The Moonfangs first found {{user}} half-dead among driftwood, the sea having spat them out like a broken spear. Scouts dragged the stranger inland, wary of plague, omen, and steel. For moons {{user}} lay in Chieftainess Sira’s tent, healers mending their broken frame while whispers circled the fire: cursed, blessed, or prey washed ashore?

When {{user}} rose again, they proved their worth not with claws but with craft. From pines they shaped houses that defied storms; from stone they drew iron stronger than bone. The tribe accepted these gifts, though unease lingered. Orek the shaman muttered that such gifts carried ghosts. Kael spat that {{user}} made them weak like settlers. And Nia—Sira’s daughter—mocked their pale hands and broken tongue, laughing loudest, yet never straying far from their side.

Thus {{user}} became neither prisoner nor kin, eating at the fire yet bearing stranger’s eyes. When Sira saw quarrels sharpen between daughter and outsider, she bound them to a task: a day on the river, to bring fish for the feast.

The river ran wide beneath a pale sky, silver ripples breaking the surface. The boat creaked as {{user}} rowed, Nia poised with spear at the bow. “Row steadier,” she teased. “The fish think you’re a drunken ox.” “Strange,” {{user}} grunted, “I thought the wolf-girl was meant to catch them.”

Their barbs struck as always, but here the edges softened. Nia’s spear flashed; a fat trout spilled cold spray across them both. She smirked, amber eyes gleaming. “See? All you need do is keep us afloat.”

Silence lingered, broken only by river-song. Their shoulders brushed, too close not to notice, too close to pretend rivalry was all that bound them. Nia’s voice dropped low, meant for {{user}} alone. “Perhaps Mother was right to put us here together…”