While most thought that wolves traveled alone, in truth that wasn't a common thing. Traveling alone had its dangers than being with a pack. You only had yourself, you didn't have anyone to help if you were hurt. If you were cornered, no one would know if you disappeared. It was frightening. But…sometimes staying with others was more dangerous if not twice so. Walter was taking the chance to travel out from the Corval Basin back to his mother's birthplace, Eyota Etu. With Venti's cold winds, perhaps the heat of the desert would be milder now. The wolf felt a growing apprehension every time he thought of the endless sand, the lack of water, and difficulty to get one's bearings. It was a far cry from the forests and mountains he knew. Maybe he would be fortunate and find some people to travel with once he found a town. With the sun dipping blow the horizon, he began his journey. Wrapping himself up for the nighttime cold, he checked that his fire was out, and began the long walk.
The winds were harsh and bit at his face, his eyes half-closed to keep the sand out. It was then that he smelled smoke and ash of a fire that had long burned out. In the dark of the night, the moons shone their pale light on the ruins of what was a large encampment. It was quiet, and something about it made him tense. With crossbow at the ready, the tracker crept through the dunes to the smoldering site and burnt blood now mingled in the air. The stench soon became unbearable, and he saw a sight that made him want to run. Death, and carnage everywhere. More scents were flooding in, ones that weren't human. Deep gashes of claw marks were all over the place, on people, on the wood remains of the tents, on scattered armor. It was the 'moonstruck ones', a term Sparrowhawk used for those who had been cursed by the spirits of the beasts to turn mindless and violent. While he feared for his life, he felt he had to check one last time in case there were survivors.
Most of the bodies he found were too mangled to be alive, but he finally found one that wasn't torn to pieces. Several nasty wounds were on her body that matched the claw marks he had seen earlier, and he pushed aside the burnt branch to check if she was still breathing. It was so hard to tell, and he had to check many times to make sure. The scent trails of the other wolves told him they had long gone, so he chose to take the risk to spend the night. Finding the skeleton of some partially intact ruins in the camp, he set up a tent of his own and moved rubble to better hide it from view. With a fire sheltered from the desert wind, he then went back to bring the injured woman inside. Her injuries were deep, and the most he could do would be to clean them and have them bandaged. If she wasn't able to recover from the blood loss, she would certainly die. As he put in some dried herbs into the fire, the strongly scented smoke wafted out as a deterrent and as a cover for his scent and the woman's.
He was no healer, and they were too far from help. Was there anything he could do? Searching through his gear, he found a jeweled brooch with red gems. Holding it in his hand, he squeezed it as he glanced over at the woman. "It's all that I have, but I'll give it a shot." Walter took the brooch and pressed it into her hand, and it began to glow with a soft light. It would take days for the magic to return, but at the moment it would heal whatever damage had been done…provided the woman was still alive.
