit up?"

Outlander stared at the old wolf out of the corner of her eye before letting out a long sigh and straining against the pain to sit up. Fire coarsed through her veins, but this time it wasn't helping her. "You want to live then, don't you?" Winks said once she finally pulled her head from the ground.

"I have to live." The words were cold emotionless, spilling from a dark pit at the bottom of her heart.

Why? There was a reason, she just couldn't remember right now.

It was a moment before Outlander realized Winks was talking, "... a miracle if you make it. Don't see many survivors of the Bone Beast."

"Is that his name? The Bone Beast?"

Winks looked up at the dreary sky. "That's what my family called him. They say he helps wolves. I've only ever seen the blood baths." He shook his head and looked down at Outlander again. "Guess that's what living dead does to you."

He started padding of, saying something to Outlander, but she lost focus again, laying her head back on the ground when he was out of sight.

"What did I say about keeping your eyes open!"

The sudden shouting startled her, causing her to shoot up into her alert stance once again, tearing at the scab on her neck. She whined in pain, shutting her eyes tightly to squeeze the tears from her vision.

How long was she asleep?

"This is the brave coywolf that faced death?" The voice was demeaning, laced with disgust. Outlander opened her eyes again, greeted with the identical faces of two pure white wolves, eyes narrowed and unconvinced by the injured half-breed before them.

"Coywolf, this is Snowbank and Snowblind, twin heirs of the alpha pair. They want to speak to you about what you saw."

~CL1

~CL1

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