Disclaimer: I do not own Voltron/Go Lion or any of their characters. They are the property of WEP and Devil's Due Comic and Toei Animation. All other characters are mine. This is written purely for entertainment purposes and I am not monetarily compensated in any way

Winters Bone

Chapter 5

She sank back in shock, horror, and a disturbing kind of elation, crab crawling backwards until she hit a rock. She struggled to her feet, using the rough stone to steady herself on weak, trembling limbs and staggered to the stream bank. The taste of the poacher's blood briny and metallic...reminiscent of something...some she had when she was a girl. Was it duck? Quail? No. Doves. When she was child her father had taken the whole family on an autumn holiday trip to North America. They had hunted doves, plump and slow, in the early, misty morning. She remembered the sound of the wings, then the rifle's blast and the smell of gun powder. She couldn't bring herself to shoot, but her father and brother did. They had brought them back to the lodge and the chef there had prepared them for dinner, wrapped in smokey bacon. Back then she had felt deeply sorry for the gentle birds and grimaced at the iron-y liver taste, unable to eat them. But now..? She licked her lips at the memory and swallowed instinctively. A second later, realizing what she had just swallowed, she gagged, the doubled over to her knees and retched. Her stomach was so empty she could only dry heave until a string of yellow bile dripped off her lower lip onto the snow.

She crawled over to the water's edge and splashed her face and scrubbed the drying blood off her hands in the water. She cupped her hands, splashed her face a few times and started to take a drink to wash the taste out of her mouth but saw it dripped pink onto the snow. Dizziness overtook her again and she staggered to her feet and made her way over to an exposed boulder and leaned on it a moment before sliding down and sitting against it, resting her head in her crossed arms. He was a man...helpless and defenseless. Injured and as desperate as I am...What have I done? I killed him. She shuddered and her stomach heaved. I cut his throat like a trussed pig. A wave of dizziness and nausea rose and she pitched forward onto her hands and knees and sucked in big gulps of the cold, sharp air. She took another deep breath relishing the piercing ozone-cold in her nose and throat and filling her lungs. It hurt, but it was also cleansing. She started to feel the nausea subside with each inhale and her panic settle with each cloudy exhale, so she just sat back in the snow and breathed. It was all she could do.

Some time had passed before she felt well enough to move again. How much she couldn't tell exactly, but she noticed the sun had sank lower, a mandarin-gold glow amid the trees which cast their long cobalt shadows across the sparkling drifts of snow.

She raised her head and saw him there, still twisting slowly. Look at him, just hanging like that…I'll bet he never thought he'd end up like this. No one would. His arms were hanging down, hands trailing in the water, his one leg stretched out and over his body like he was kicking a football goal...the other held tight by the snare. Her gaze skipped quickly over the gaping black-red gash she had put in his throat. His mouth was closed, his face completely covered and still dripping red with blood, but his eyes were open wide. They seemed to stare at her, following as he turned slowly back and forth. She felt a stab of pity and shame. Like a sort of secondhand embarrassment for the indignity of his plight.

'...get my knife...cut me down…' She could hear his ragged voice begging, pleading, demanding…

And what had she done? She had killed him in a moment of panic.

'...I can help you...help your kids…' The sound of his words echoed in her ears as she sat in the snow watching him sway. She struggled to her feet, noting her fingers and nails were pale and blue. She had to do something, she couldn't just sit here and wait to freeze to death. The princess was waiting for her and probably becoming worried by now. I didn't mean to hurt him. It was just an accident. He shouldn't have grabbed at me like that. But he did...it's done now...nothing will change it...

Nanny spied the soldiers knapsack in the stream and walked over to it unsteadily, her boot soles packed with ice and squeaking in the heavy snow. Maybe she hadn't gotten a pig, but she had got something anyway. I'll bet he has food in that thing. Other stuff too...She pulled it out of the water, struggling a bit with it's weight. She noticed the rifle too, and felt the quick joy of surprise, and a little stupid too, that she had forgotten about it in her brief stupor. She set the knapsack down on the snow and stepped gingerly from that rock to the next and pulled out the rifle. That too was heavier than she thought, but it was well balanced and she noticed it had a full charge. She hopped from the rock to the stream side and set the rifle down.

She opened the knapsack and whooped out loud, the sound echoing through the trees. It was full of supplies. She dug around, finding a rolled heat blanket, extra garments, a med kit, a small side arm and most wonderful of all...food. Not a lot, but enough to make due until she could snare another rabbit...or pig. She reached in and grabbed out a ration packet. She pressed on it, smooshing its contents. She couldn't read Drule but she recognized the brand logo of the meal replacement drink on the label. Her fingers, stiff and clumsy with cold shook and slipped as tried to tear it open. She tried to use her teeth but only succeeded in tearing the tab off and cutting her lip.

"Gottverdammt!" she cursed out loud and then remembered the soldier's knife. She shuddered at the idea of going over to where he was with his accusing eyes staring right at her, but there was no choice about it. She needed the knife. She set he ration pouch down and reluctantly sloshed into the water.

The weapon was directly beneath him. She tried to avoid looking at his blood caked face as she crouched, shin deep into the water, as she fished it out. She turned and went back to the knapsack and gingerly sliced open the pouch along the dotted line. She carefully set down the blade. Her hands shook with excitement as she drank a swallow of the contents. Mien got! It's sweet! Like apples...or maybe pear...and savory...like bacon... The sensory rush that rippled though her as the protein and glucose hit her empty stomach felt like pure joy. She felt lightheaded and thought for a moment she might vomit again, but the feeling passed and she drank a few more swallows. It was an act of sheer willpower that she didn't slurp down the rest. After all, she had save some for the princess.

It was a very odd and manic tangle of emotions she had then as she folded the open edge of the pouch and pressed until it sealed. She felt such immense gratitude to the dead soldier, then a deep revulsion that morphed into anger as she stared at the pouch. He had had food. He didn't have to steal her rabbits. He was just being greedy like all those Drule are. She stared at him from across the stream, hate building within her as she remembered how frightened and helpless she felt. All those nights with nothing but warm water and mushrooms, her belly growling like an alley cat for days, until it stopped and the hunger went deep into her bones. The worst was watching the same thing happen to little Allura, just a child who should be growing strong and playing in the sunshine. But instead she was hiding for her life, slowly starving and freezing to death in a dark cave.

"It's your fault," Nanny said out loud to the corpse, pointing her finger at it. "You did this. This was your fault. You should have stayed home and never come here," she glared at him as he twisted in her direction. "Stole my rabbits and you didn't need them! You starved my princess! You disgusting thief!" her fingers balled into fists and her voice carried angry and fierce through the trees.

At the memory of the missing rabbits and their severed legs she had a sinking feeling as she realized he had her snare now, or rather it had him. He was dangling from her last functioning snare.

"Scheisse!" she cursed as she followed the trail of the line from his leg over to the drift covered tree where she had secured it. "What a pain in the ass you are, rabbit-thief," she grumbled aloud and stooped to pick up the knife, feeling the cold more now as she splashed back into the stream and headed towards the tree.

It took her the better part of a half hour to dig out the snow only to find that because of his weight she could not pull enough slack in the line to release it from the snap hook of the carabiner. She was going to have to cut it. Annoying, but she would still be able to use it with a little repair work.

"You wanted me to cut you down? Well, down you go!" she angled herself away from the line and the lazon blade blade sliced through the galvanized steel wire like sewing thread. The dead man landed with an inglorious splash. Nanny exhaled in irritation as carefully slid the knife through her belt and sloshed into the freezing water yet again to retrieve her snare.

Thankfully, he landed turned away from her, almost face down, his legs sprawled open. Nanny made her way to the leg with snare had landed propped up and out of the water on a cluster of rocks. She didn't have kneel or sit in the water. she thanked whatever gods had not fully forsaken her. She traced the line to above his boot, where it held fast around his calf. As she felt the area looking for a place to work it loose she noticed that the lower part of his leg where the snare had caught him was hard as stone. The foot wouldn't even move. In a flash it occurred to her that the snare had acted like a tourniquet, stopping all blood from that area; killing off that limb. He would have died regardless of what she did. There was no way he could have helped her and Allura. He probably wouldn't even have been able to follow her to the cave in this condition.

"Well Arschloch, you had a quick death thanks to me," she mumbled as she ran her fingers around the snare and tried to dig a finger under it to pull the line slack. It held fast. "God damn it!" she cursed again in frustration. Why was nothing ever easy?

She took a deep breath, realizing she might have to loose her last snare to this damn rabbit thief.

Her anger grew as she once more thought about finding the severed rabbit foot. She boiled soup from those tiny bones for three days...all the while this-this- disgusting pig! This pig had had plenty of food, a rifle, a knife and who knows what else when he stole their dinner just because he could. Just like a pig. Just like those wretched, greedy pigs do.

The light was fading. She had to make a decision. One more try. She stared at his leg and tried to turn it attempting to access the metal loop that secured the line but the injured limb wouldn't budge. She lost her temper and pummeled the dead soldier's leg, wishing she could break it in half—wait. Wait. She pressed her lips together as an idea came to her.What if I just cut it off? She reached for the knife.

The lazon blade made easy work of her task. The blade sliced through his fatigues and the meaty part of his calf like a loaf of bread. The snare popped right off, and thanks to him hanging there upside down all night and bleeding like he did when she killed him, there wasn't much blood. In fact, it cut so cleanly through that it was a perfect cross section of the muscle and bone.

For a moment she felt strange, giddy almost as she looked at it. It looks like a lamb shank. At the suggestion her stomach rumbled and the phantom smell of roasting lamb overwhelmed her. When had she last had lamb? Terra. In New Zealand. She was at a dinner with her team mates there. They had done well in the dressage and the show jumping was the next day. It was at Le Boeuf, a famous restaurant specializing in the tradition of open flame cooking with actual wood. No one had the space to do that in cities and it was a rare experience indeed. The memory was like a flash bulb. She could remember everything, her teammates faces...the glint of the fire light on the rim of her wine glass. But most of all the smell of roast lamb, marinated in red wine and crusted in garlic and rosemary. The meat was tender enough to fall of the bone and the taste of the smoke and fire-charred fat...

The memory faded and Nanny shook her head trying the clear it. She realized she still clutched the soldier's severed leg and as she made to cast it aside she saw once more how very much like a lamb shank it looked...except for the boot. Her stomach, teased with a few swallows of protein shake, rumbled again and the smell of meat and rosemary invaded her memory. Didn't the Drule eat humans? Hadn't she read somewhere that human soldiers' bodies had been returned missing the hearts and their livers? They were such pigs. Creating nothing, taking and destroying everything. Like this one here, worthless except for his meat and bone.

The wind rattled through the trees, bringing her back to reality and the rapidly setting sun. The princess will be worried sick and starving too. Without her even realizing it something frayed apart in her and the last vestiges of domesticity and civility fell away from her. She cut off the boot and the soldier's foot with the efficiency of a practiced butcher. She quickly rinsed the smooth wax colored section of calf in the flowing water and cut a section of the soldier's uniform off to wrap it in. She sheathed the knife and purposefully splashed back to where she put the knapsack, gathered her snare and packed her bundle away. She slung the heavy pack on her back, grabbed the rifle and started back up the stream to cave. She paused a moment and looked back at the dead man. She saw movement flickering around the tree trunks. Pigs. They had come for the corpse. Looks like everyone is eating well tonight, she mused and hustled on her way in the dying light.

Allura was waiting for her when she returned, anxious as she always was when Nanny left to go forage.

"Oh! My Schnucki, do I have a surprise for you!" Nanny exclaimed to the little princess as she leaned the rifle against the wall and shrugged off the pack.

"Did you get a rabbit?" Allura watched her movements intently.

"Oh, even better!" Nanny opened the knapsack and pulled out the half finished shake. Here, this is all for you, Nanny said pushing the foil pouch into Allura's waiting hands. The girl took a swallow and gasped in amazement. "Try not to drink it all at once, you'll upset your tummy...there, that's better. Now wait, I have something else…"

"Where did you get this?" Allura asked between sips.

"It was by the stream, along with this-" Nanny pulled out the wrapped bundle and showed Allura the cross section of meat and bone. "I caught us a pig!"

The princess gasped in surprise, "Nanny! That's amazing—wait, is that a rifle?"

"Ach, never mind about that," the governess said as she gently turned the princess' face away from where the weapon stood telltale against the wall. "Let's get some extra wood from the pile so the coals get real hot and roast this...have you ever had pork shank cooked on a wood fire before?"