Cinders
It wasn't uncommon for mere days to feel like another lifetime, when your entire life was only a hundred and some change worth of them especially, but wow did it feel like another lifetime since she had been in the glade. She was hunched down in the undergrowth, still angling to get a meal, and yet nothing else was the same as it had been. Almost out of instinct her mind drifts back to that day, holding her breath until her lungs strained against her ribcage, remembering how pathetic and helpless she'd felt pressed against her mothers corpse and hoping they mistook her for dead. They had, the attack was just a lesson after all, maybe they even let her survive because a murdered pup was a step too far. She didn't ask, she'd stayed still as possible until their backs were turned, and then she ran and ran until she collapsed outside the valley.
The exact horrors of her past remained a closely guarded secret. No one needed to know how deeply she was traumatized, because time wasted on sympathy could instead be spent learning. Becoming stronger, faster, better. The more of that she did the less likely she was to ever suffer the same fate again. She would protect her new pack, as they cared and protected her, and together they were strong enough to fend off any other attempt to repeat the horrible past she'd experienced.
Of course, getting distracted by thoughts was bad for hunting, and hearing a rustle she panicked as she realized the prey was getting away. It was just a pride thing now, she didn't require this to survive, but this was all part of getting better. And so, far too frantically, she launched herself out of the bushes to pin down her prey.
Except, well, it was larger than a squirrel.....or even a rabbit!