I had slipped off this winter into the free lands once more, a jaunt in my step as time seemed to pass and nothing bad happened. They hadn't found my friend and he seemed just as jovial as I did. All would be well, I was sure of it, and they would soon see that they were wrong. Nothing bad would happen - it couldn't. Meryl had given me stuff to chew that made me sleep so good I felt like I could run from one end of Molodian and back if it didn't meant barging into another kingdom and I was pretty sure I didn't even want to get close to the plains. The last time I had met with my friend, well, was he just a friend anymore? Things had grown physical. It wasn't the type of physical I was used to although I had done it once before but not because I had wanted it. Then it had been something that had been thrown on me without my consent but my mate had wooed me with touches that still left a silken feeling on me. It was... strange, but I liked it. I felt a sense of possessiveness over him now because we were close and intimate and I KNEW he wouldn't abandon me like everyone else.
Still, it had been many weeks since I had received word from him and I had begun to notice a change in myself. My chipper mood bled away and left me feeling depressed, my intense fear returning in full and my belly began to grow rounder. Even my teats grew as time passed and they were so sensitive I didn't want to lay directly on my stomach anymore, whimpering in my den when I was forced to lay on my side, which was just as uncomfortable. I wasn't HUGE like I had been before but I was pretty sure I was pregnant. It was so scary.
I had raided the stockpiles of available meat that the hunters brought in today, finding no energy to try and hunt down something, and settled for a fat squirrel that had peeked a bit too early from his hiding spot. I carried him in my mouth, his busy tail slapping against my chest as I headed in the direction that I had found Meryl before, assuming he would magically appear. In fact, I DO spy him, and I feel a jolt of pleasure at my own tracking skills - which, this wasn't tracking but still - and my tail wags as I draw closer.
I drop my squirrel at my feet in the snow, standing before Meryl with a serious expression on my face.