i am the blood of the mountain

As frayed as the nerves of Micteca and Uno seemed to be, when Zen called them to attention and gave them something to do they responded. I gave her a small, confident smile as she instructed them to listen for each of the male's heartbeats. If nothing else, it would keep them occupied and allow them to focus their energy on a task rather than worrying for the wellbeing of their two fallen friends. Despite her own wounds, Zen seemed to have a good handle on the situation. I kept pressure pushed against the wound on Amir's shoulder, but my eyes drifted down the length of his body to take in the rest of the damage. He had a laceration just behind the shoulder, as well as various injuries over his chest and even a few vicious bite wounds on his front paws. The small cut on his face seemed inconsequential, at least for the moment. It would need to be tended to later to ensure no infection occurred, but the most important thing now seemed to be to stop the bleeding from the deep cut I pressed upon. The longer I held my paw firmly upon it, the less that blood seeped out from around the saturated moss. The pooling of blood on the ground began to soak into the earth, and there was nothing new to refresh it. It was working, and my eyes flashed up to Zen to give her a nod of reassurance. Mictecta's ear was pressed against his side and she whimpered softly, echoing Uno's diagnosis in that the heartbeat was there, but slow.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted the white form of my sister approaching, and my gaze shifted to her as she approached. I dipped my head in greeting, grateful for her quick response to my call. I was unsure if any of the septons would join us, but at this point it did not matter. What mattered was ensuring that the two unconscious wolves survived, and we were already taking steps to do that by keeping pressure on the wounds. The bleeding had stopped, but if we were not careful the worst of the wounds would easily be disturbed and begin flowing freely once more. My ears pricked forward as Ceal instructed me to go and find more moss, but I was reluctant to go. Zen still had a bit of moss left in her own healing collection, and I while I trusted Ceal to care for these wolves to the best of her abilities I would not leave them. My tail thrashed over my back a single time, expressing as much to Ceal. For now, we would make do with what we had. All I could heard was Meryl's voice in my memory, 'You have to clean fresh supplies.' Would we not simply introduce the possibility for infection if we did not take the time to clean the moss first? I did not question her here, instead nodding in agreement as she spoke of remaining here until the two wolves were more stable.

Ceal moved then to speak directly with Zen, asking her for an explanation of what had happened to them. Before I could say anything to the contrary Zen began to tell the story of what had happened. And immediately my ears flattened against my skull and my lips pulled back in a silent grimace at the name. Zeus. I had met him once before, when he came to these very borders claiming to be a god with the ability to control lightning. I had thought him deranged, but also potentially dangerous. "I know this Zeus you speak of," I commented, my voice steady but my distaste for the wolf plain. This occurrence had proved his maleficent nature, and I suddenly wished I had done something more than just turned him away from Spirane. But there was nothing to be done for it now, and so I yawned to relieve the tension from my face, snorting in discontentment as Zen finished explaining the extent of both wolves wounds. Ceal listened intently to the explanation before stating that the dressings Zen had applied would need to be removed so that the lesions could be cleaned. I stepped back, removing my paw from Amir's shoulder and leaning forward to gingerly peel away the moss saturated with blood. I was afraid that once that barrier was removed he would begin to bleed again, but once the moss was gone the wound remained clotted. I aided by removing the rest of his dressings before stepping back to allow Ceal to further inspect them.

daenerys