ROUND 1 WINNER ONC25 || Running from a war-torn world, Aulka and her pack find refuge in a Dream where there is no suffering, no pain, and no death. It's a well-needed reprieve...until Aulka is attacked by the very creatures that killed her family.
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Forever is the flow of time A constant change that never ends
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Owna had told her that the greatest gift is life.
She taught Aulka how to preserve it, how to support it, how to make it flourish and bloom like a flower in newbirth's snow. Life is a precious, irreplaceable gift, Owna had said time and time again as she packed serialized moss into wounds, or pounded herbs into poultice, or tucked a fur around an ailing eldu.
Healing, Owna taught, is to preserve this life, and no kind of pelt, no power of shard, no threat of fang and claw, should ever stop her from tending life. A life is a life, a soul is a soul. Each one is wholly unique, and once lost, it is gone forever.
From tiny, soundless and sightless pups, to ever-growing youngsters, to inexperienced adults, to wise, aging eldu, life is an adaptable, ever-changing, ever growing concept to flow with and along. Life is change, like forever is endless, while Death is stagnant, stillness, changeless, though eternal in its own right.
Owna taught these things and Aulka learned. Learned to open her heart and expertise to all who came, to treasure each and every one of her pack members, to appreciate the life growing all around her.
All life is precious. All life is unique. All life is change.
So as Ishu's pups play like leaves falling, Aulka worries. Worries because they aren't a paw bigger, a leg taller, a snout longer than two icewalks before.
When she asks, do you feel bigger? Stronger? they always say yes. Are you hungry all the time, do you have to take naps? And they always say no. Over and over, the same questions with the same answers and Aulkaworries.
They tell her not to. Don't worry about us! they say with open mouths and wagging tails. We're fine! We'll grow big and strong like Father soon!
But soon hadn't come. Not in the first icewalk that was only cold enough to make one feel alive and where the elk had pelts that glittered like glass; not when newbirth passed, not when worldfire came and went along with icewalk again, not when whelping season turned around... And for a second time there were no new mouths to feed, despite Umble's belly full of unborn pups.
It's unnatural, Aulka says. Too long. But when she asks the eldu and the youngsters, none seem to notice or care.
Don't worry so much, Aulka, Eldu Atta whuffs as she lifts her head from her sun-warmed rock. Some pups take time to grow.
And no matter how many, It's been two icewalks, and, They haven't grown a nose-length since two icewalks, or, Umble's been due to whelp any day now for narblinks, she says, she gets no more than a reassuring tail tap and, All will come in time.
Eldu Teol only sighs and mumbles, You'll worry your snout of yours grey. Pups are pups. Let the elk gather their young, and the swallow her eggs, and resumes nibbling on his paws and watching the pack from under the purple and gold willow that overlooks their dens.
