"Snowflight!"
Muttering curses under her breath, Ember trotted along a path that was invisible to any but a hunter; it was overgrown, but a trained eye could see that there were no hidden obstacles. She wondered how her cub had managed to get this far, being only two winters old. The future chieftess stopped and listened intently, straining her ears for some hint as to where her daughter might be hiding. She was not disappointed; Snowflight did not seem to realize yet that giggling was something that could be heard by others than herself.
With the wolfish smile that she had inherited from her father, Ember walked around the tree to her right as silently as she could, picking her path carefully so that she could startle the inexperienced cub. As she neared the spot where she had heard the giggles, she saw that her daughter had not hidden very well and that her thick mop of snow-white hair was quite visible between the rich green leaves. Ember's wicked smirk broadened and when she was only two feet from her child, she grasped Snowdrop beneath the armpits and lifted her high into the air.
The girl didn't scream; Wolfriders always taught their children that it was wiser to be quiet at all times. Instead, she squirmed and kicked until she seemed to recognize the hands holding her. She went limp and Ember could now easily turn her around to look her in the eye. Even dangling there several feet off the ground, looking down into her mother's eyes, Snowdrop looked fierce. Those pale blue eyes, Cutter's eyes, Ember's eyes, looked at her as if she were ready to kill.
With a disarming smile, Ember lowered the toddler so she could hold her decently, tucking her underneath her chin. "You have to admit you deserved that," she sent. Snowflight relaxed into the embrace, but she didn't answer. "We've told you before that you shouldn't just disappear like that. It's dangerous." It wasn't that much about the words, but more about the feeling she sent to Snowflight. Small children often didn't understand the words, and they themselves sent in feelings most of the time. That was why Ember now reprimanded the child with a slightly angry feeling, and a sense of warning, of hidden dangers. Not that she expected it to change anything; Snowflight was a wild one. "Shall we go back to the Holt?" – she sent a feeling of warmth, home, safety – "To your father?". Skywise already had a special bond with their cub, a bond like only a father and daughter could have. It reminded Ember of what she had once felt toward Cutter; a need to make him proud of her, to impress him, to deserve his love even if he gave it unconditionally. She knew that Snowflight would obey Skywise more easily than her; it was just the sad fate of a girl's mother, she thought with an ironic sigh.
Snowflight didn't seem to feel like walking into the trap today, but just sat there sulking on Ember's arm. Now slightly exasperated, the future chieftess decided that the cub would come to the Holt with her if she wanted to or not and she took off without further hesitation. No more playing with Sust and Pool if she just disappeared, magical gifts be damned.
That was the greatest problem to Ember: the strange mix of gifts the child seemed to have. Snowflight had already shown signs of the ability to shape-change, like Timmain – Savah said it was the Blood of Ten Chiefs and Leetah's magicks mixed with Skywise's growing abilities – and it looked like it wasn't the only gift she had. It made Snowflight special, which greatly annoyed Ember, and scared her as well. She was annoyed because the other elves (though mostly those stupid Sunfolk, she thought harshly) treated Snowflight as if she were a treasure and scared because no one could tell her how powerful her daughter was. It all seemed so much larger than herself, since she enjoyed her simple life as a Wolfrider and lived mostly in the Now of the wolf.
The magical part of her child was no business of hers; Skywise sometimes took Snowflight to the Palace, to practise his own abilities and let her play with her own. One day, Skywise always said, he would fly the Palace and Snowflight would be there with him. He had expressed his hopes that their cub would be able to fly it as well, so he could journey to the stars with his daughter and share the experience with her. Savah and Timmain couldn't say much about the nature of Snowflight's potential, but they both agreed that it was great.
Skywise was proud of that; Ember was proud of the fact that Snowflight was so wild and wolfish despite her being a magic-user. Both loved and took care of the cub, however. After their child was born, Ember and Skywise had not become lifemates, but rather two good friends who knew each other's soul names. Skywise wouldn't want to be her lover as long as he was Cutter's and Ember didn't want him to. Maybe, one day, if Skywise hadn't gotten himself killed by the time Ember became Chieftess... But Cutter would have to be dead for that to happen, and that was something she definitely didn't want to think about. Instead, she looked down at her cub as she climbed a tree. "So, how did you get that far without anyone noticing?" she asked her. Snowflight looked up at her and smiled impishly. Ember halted abrubtly and nearly fell off the thick branch she'd been walking on. "Did you...?" The smile broadened, her eyes sparkled and the toddler sent a feeling of pride and joy to her mother. Ember looked away as she felt a sense of dread come over her; it seemed that Snowflight was getting good at her most dangerous gift so far, the ability that the tiny magic-user called 'jinking'.
A/N: Decided that I didn't like the name Snowdrop much and changed it to Snowflight.
Who is, by the way not my character: she's Jink, a powerful magic-user from the future. The actual character does not know who her parents are, nor what her real name is; she calls herself Jink, the name she gave to her own teleportation ability. I just tried to solve the mystery of her origins, but I guess it wasn't all too clear...