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In the past couple of weeks, the twins had felt the wind gotten stronger. The same wind that once brought warmth soothing breezes now came with cold frigid gusts. It wasn't their favourite at all but they were glad they were born with some fur on their bodies. at least when winter comes they can still keep each other warm. They knew winter was coming but not sure when.

Be'lakor and Lokhir were preparing themselves a hideout already since all the caves were taken over by bears and wolves, the occasional bats flying out, and even other soquili they rather not want to fight. Living in a forest close to the swamp, both had gathered wood and mud to make their own makeshift cave, but smaller. it was more like a shabby den they dug with their hooves to make it bigger from an abandoned foxhole. Not wanting to attract any potential enemies or predators, they had decorated their hideout with more mud and anything else they could find on the forest's ground: sticks, leaves, grass, feathers left behind by birds. The twins had worked hard at it for days and it slowly became wide enough for the both of them to crawl inside and move around to get comfortable.

The forest felt much quieter as the temperature had gotten cooler. Their usual stroll through the forest got dark faster too, and the plants and berries were getting scarce to gather as they walked about. The leaves too, they noticed, had started to turn to a duller darker brown instead of the vivid green they used to see. With those thoughts in mind, they crawled into their den one at a time and went to sleep, exhausted from perfecting their hideout...

"Be'lakor," whispered Lokhir, "Be'lakor, wake up. Did you hear that?" There was a lot of shuffling about and then the sound stopped.

Was it daytime already? Be'lakor opened his eyes in the bright light after making a very long yawn. Being the heavy sleeper that he is, the dark twin had no idea what was going on. "What. What sound? Where are you?" he asked back, trying to spot Lokhir. He stepped out of the den and his hooves stepped onto a thin blanket of snow. He shivered at how cold it has gotten. There was a faint trail of his twin's hooves tracks before the wind blew more snow over it to cover it all up. Ugh, he thought, this means there will be a strong snowstorm coming again...

Trudging through the bushes were the tracks had vanished, Be'lakor spent a few seconds scouting the area around him and spotted a grey tail with blueish fur sticking out low from behind a tree trunk. "What are you doing?" he demanded, circling around the tree to see what his twin was doing.

"I heard something crying, and followed it all the way here..." replied Lokhir, who was now halfway down a steep slope. "Listen! There it is again.." he went on, now having lowered his entire body down to the cold lake's frozen surface. The sheet of ice was so chilly that he tried to stay on the bits of rocks before having to step his hooves back onto the frozen water to cross. "Are you coming or just watching from up there?" he asked back with a tilted head. He could hear the ice crack from under him, somewhat succeeding in supporting his weight, but not for long...

Be'lakor grumbled as he followed after his caring twin down the slope and stopped himself just before touching the ice. There was no way around the lake but he did not want to step his hooves on there either. There was a cold mist hovering over this area, and there was nothing there that was not already frozen...

Inhaling deeply, the half suti gave a low roar and shot a hot fire ball into the thin sheet of ice! Parts of the ice cracked loudly from his sudden attack and a small chunk of ice dislodged. Digging at it with his hoof, he spotted a small frozen fish inside of it. Snatching it up with his teeth, he happily threw it aside as he waited for his brother to call out to him. His eyes became more alert and more focused than before. There are still fish in the lake! Better than eating berries! Blasting another fireball at the shallow end of the lake, he managed to crack the thin side of the ice to hunt for more frozen fish.

Some time had passed since Be'lakor started fish hunting on his own and Lokhir came back with...a lost bear? "Brother look at this!" he shouted as he herded the tame bear towards his twin. "This was crying because it couldn't get back up to higher grounds on its own!"

"No you look, I caught us fish!" Be'lakor pointed his hoof to three frozen fish in ice chunks on the snowy ground. "Let's eat it now before anyone else finds out!" he flicked his tail in annoyance as he looked the bear over. "That's a tame one... someone must be his owner..or friend.." Lowering his head, Be'lakor started to munch on the ice to get to the fish. "Come eat first," he called to his brother. "Worry about the bear later."

Coming closer to inspect the remaining fish, Lokhir picked one that was dull yellow with black stripes. "One for me, one for you," he spoke while chewing and knew that Be'lakor probably wanted to share half and half on the last fish..but.. looking over at the bear he just found, it wailed loudly again as he used a paw to wipe his face..."maybe one for him?" he trailed off, not trying to anger his brother...

"And what did HE do that allows him to eat with us?" he questioned Lokhir, semi glaring at him. "Besides, they're not our pet. Where is their owner anyway?"

Lokhir chewed as he thought about Be'lakor's stern words. He knew his brother was right but he just felt sorry for the bear. "What if this bear has been down here all day? Without having anything to eat? What if he is starving? What if his owner died?" He looked at the bear and then back at Be'lakor. "What if HE will die if we don't watch over him?" There he went, trying to guilt trip Be'lakor in sharing the last remainder of the fish to a stranger.

With a heavy sigh, Be'lakor kicked the iced fish with a hoof towards the bear. It slid for a bit before coming to a halt. "These small creatures will be your doom one day. Lokhir..."

He walked past the bear while shaking his head, and started to climb back up the slope. First he jabbed his hoof into the hard soil and used his other hooves to do the same. Slowly but surely, Be'lakor climbed up and heaved himself onto higher grounds. He shivered and wriggled as he felt the cold snowy ground on his exposed fur-less side. "Better hurry!" he called down to Lokhir, "The wind is getting stronger up here, and really really cold." Peeking over the edge, he saw his brother starting to climb up with the bear trailing after him. "A storm may be coming...i'll gather some dry wood first. Meet me back at the den." And the dark suti disappeared into the bushes.

Lokhir watched his brother's head retreat and disappear behind the frosted tall grass. "Well, it's just you and me now, bear. You heard what he said. Gotta hurry unless you want to stay down here and die.." He showed the bear how to climb up the slope and after a few tries, the bear managed to lash out his claws and clawed onto the solid soil and up to higher grounds.


[ 1303 words .. will finish after foodening ]