Namid was a rampaging beast.

Aleister had been gone for nearly two weeks, the longest of his brief disappearances and the queen was another day away from a heart attack. It had gone in stages for the woman, beginning with a little worry but not nearly the feeling of complete terror she felt at that moment. Then, after the first week it had been a depression. Moping around, sorry posture, sorry mindset, sorry state. Nothing anyone could say could console the practically mourning mother, not even the love of her husband. Now, it was a state of extreme anger.

Heat had officially set in, her entire body itching and on fire. She knew what this was now, understood what it meant and what it led to but the timing wasn’t right. There was still so much disarray, so much feeling that she had pent up over her loss and all she wanted to do was scream. Wanted to cry into the heavens about how unfair is was. How it wasn’t right that her family always be taken from her, especially not one of her own body. Her legs pumped over landscape, powering up rugged rocks and over with a directionless fervor. She didn’t stop until she reached a somewhat calming place at the base of the mountain, a gentle stream running through the center of the grove of trees but even the calming scene did nothing to save her.

Even in the frigid air she was on fire, emotion coursing through her veins fluffing her pelt and dilating her pupils. She didn’t know what to do, instead choosing to pace. How stupid could she have been for letting him out of her sight? Did she even deserve to have another litter if she couldn’t even keep her first whole? What kind of mother was she? And why hadn’t her child listened to her in the first place. If he just hadn’t strayed far from home none of this would have happened. A strangled growl left her jaws, and then she was doing the only thing she could think of to cool herself down.

Literally.

She leapt for the freezing spring, plunging in until she was up to her stomach before dropping to her knees. Her head dipped under the surface, shocking her system and briefly clearing her mind. She floundered to the surface, sputtering for air that had her throat stricken. Namid could do nothing but stand there, shaking in the flowing waters and pouring snow with lowered head, lowered ears, chest heaving in exertion. She was breaking at the seams.

Swimming, her mind was swimming. Twisting and churning along with her gut, mismatched gaze turning toward the sky and watching the pale flakes filter down from the gloomy sky. Gloomy, appropriate for the occasions, she thought bitterly. Namid was lost in the torrent that pulled at her legs and pelt, lost in the bitterness of winter. She hated winter, she decided right then and there. Winter was destruction, it was doom, it was loss. It pulled lives apart, buried them beneath its surface or swept them away with its white-washed gales like it had hers. It took away potential, tucked it away for its own selfish needs. Aleister had had so much potential, and suddenly she was chocking, biting back sobs. When had her child become a past tense?

Splashing rose above the murk of her conscience, then there was a body next to her. Her head turned groggily toward the figure, blinking once, twice, three times. "Hey; you're gonna get yourself sick." the unfocused entity’s mottled voice said, and then everything seemed to snap in focus so quickly she gave a small gasp as air flooded her lungs. Small pin-needles of cold pain pricked at her skin, ice slowly forming within the fibers of her coat. God she was frigid she realized for the first time that day. The cold had done its duty too well of washing away the fire that was her heat, but now her body was practically numb.

She couldn’t say she minded at that moment.

Then, as everything was slow at that point, she realized that he too was standing in the water with her. A small frown dipped at her maw as Namid was then the one shoving him toward the bank. “Y-you t-to,” she chattered out, shivers causing her speech to slur choppily. “W-why did you g-go i-in, s’n-not good,” she said, her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth. Jeez, couldn’t she do anything right?