"—and what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches towards bethlehem to be born?" Grendel'd never met anyone who was so eager to welcome and calm a near-stranger. Yet when she passed another glance over the dark-haired, clear-eyed girl, she could sense no other motive lurking beneath her face like vermin crawling beneath woodwork. She bows her head to the white leader, adopting the familiar submissive position that was expected of her. This part, at least, she could understand well. But before the woman could even begin to move forwards, the unmistakeable presence of coyotes materialised from thick shadow. This too, she could understand.

Her hackles raise ever so lightly, her face pressed into a dark suggestion of a growl— but she knows better than to attack. She is weak, and vulnerable, even here, at the mouth of her new home. Frustration smoulders in her face as she slinks away, following Celandine's order. All she wants now is to get the stench of coyote out of her nose, and she glares at the loiterers, communicating an inflectionless warning in her flat gaze.