It was as she had feared. The contractions caught her far from the den she shared with X'yrin and Saluce and they came quick and painful. Earlier Nayru had risen, comfortable and warm in her nest of pelts and pine needles, and had taken what she felt was only a small walk away from home. The tiny room dug out by Saluce was perfect for her and the coming pups, but the Jiryu could not keep herself shut up for too long. When the pups played upon her bladder in the early morning she exited silently, as to not wake the others, and moved a fair amount away from the den before she pissed the urine strong with hormones out onto the frozen January soil. Afterwards, feeling revived and glad of the fresh air, she had simply taken to strolling in no direction in particular, until the sudden and sharp pain.
At the first pain Nayru's heart quickened in a way she was unaccustomed to. So well trained was her mind and body she at first did not recognize the rush of sudden emotion. Fear. Quickly she turned to face where she had come from and realized that she had wandered much further than she had intended. She had wandered much further than had been wise. The sun was not even up and perhaps wouldn't be by the time the ordeal was over, and Nayru quickened her pace to return to the den, desperation sinking in all of a sudden. The lady only moved a few uncertain steps before another, stronger, pain rushed over her small body.
The pain started in her womb but spread to every part of her. From what Nayru knew of birthing, and admittedly it was little, the contractions should have come upon her more slowly at first, but that they came quick and more severe each moment seemed the first indication that something was wrong. The second clue that something was amiss was when the gush of water that seemed to come too quickly was accompanied by the flow of bright red blood. Nayru recognized the liquid only by smell then, her eyes shut hard against each contraction that wrecked her body.
The waves of contractions came stronger then, trying to expel what clung to the walls of Nayru's womb. When the lady did open her eyes there was only a blinding white light to accompany the heat that ripped through her body, that caused her to believe her spine was breaking into two. Between each contraction Nayru took to crawling on hands and knees in the direction she came, calling out sharply with yelps when the hurt became unbearable. Surely X'yrin or Saluce would hear her? She meant to call out to them, a long howl for help, but her breath was taken away when she threw back her head to try as she felt again her body attempting to force the pups out.
Just how close she had come to returning to the den she did not know, and in her attempts the woman blacked out. In her unconsciousness she saw the familiar face, snow white and navy eyes, urging her back to the living world. Nayru resisted the lady, too weary to fight life and birth and death but the phantom white lady pushed her, and Nayru again knew consciousness. How the small thing had worked its way out of her body Nayru did not know, but when her eyes opened the small, black creature was laying among a mass of blood. His or her's it did not matter; Nayru did not believe a living thing could be accompanied by such gore. Weakly she reached for the body, found it unmoving and pulled her hand back quickly. For a long moment she stared at the dead thing, seeing no breath rise in its chest, unable to express her grief properly for another contraction woke her from the spell.
"Salvador… Sadira…" The name burst from her lips in a scream, for even in such misery she knew better than to send any being to the afterlife without a name. Yet when the pain subsided she wasted no time. She'd have to come back for the body for a proper burial, getting back to the den and saving herself and any unborn pups left within her was all that mattered just then. Turning her back to the child she crawling away, a trail of blood and after birth smearing in the snow after her.
It took some time before she was close enough that her yelps and shouts would penetrate the earth that X'yrin and Saluce slept beneath. The contractions died down enough that she carried herself on feet for sometime before resorting to hands and knees once more. By then she had long since left the newly born boy behind and could have no idea that life had decided to stir within him after all.
