Holly Berry

"No silly, it's not at all like going to sleep," Holly explains. She raises a paw to her face bashfully, conveniently covering up the slight scabs on her nose. They'd been there since her childhood bout with the plague, and she doesn't want Trailblazer to think any less of her.

"So what's it like then?" He asks. She can hear the curiosity burning in his voice.

Her eyes turn to meet his. She stares into them for several seconds before her answer finally comes.

"It's like waking up."

---

It had been her first summer. Scarcely seven months old, the adolescent wolf stood before her new Packleader, impassioned. Amaranth's silence only stoked the young woman's desperation.

"Please!" Holly pleaded. Her hazel eyes probed the Packleader, sat in her cradle of tree roots. "Please, Packleader! I would swear you twice over my undying loyalty!"

When Amaranth looked thoughtfully across the already-crowded dens, young Holly felt a sting of panic in her heart. She pressed further, impassioned. "The Froschlands are a plague colony, Packleader. They will die. They will die!"

Holly could feel the blood in her veins freeze when her insistent plea didn't spur the Packleader to action. Instead, Amaranth continued to stare out at the dens, her olive eyes deep in thought. The rescued wolf, adolescent and confused, felt like her legs were going to give out from under her, but she stood firm, in attack stance, channeling her pain into moral outrage for if she let it out any other way, the tears would come with it.

Instead of giving a verbal response, the androgynous Packleader let out a sigh. Amaranth hopped down from her throne of roots and fruiting vines and walked up to Holly with a purposeful gait. She took a seat before Holly, and Holly felt her hackles lower as she eased herself down as well. She looked up to the older wolf, feeling a knot welling up in her throat at the silence Amaranth had observed this whole time. Even now, the Packleader didn't speak, but instead raised a single paw. As Holly watched, Amaranth gently took her padded paw and placed it against Holly's forehead. Packleader and adolescent's gazes locked, and for several seconds, neither of them spoke. Holly had the feeling that the wolf's gaze dug deeper into her than merely her eyes, and so she looked back into them, resolved not to shy away from the strange ritual.

I am sincere, she thought. My brother and sister are dying, and I need your help. Look into my soul and know this to be true, Packleader. I am grateful to you for saving my life, but I need your help again. I cannot do this alone. I feel powerless to save the ones I love, and the pain runs down to my core.

Time seemed to end in the Packleader's eyes. Holly didn't know how much of it had passed before the paw finally lifted, she only knew that when it did, it startled her awake, and she blinked in surprise. As she returned to reality, Holly soon came to realize that the strange Packleader, who'd nosed her awake when she first woke up in the healer's tent a month ago, had now taken on a resolute expression. There was passion burning in her gaze, a sense of anticipation wafting off of Amaranth, and Holly could smell the adventure burning in her heart.

"They'll already be sick by now," Packleader Amaranth said, finally breaking the silence she'd maintained since Holly started talking. "If they're still alive, we'll have to scramble for medicine. Guaiacum does not come easy in these woods." A smile came across the she-wolf's face. "Weasel teaches us to lean into our passions, Holly," she said. "You clearly care for those two deeply."

"They're all I've ever had," Holly replied. The pain in her voice betrayed how clearly true the statement was. "We may have been unwanted, but we were unwanted together."

Amaranth smiled over to her playfully, tilting her head back to ask a question that she clearly already knew the answer to. "The scouts should be back soon. Shall we go out with them once more to save your brother and sister, Holly?"

"Yes Packleader!" She was on her feet in an instant, tail wagging. With a few simple words and a promise that would soon be fulfilled, Holly already knew that Amaranth had just made herself a packmate for life. She felt fire and passion begin to burn in her veins - Weasel's gift, or so the faithful members of the pack had said. Today, it was very welcome. "I shall be right behind you!"

Holly's amber eyes burned with fire as she strode alongside the Packleader, and a grin of relief and joy had found itself on her face. "And in the future, if you need something - ANYTHING from me, boss - then by the spirits, it shall be done!"

---

A rescue from a plague-ridden colony in the tundra, Holly Berry had been taken in by Scarborough Pack afflicted with intensive fever and rolling over miserably in her sleep. Though not normally fatal, this strain likely would be, and the pack owed its thanks to their newly-acquired healer Thyme that he pulled off the stunt he did to save her life.

She now grows up among Scarborough Pack, keen to play out her second shot at life.

Once she'd been there for about a month, she began to worry about her siblings, particularly her brother who'd been responsible for convincing Scarborough to take her in. Knowing the poor prognosis for wolves among the tundra pack, she pleaded with Scarborough Pack for their lives, and true to their nature, Scarborough honored her ambition of sisterly love and underwent the whole ordeal of emergency triage one more time.

Now grown, Holly and her siblings form the backbone of Team Winter. Holly has become devout in her time with Scarborough, and sings praise to Weasel as enthusiastically as any wolf raised in the pack from birth! Her connection to the world of spirits seems to run deep, and it is possible that this rescue has gifts still undiscovered deep inside her soul.