Nypon 🌱✒️

"Yes, distemper," her older sister and guardian always explained things in the most gruesome ways, "you might die."
"This could lead to an infection and death," was something she heard often, too, as Nypon was, well, a bit accident-prone. Clumsy, was what she and everyone else called it. But in reality, Nypon was just so scared that things would go wrong, she would overthink and things went wrong because of it!
When her mother, Skivling, took her away to live in her herbalist den, Nypon felt like she had done something wrong. But her mother spoke gently to her and let her roam free just as long as she came back before sunset. Nypon started watching her mother as she worked with herbs, but Nypon wasn't allowed to join in. She did experiments of her own, in secret, until one day her mother came back home and said frankly:
"It's time for you to learn a thing or two."
-
When Nypon had become an adult, she moved back to the pack. She was so excited to meet her sister again, and show her everything she knew! The knowledge of what herbs can do and what signs sicknesses have, made Nypon significantly less anxious and she felt this time with her mother had been a really good thing, but she missed her sister so much.
When she arrived at the packs territory, Nattljus was nowhere to be found.
-
The years went and went. Nypon built her life as the packs herbalist after her mother had died. The position was supposed to go to Nattljus, but she was still missing, and their mother had prepared for this moment. Nypon, just like the previous herbalists, found her own herbalists den in the forest where water poured down from a cliff, creating a beautiful waterfall. She was sad to leave her mothers den abandoned, but she knew every herbalist needed their own independent space to work in, her mother taught her that.
One day, after many years, she heard a voice that she instantly recognized as her sisters. Nypon was in shock, her ears pricked up and she stayed still, watching the bushes where she thought she heard the noise. Did she just imagine it?
"Hello?" her sisters voice yelled once more, and Nypon ran as fast as she could, through the bushes and out into a clearing, that's where she was. They stared at eachother for a few seconds, which felt like hours. Nattljus was limping, a large gash was covering her thigh. It wasn't bleeding, but Nattljus looked weak and Nypon knew what had happened. She ran to her sister and helped her to her herbalist den just a few meters from there.
As she was pouring various cleansing liquids on the infected wound, they were silent, until
"I had forgotten how blue your fur is," Nattljus said, and as Nypon looked up from her work they locked eyes, and tears started pouring from their eyes. Nattljus immedietly got up to comfort her little sister, assuming the protector role once again. I missed you so much, Nypon wanted to say, but she couldn't stop sobbing.
"It's not that blue," she sniffeled and Nattljus laughed. Then Nypon looked up at her, "where have you been?"
Nattljus explained everything, even from the beginning.
"I didn't want mor to take you away from me, I'm sorry that happened," she shook her head in regret.
After Nypon had moved away from the pack, Nattljus had joined a different pack, where she found out they had a relative. They had a cousin, also from the herbalist bloodline! The pack needed a herbalist, and Nattljus was trained for it. That's where she had been all this time. Recently, the pack was dismantled, and only one family remained, and this family was -
"Utterly insane, they fight all the time and they just cannot get along with eachother," Nattljus explained, "Its crazy."
And then she got hurt during a hunt, and she got an infection, and no matter what she did she didn't seem to be able to cure it. And that's how her leg got in such a bad condition.
"Will you move back home?" Nypon asked.
"Ehh.. I don't think they would accept me just like that, but we'll see alright?"
Nypon nodded in response. When the wound was cleaned up and treated, they both went to sleep.
-
Nypon had had pups twice before, but then her mate had been with her. He was long dead now and Nypon was on her own, foolishly she went out to forage and didn't realize it would be time for her pups to come. She tried to walk home, but it was too far. She collapsed on the trail as her first puppy came out, it was dead. The stress caused her delivery to slow down, and as she laid there next to the stillborn, she noticed predators assembling. The next pup started coming out, and Nypon tried to crawl away from the place. That's when a pack of coyotes arrived, some went for the stillborn, and some took her new puppy. Nypon never got to see if it was alive or not. She ran, even though she was exhausted, and eventually found shelter at the base of a fir tree. The large majestic branches were hanging down, hiding her. Nypon cried in sorrow over her lost puppies, and she condemned herself, and she missed her mate so much. She gave birth to two more pups under that tree.