~The 1st Moment~
Running. It seems that this is what my life will be from this point on. Running. Fleeing. Surviving. Its all the same. The most cowardice act in the eyes of my family. The Chimakum tribe, The Legendary Tribe of the Great Wolves, is my blood, my kin, my heart, and they are my hunters.
"I must look a mess." She thinks. If only she knew. She runs at a pitiful pace for a wolf, nearly dragging herself over the terrain of the forest with short fits of trotting driven purely by the fear in her soul. Her lush fur, once a copper tinged brown, is now caked by layers of thick mud and matted with unknown debre from her days of travel. The mud was so heavy. After days of running without food or water, she was weak, her bones feeling hollow and fragile. Her muscles aching. The mud caked on her body and paws made each step harder than the previous. Beneath, her paws are cracked and bleeding - too numb for her to notice. She knows she needs to bathe in order to hunt, to run, to survive. But no matter what, she had to keep going forward, lest they catch up to her. The men are more agile and faster than their female counterparts, due mostly to their size. But she is put at a larger disadvantage. Being the daughter of a Hakidonmuya, she has inherited her mother's power, unmistakable because of there small stature compared to even the smallest of females within the pack. And its the pride of the Hakidonmuya bloodline, no matter how wounded from being exiled from her pack, that won't let herself be killed.
And so she goes on, stumbling over the slippery terrain like a cub just out of the den. "A little longer. A little longer, then I may rest." She reasoned with her body, her aching muscles, and her blurry vision. The winter was incredibly difficult to her this year. Unrelenting storms of snow, rain, and wind made her trek harder. Wind was her opponent at the moment. Whipping at her dry nose, forcing unwelcomed air into her lungs. She wondered if she had angered The Mother in some way; she surely has to apologize when she had her strength back. The Mother had such a gentle heart, it is easy to unknowingly wrong her. This wolf's size, nearly half as small as an average male, against this weather is what made it easy for her hunters to find her so fast. But her determination, and her fear she knew well enough, is what now put her at least 4 days run from her pursuers - cousins on the chief's side. "Father could make this distance in half the time. Dammit, MOVE!" She commanded her body, but it was not obeying - ignorant to her fear now. This pitiful wolf curses her size into the wind. Whipping her snout, a sharp wind sends her crashing into the snow below a fallen pine. The Mother's disipline. "I'm sorry," she whines weakly, "I do not mean to be ungrateful for the body you have given me." Suddenly, a great wind of flurries washes over her turning her vision white. She finally submits and she feels herself slip into unconsciousness. Beneath the whistling of the wind, a wolf howls.