That was the last den he could find. Aheero’s paws quivered, the nails broken and bloody and each step painful. But not nearly as sore and throbbing as his heart. This was almost…not even a tenth of the pack. Barely any had survived. If only he’d been faster, done a better job…how could he have let this happen? They’d been counting on him to find new dens and even the Queen’s daughter had gone with them to ensure the spirit’s blessing.
The only ‘blessing’ was that they had survived, or perhaps it was merely a curse in disguise….no. No he refused to believe that. He couldn’t afford to believe that. Swallowing hard, looking over to where Kurroa was busily helping clear rubble, he forced himself to stop shaking. If she, a half-blind Dame who’d just lost her mate, could stand up and be strong, then by the spirits he would not crumble and fall. He would stay here, standing on all four paws, because he was one of the few who still could. And those who couldn’t…then they could lean on him.
“Vorona…” he called softly, padding across the now treacherous slope towards the young princess. Queen. She was surely their Queen now. Spirits help her, she was young as he was if not younger. “I think we’ve done all we can,” Aheero began, wondering how she would react to this. He was tired of bringing naught but bad news…
Vorona had tried to help, but her paws and claws were not used to digging. She was royalty, and although she tended the pack as the others did, she was more frail then the others who had their jobs within the pack. Her paws had become scraped, the white fur stained lightly as cuts had bled. Now, she stood near a familiar den, or what remained of it. Her eyes stared at the rubble, unable to comprehend what lied beneath it. Her...no. She couldn't even think. Her eyes filled with tears as she stared at the rubble.
Her pack. Her family. Everything was gone! How could she be all that was left? She was the youngest daughter, she wasn't ready for this. She had been trained in case her sisters had not been acceptable to the mountain but she had never thought this day would come. She was the youngest princess, not ready to be a queen yet. “Mother,” she whispered quietly, as the sound of the dogs scrambling fitfully at the rocks echoed around her. She placed a bleeding paw onto one of the many rocks which had collapse her family's den, her eyes squeezing shut. She had opened her mouth to speak again when a voice called to her, and it was not that of her mothers.
She jerked her head towards the ranger. He had been escorting the party to find new dens and leading the search for the pride after they had returned. She knew him. Of course she knew him, she knew everyone in the pack. Her eyes were glossy, but they narrowed at his words. “No, Ranger! We haven't.” She pulled her paw away from her family's den. “We can't stop until we find out...until we know...” she shook her head, staring at the dogs who were tired, and injured now from the search. “If there's even a chance that someone has survived...we have to try,” she whispered, but caught sight of his bloodied paws. They were worse than her own, and she knew how hers pained her. She squeezed her eyes shut and drew herself up. She couldn't sacrifice what was left to save what might not even be there. Her mother had taught her better than that.
“Tell the others to stop. We'll bind the feet of the injured and set out for new dens tonight.” She would not sleep with the spirits of the den hovering above.
Aheero’s ears laid back slightly when she snapped at him, though whether he intended to argue or if it was surprise or submission to her will…he didn’t know. Maybe it was all three. She was, after all, his Princess. But he knew these mountains, and the limits of his own body, better than any noble-blooded Dame or Queen ever could. And he knew what would happen if those limits were pushed too far. He refused to become a burden, and if he passed out then that was all he would be. But maybe he could push a bit further…
“As you wish, my Princess,” he murmured when she told him to tell the others to stop, painfully self-conscious that it was his own bloodied paws that edged her towards her decision. But some of the others truly did need to stop. He worried for his stubborn friend, she would never lie down and stop without the command. And the others…all devoted to their pack, their friends, the families… none of them wished to be the first to give up. Maybe that made him a coward, for stopping. His family, after all, was long gone. But he didn’t want to see people getting seriously hurt.
“If you’d like…I and a few of the stronger dogs might stay. We can keep looking a while, if it would ease your mind.” He could stay a bit longer, he knew he could push himself just a bit further. And if it would help Vorona…he would. He would do it in less than the span of a heartbeat. He’d have done anything for her…
Her shoulders were firm as she stood, her own paws aching but it was nothing like the others who were still digging. Mother, please give me guidance. The mountain seems to have turned it's back on you and now my heart is telling me I must do the same. She closed her eyes briefly. May your spirit rest in the mountains warm embrace, and may my sisters sleep peacefully. She opened her eyes again, and looked at the Ranger who stood before her. As she wished. She didn't wish for this. She wished that this was all over, that things were back to normal. She wished for her etiquette lessons with her sisters, following her mother as she looked over the pack. How could things go from happy to misery in such a short time?
“No!” She said firmly, at his suggestion. Oh how she wished she could say yes. “We leave as a pack, or we do not leave at all.” She glanced over his shoulder at the pack, her eyes sombre. “This area may still not be stable, to leave you or any other member here may lead to more death. We need the strength our numbers will bring.” She looking back at him now. “We are all that's left. I will not lose more of us for foolish dreams.”
It took all her strength to not glance back at her family's den. “I will find herbs to bind feet. Now...please, gather the pack.” Perhaps it was a sign of her tiredness, but the 'please' slipped out almost unnoticed. She was tired. She wanted this all over. Why couldn't it be over?
He felt as though she snapped at him again, leaving him somehow feeling worse than before to know he had added to her distress. It was not true, he knew. She was merely tired, as they all were. Tired deep in her heart. This was…unprecedented. No one knew what to do, but all eyes would turn to her. The only remaining daughter of their Queen. Their leader, though it was a heavy task for such young shoulders. His heart ached for her, he knew her choices would be hard and there was little he could do to help. For the first time, he wished he’d been able to become a Knight as his father had been rather than following in his mother’s pawsteps, but he clamped down on the thought and chased it away. Rangers were needed. Now more than ever. For who would scavenge the mountain and keep the recovering pride fed? Who would find new places to hunt, find new paths to follow, outline new territories, find new water sources…who else but him and his like?
“As you wish, my Princess,” Aheero said again, bowing his head to her. He wanted to reassure her. He wanted to tell her that dreams were not foolish, that it hurt to lose someone, that he understood what it felt like to be standing atop a pile of rubble and know you were all alone in the world. But she wasn’t alone, she would never be alone. He wanted to nuzzle her and comfort her so that she would not feel so utterly lost. Instead, he turned and padded back across the slippery rocks to round up the others, explaining quietly what their leader had decided. The arguments he quelled himself, with reason rather than authority. The surviving Clerics took up the task of looking after the injured searchers as well as those who’d been hurt in the slide, and only when the task was underway did Aheero weave through to find Vorona once again. If anyone would need a shoulder to lean on, she would.
She watched him leave, a moments pause as she waited for him to begin to round up the rest of the pack. There was so few of them. She winced at the dwindling numbers. She had to be careful. If they weren't, they may loose more and what if they were unable to recover? Her heart ached. She would not let their heritage, everything the pack was, die away. She took a deep steadying breath and, a moment of weakness overtaking her as she nuzzled a rock on her family den. “Goodbye,” she whispered, and moved away from the pack.
Her paws were steady as she climbed the rocks, her body able to weave through and over the large rocks that she had once played on as a pup. Things had changed. Her nose was on the rocks, as she sought the herbs she knew she would find. The clerics would begin to heal the paws, but there was little they could do if they could not bind them. She found a small patch, gathering the herbs quickly. They were long and wide, perfect to wrap around the paws to stop infection spreading. She laid them over her back in long strips, careful that none would fall off. They were weightless but the burden was heavy as she made her way back to the pack.
As she approached the area, she was surprised to find Aheero moving towards her. She didn't acknowledge him, and instead brought the herbs directly to the clerics who took them from her to use on the worst. She took a few steps back, careful to hide her own paws from the healers. Hers did not need to be wrapped, she believed, as they were barely more than scratches. Now she glanced towards Aheero, and down at his paws. “You must see the clerics,” she told him, her voice rather flat.
Aheero stood quietly by, watching as Vorona brought the herbs to the clerics to use. She certainly had a good head on her shoulders, but then, he’d always suspected as much. He said nothing when she approached him, merely let his soft green eyes rove across the ruined terrain. Where was that ledge he used to lay upon and wonder about the world beyond? Gone now, he supposed. Buried like everything else. A silly thing to be thinking about now, he supposed, but his thoughts were his own.
“I’ll be just as fine as you will,” he countered to her comment about needed to get medical attention for his paws. He had had worse, the scars on his shoulder and muzzle were testimony enough to that. But he didn’t argue, he wouldn’t argue with his leader. Females ruled the pack after all, and the Queen was the ruler of all. Their spirit-chosen leader. Quietly, he shuffled his paws, trying to find a way to ease the pressure without making it obvious that they hurt. Many of the others were much worse off than he was anyway.
Vorona cast him a sharp glance at his words, but knew he was not going against her wishes. He was stubborn, but not disrespectful. Glancing down at her own paws, she frowned and looked across at his. Well, she knew how to get him to get his paws fixed, but she did not wish to do it. Glancing up, with a quiet sigh. “I will not be fine,” she remarked. “I am simply waiting for others to be tended first. If my paws are to be tended, then yours are as well.” She refused to look at him now, watching as the clerics healed those that they could. There was a limit to what they could do, but they were trying. They all were. “The pack needs you healthy, Ranger.” They needed him in the pack and he would do no good to them infected or struck-ill due to his own stubbornness.
Aheero kept his head bowed as she spoke, avoiding the sharp look he knew she would throw him. She said she was waiting for the others to be tended first, but that sneaking suspicion remained. Regardless, so long as her injuries were tended to then he would be more than satisfied. He could be her scapegoat if she needed to be frustrated by it. It didn’t matter to him so long as she was well.
“They need you as well, Princess,” he reminded her softly when she chided him on being healthy for the pack. He was just one ranger. There were others. She was the Queen, or she must surely become so. Who else might there be that the spirits could choose? And what else need be done to prove she was chosen? There was no one else left…
Vorona scoffed, before trying to stifle the unlady-like noise. She frowned down at her paws but did not see them. His words...they were lies. Perhaps the pack did need her, but it was not because of her strengths as they did with Aheero. She was the last of her kin, she was the last royal. That was why they needed her. She had not even passed the test of the mountain to know if she could be blessed as Queen! How could they need her? They did not know if the mountain would watch over them now. “They need a leader, they do not need me, Ranger,” she said quietly, so no one else in the pack could overhear, though they stood close to the pack.
Aheero shook his head softly to her quiet comment. “You are their leader,” he informed her, his soft voice respectful but firm. “You are the only one who can inspire them, you are their Princess.” Couldn’t she see? That even if he was more knowledgeable at finding a path than she was, or the powerful Knight was stronger, or that Dame was faster, or that Cleric knew more about healing herbs…couldn’t she see that she was the only one the spirits might choose? Even if it was only a might, it was far better than the chance all the rest of them had. “If you give up,” Aheero warned her, his voice dropping to the barest of murmurs, “Then so will they.”
Vorona knew he was right as he spoke but still it was hard. What if she had already given up? What would happen then? How could she even bare to go on when her family was gone. She was the last. What if she failed. If you give up...then so will they. She looked back to her pack, and it was hers now. They were tired and bruised and battered. They had worked so hard and come so little, their lives around them in ruins. She was not the only one who had lost so much. She could not give up. She would not loose them too. She drew herself up, a steadying breath filling her lungs. She was meant to inspire them, she thought, staring down at her pack, but he had inspired her. So what did that make him? She looked at him now. “Thank you,” she said quietly, inclining her head lightly. She did not wait for his reply, saying instead. “Get those paws wrapped. I won't tell you again.” Her tone was firm, but not angry. She moved towards the cleric who was wrapping paws, a slight limp to her walk but she hid it well. She would be their icon, their symbol of hope, even if her hope was not strong. She would not let this pack fall because of her own emotions. She knew better than that. The pack came first. It always came first.
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