He’d been closed off for so long, shut himself away, buried all his seeds of woe and been helpless as they rooted deep in his body, joined his veins amidst his flesh and muscles. Those seeds that felt so small at the time had grown, unseen, and sprouted saplings along his back. He was life at the forest floor, suffocated by endless shade. But here? God, everything was so open here, so exposed. The tundra wore its heart on its sleeve, and Aleksei wondered if maybe he should do so too; maybe it would do him good.

It was odd, not being surrounded by trees. Born and raised a forest wolf, Aleksei had never gone without the shelter of a canopy far, far above his head. It was bizarre, hard to adjust to, but he welcomed the change. He found it rather enjoyable to watch the stars twinkle in the heavens, lulling him to sleep. He’d also never seen so many birds in his life—eagles and ravens and ducks.

In fact, it was thinking of delicious duck meat (fat, juicy, plump birds) that had Aleksei snooping through the tundra. He figured that a territory as large as this had to have some kind of river system, or even marshland, that the aquatic birds would take advantage of. He hadn’t eaten this morning, and was now fully regretting his choice to take a walk on an empty belly. He huffed a sigh as he pushed on up the hill he had chosen as a vantage point, only to freeze on the spot as he took in the sight before him.

Another wolf stood in front of mangled, rotting carcass. Aleksei could only stare, shock obvious on his face, and he struggled to move. Good god, this was just like Kjors all over again. Was he going to be cursed to discovering decomposing bodies his entire life? He took a step forward, brows furrowed as his eyes danced between looking at the mess of rot and the woman investigating it. “Get back,” he suddenly sputtered, drawing closer still. “It might be diseased.” He couldn’t see the cause of death, only saw the back. How would he have known this was a murder?

Her reaction, sudden and startled, had Aleksei take a few steps back. He wasn’t really up for being on the receiving end of a bite—he knew all too well how wolves taken by surprise could act—so the precaution was instinctive. A whine whistled through his nose. He’d never meant to scare the woman, and actually felt quite bad for blurting out his warning the way he had. Still, he couldn’t ignore the fact that there was a mysterious corpse right in front of him. Sure, he had approached Kjors’ body without a second thought, but that was different somehow. He knew that man and, as tainted as Aleksei’s feelings towards the dragon had been in the end, he felt he had to do right by Karina.

She spoke, and the large male could only blink in surprise. Someone had hurt them? How could she be sure? Curiosity led him to take a few bold steps forward, though he kept a respectful distance from her, and crane his neck forward. He wanted to see—oh. His heart stumbled, and his stomach felt as if it had dropped down to his knees; he hadn’t expected to see that.

Aleksei’s muzzle wrinkled in response, a mixture of disgust, pity, and confusion. It looked gross as all hell, with the dead wolf’s snout torn to shreds, mangled with bone exposed. He sucked in air between his teeth, a hiss that conveyed the feeling of “ouch, yikes”. That couldn’t have been a fun way to die. But why had this happened? What had this wolf done to deserve such an end? Who had they been? Who had done this?

Questions. He had a lot of questions that he likely wouldn’t ever get answers to. Was there any point in thinking about it? He wasn’t here to play detective, to be a righteous man who brought justice to wrong-doers. God, he was just trying to get by! And yet … and yet …

The woman here cared, didn’t she? A stranger to the victim, an unsuspecting discoverer of death, cared about the life that had once been enough to ignore the possibility of contracting sickness. It was brave, in a stupid sort of way, and Aleksei chalked it up to two things. The first was simple: good morals. The second? She might not actually realise that dealing with random corpses was a bad idea. “All right,” he started slowly, turning his attention back to the living, “then what do you propose we do with them? Bury them?” Alek had experience in digging graves, after all.

Aleksei had kept a lot of things from his family. What he had done whilst he had been gone was never brought up, as if the whole thing were some taboo, but he’d had quite a time of it. He’d seen murder—hell, he’d been dragged into a vicious scheme that even now felt like it was a nightmare, something he’d invented in his sleep. But no. He could remember the crying, the running, the smell, and it made his blood run cold in the middle of the night when he was startled awake by the shrill screams of foxes. Even so, he’d not dealt with their bodies because he fled the scene (he had something important to protect, after all). That experience came about itself. He’d not been as uncomfortable staring a lifeless husk in the face as he originally thought he’d be. Maybe that said something bad about his character?

Another sigh heaved out of his chest as she admitted she’d never buried another wolf, never dug a grave out of the ground. He eyed her for a moment, with those apologetic, sad eyes. How pitiful he must had looked. “If I told you I do, would you find it odd?” Would you judge me? He couldn’t imagine many wolves had dug graves for others, though he wasn’t entirely sure why he cared if people judged him for doing so. It wasn’t like respecting the dead was a dirty thing, that burying someone made you a terrible person. Hell, maybe she’d think it was only family he’d buried. But, wouldn’t she find it bizarre that he asked if she found it odd?

He really wasn’t doing himself any favours, was he?

“Doesn’t matter whether or not you’ve done it before though, I suppose. You just … you just dig.” And so, without another word, he stepped around the body, dug his claws into the soil and began to scoop.

There was no emotion, no feeling, in the task at hand for Aleksei. He wasn’t doing it for a wolf he knew, wasn’t doing it because he felt some tie to the deceased. Hell, they could have been a total monster in their life time—maybe their death was a blessing in disguise. Whatever. Then why was he doing it? He might have been loathe to admit it in his current state, but it was because this woman, even with her skittish attitude, had seemed so certain that doing it was necessary, that it was the right thing to do. She had unintentionally made him feel bad for not feeling the same.

Eventually, the two wolves had dug out a sizeable grave. Aleksei’s paws ached, and he panted for a moment to catch his breath (the last flurry of kicks had been the worst) before glancing at his current company. She looked exhausted, with wobbly limbs and a poorly hidden lack of breath. He was silent at her request that he move the corpse, only bobbing his head once before repositioning again. Towering over the dead wolf, Aleksei grunted quietly as his muzzle wrinkled; the stench was overpowering now that he was truly close to it. The fact that some scavenger hadn’t already discovered the carcass and picked the bones clean was a miracle.

He sucked in a deep breath, held it in his chest, and lowered his head. It didn’t take long before his eyes began to water. With a tentative move, the agouti male nudged the body and—oh, fucking hell! He wanted to gag, desperately swallowed it down as he took a step back to cough. The sun sped up the rot process here, clearly. At least the snow and the cold had kept Kjors’ body relatively in tact. All right, to hell with picking the corpse up in his mouth and shifting it that way. Aleksei wasn’t going to risk making himself vomit on a dead person! But he didn’t want to disappoint either, so he gathered his thoughts (and his bravery) before deciding that pushing with his front paws would be the best course of action. He placed one foot on the male and shoved, shifting the bag of bones, skin and weird body goo.

It felt fucking horrible, warm and damp. Aleksei kept his eyes firmly closed, knowing full well how awful it’d look. Just hearing the popping joints and occasional squelch made his skin prickle.

Eventually, after a few shoves and pushes, Alek heard the body half tumble, half slide into the hole. He staggered backwards, wheezing for fresh, untainted corpse air. “I need a moment,” was all he said, fighting back the nausea and the dizziness.