Wraen's latest scouting expedition had turned out to be longer than expected, involving some slipping and unlucky falling on the ice. Therefore the next morning the young wolf woke up with a stiff and painful hind foot. This had happened before, therefore initially she thought that it was only a matter of moving around and warming up and she would get better. Yet the foot had other ideas and with a resigned sigh Wraen decided to stay within the borders today.
Hobbling on three feet - though embarrassing to some level - was also hilarous. Especially, when Wraen began to entertain herself with the conversation all four feet could have now and, who the three functioning ones would be all condescending and angry at the stiff one for slacking. And at one point it got so funny, that Wraen plopped down on her bum to laugh. Somehow laughing and coordinating her three remaining paws was not a task that could be combined.
((>> hi!!! Hope you don't mind <3 pretending this comes before Charon thread!))
Gannet was dozing restlessly when the sound of laughter outside woke him up. As he groggily lifted his head, he winced at the pain that spiked through his leg. It had been a while since Hydra had returned with herbs.
Was that her, perhaps, outside? No. The laugh was wrong. Whoever it was sounded happy, though, and Gannet smiled in spite of himself. "What's funny?" He called out, hoping to perhaps share in the joke and get his mind off of his leg.
Until Gannet called out to her, Wraen had not registered that she had wandered close to the place, where their current captive was held. Another Redhawk wolf, who had been captured and injured in the process by the Cerberus and whose fate was at the hands of the leaders now. She turned her head (since the den, where the fellow was staying was behind her, the angle of her head, when she eyed the guy was a little impossible) and gave a toothy grin.
Then she got to her feet again and hobbled towards the young man. "Well... I might be the world's first three-legged scout," she told him. "And what are you famous for?"
Well!! He was impressed. Though he wondered briefly if that was true. Surely out there there was another three legged scout? They matched, in a way, but Gannet wasn't sure he could laugh about his own injury. Smile maybe, but not laugh.
"I don't think I'm famous," he said happily, tail thumping. He didn't quite get the game. "Why d'you got three legs? Did they break yours too?"
"Not really, though I know that in the secret order I am part of, they used to do that as a part of initiation ritual. If you survived - you were deemed worthy to join the sacred guild. If you died - well, good riddance," Wraen continued to mess with the guy, because he seemed naive enough to believe every word she said. For now, anyway.
"Here I beg to differ - you are famous. There isn't a Moonspear wolf, who does not know you by name," she replied, now perfectly serious. "Gannet, am I right? Brother to Towhee and you may know Raven as well?"
She wasn't wrong in her assumption; most things he heard, Gannet took completely at face value. He was able to read a joke, of course, but Wraen's voice lacked the pitch for it, so instead of calling her a liar, he looked with interest. Secret order, ay?
"I survived," he said, no real pride in his voice. So far he had at least, mostly due to the Moonspear's mercy towards him. Perhaps he could be a member, then? Though he wasn't sure quite what a secret guild did. Perhaps it wasn't something one could just join.
"'s right," he said, surprised and happy that she seemed to know his name. Why? He hadn't had many visitors outside the Ceberus, and it hadn't crossed his mind yet he might be the subject of conversation outside of them. After all, all he'd done so far was stay here and keep still.
"What's yours?"
"Take some pride in that, lad," Wraen spoke to him in a way a senior speaks to a shy youngster. "Some people would be crying like babies in your situation and, since I have not heard your wails in the forest, I suggest that you are brave about pain." In other, more simpler words (before she got carried away), the girl was asking, how the fellow was doing.
"I am Wraen Redleaf-DiSarinno, though usually just Wraen. Surnames are for showing off," she said. "Raven is my cousin, by the way - her dad Peregrine was my mom's brother. In case you are interested."
Gannet shook his head at that; he'd certainly screamed at the time! But for now, he didn't need to. "It's not bad," he responded, shrugging. They had allowed him to live, after all, and continued to. His leg hurt, of course, but if he did not move, it wasn't so unbearable. It was only when he forgot, and attempted to shift it, that he couldn't help but react.
He skipped quickly over that, however, as her next statement had been of particular interest to her. "Peregrine was my da. You're... my cousin?" If she was Raven's, she had to be his. He didn't recall hearing of her, but he'd heard tell of Osprey for sure. She was family!
"Would you look at that..." Wraen smiled at the revelation that this was yet another offspring of Peregrine. Mom had been right in saying that "little peregrines would be everywhere". He had had a head-start and was three litters ahead of his sister by the time she had had her first.
"Seems so and, since you are a likeable fellow - I deem you worthy of being my cousin," she replied with another joke, as if she was some sort of royalty, whose respect had to be earned. "So... Gannet," Wraen lied down to be in the same eye-level with the boy. "Tell me about yourself."
When he was deemed worthy, he gave a little shake, elated. More family was ever a good thing! And he had already deemed her likable too, very much so. She had a way of speaking that piqued his interest, different from Liffey and Hydra. Less sensible? Formal? But in a good way.
Then she wanted to know about him. Knowing this wasn't exactly a strong suit of his, he shifted his paws a bit. "What sorta stuff?" He asked then, unsure. What should he say about himself? What even did he know how to say?
"Hmm... that is a very good question," Wraen replied and pretended to contemplate very long and very hard, shifting her gaze between the very interesting cloud in the sky and Gannet. There were two options - the long list or the short list, which was still long, but it could take a lot of back and forth single questions to find out.
"Prepare your ears and your brain - you are about to get swamped," she finally said and gave her cousin a sly grin. "What: 1) is your favorite - food, past-time, color, game, sibling and thing in life? 2) are your "don't like"s? 3) other places besides your pack have you seen, been to and visited? 4) do you think about owls, mountain lions and ill-tempered, cranky wolves? 5) is your opinion about Santa-paws and his little helpers? 6) have you never done in your life, but wish you could? 7) superpower you would like to have?" Wraen finished, her sides heaving from the effort of asking all the relevant questions. And while she regained her breath, Gannet had time to remember, what exactly she had asked and get at least some answers.
She rattled off a good number of questions; sometimes Gannet had a hard time following conversation, but this time, his mind ticked off each one like a list. He saw the game and he wanted to meet her challenge, though he ignored the ones to which answers did not immediately come to mind. "Chasing. Whip. South, I think. I've never met one." Ok, that was untrue about cranky wolves. But he tended to avoid conversation with those he sensed didn't want it. "Fly." That one surprised him even a bit. It was impractical, but if chasing on the ground was fun, imagine what it must be like from the air!
"Whip's m' brother," he clarified after a minute. "Who's Santa Paws?"
Most of the answers were lost to Wraen, but she valued the effort Gannet had put in to respond to them at all. She deduced correctly that his superpower would be flying and this - in her opinion - would be quite a useful thing, if it was possible. If by "flying" you did not mean the one time only, one way only flight from the top of the mountain towards the ground.
"Santa Paws? He is supposed to bring little, good kids gifts and little, naughty kids - rocks," Wraen explained with a serious expression. "I guess I have never been on his good list, because it has been two Solstices - because he is supposed to come during Solstice - already and on neither occasion did he bring me a dragon."
Gannet had never heard of such a thing; likely due to his birth just after winter, and then his parents' death before the next one came. And something told him Fox wasn't much for present bringing creatures, no matter how friendly. Likely his mom and da woulda chased this Santa Paws character right back over the border if he'd even tried to visit.
"So you got rocks?" He asked, keenly feeling her disappointment. What someone could do with a dragon! Now those he knew about. "Do you have siblings? Did they get rocks too?" He suddenly wondered if he had other cousins, more family than he had guessed. It made him happy to think about; no matter where you went, there was a chance you would run into someone interesting, and that was a fine thing indeed!
"Not even rocks," Wraen said, disppointment evident in her voice and she pretended to sniffle and fight back a sob. "I think that Santa Paws has failed to include me in his list alltogether. And I doubt that any of my siblings got anything either. Though they weren't so keen on believing the guy to begin with. So - perhaps - they did not wish for anything either."
"Let's make it fair - I will name all of my siblings - that I know of - and you do the same," she offered and knowing that Gannet would comply with her request, because he was such a nice guy, Wraen did not wait for his answer and went on. "So - there is cousin Terance, who also happens to live here at the moment and is busy with becoming a mercenary. There is cousin Sarah, who lives with my parents and will probably take over the pack. And then there are younger cousins - Maia, Cassandra and Coriander. And perhaps this year - there will be more."
Gannet's grin widened into a silent laugh, her sob making it clear she was in fact kidding. It was a fanciful enough story that he got that impression already, but he wasn't one to assume what others chose to believe.
He listened, rapt, as she listed off his cousins. Another here!? He shifted, knowing he wouldn't be able to track him down now, but desiring to absolutely. "So your parents are still around?" He asked, finding that this surprised him. Not many wolves he knew their age had this the case. Unbeknownst to him, his parents had actually died young, and were an uncommonality.
"Mine arent. But I have a lot." He paused. "Me n Whip n Ferret, but they are both gone. And then younger ones. Towhee, Titmouse, Orca, n Phox. Oh and Raven. She's older." He paused. "There's more but I don't know them." He couldnt recall their names, not really. The one he'd met on the mountain, so long ago, when mom had taken him. And others long gone or dead, not really worth mentioning.
"When I last saw them - they were," Wraen replied, though she could not be sure 100%. During their travels Osprey had been quite weak for a while, she had had good days and bad days, but somehow things changed for the better in the spring. And she hoped that the summer and autumn, and now winter had not been harsh on her family, because she could not stand the thought of any of them to simply stop existing.
"You go for animal names I see," she said, when Gannet had named all of the siblings he was aware of. "My mom came from a pack, where at least half of the wolves had been called after birds. Her included.... and now that I mention it... I am the victim of that tradition as well."
He nodded- so an aunt too! He wondered what they were like. Automatically he assumed a similar wolf to his dad, and he decided he'd probably rather enjoy meeting them as well.
"Yeah. Me too, I think." He'd never seen a gannet, but they had said it was a bird, so he assumed that was the case. "Wraen. I like it." He added, smiling. He didn't mind Gannet, but her name was definitely cooler. It was a bird, but it wasn't at the same time.
"Why're you here?" He asked finally, now extremely curious. Of all the places to find family, this was the last he'd expected after the welcome he'd received on arrival.
"That is a very long and complicated story," Wraen was not very inclined on revealing all the reasons behind her decision to leave her home. When you had told this to two or more people, it was neither interesting, nor very compelling to relay further.
"But things happen for a reason," she went on. "Ma-a-aybe I was meant to come here to run into you - in that case the gods must have played their cards well."
He wasn't about to argue with her on the story front; he'd never been one for long explanations, so doing so would be hypocritical beyond belief. It didn't bother him when others had secrets. They shared with him what he wanted, and he appreciated what they shared.
and what she shared he appreciated a whole heck of a lot. "Yeah," he agreed emphatically, also happy to have met her and pleased she felt the same. Gods hadn't played much into his upbringing, but he got the reference well enough. Still.... "what gods?" Came out next, almost unbidden, as he wondered what sorta gods his aunt and uncle would follow. As far as he knew, Peregrine and Fox didn't believe in anything controlling fate more than they themselves.
"No idea, really," Wraen shrugged. Osprey, who had an almost encyclopedic knowledge about various tales, myths and legends had also dipped her paws in religious beliefs as well. Beginning with angry, possessing bear spirits, to goddesses of the sea, to old Greeks and Romans (Dante's influence, as well as her grandfather's Aether's), to viking fighting gods and The Great Spirit of Wind nomads. Her daughter, who had loved to hear the stories, did not remember all of them in precise detail. Therefore rather than depicting, which god belonged to which religion, she had decided that all of them existed at the same time and shared a vast and fancy realm.
"Any and all - I would not want to choose one for the fear of offending another," her reply was annoyingly cryptic and gave no information at all really.
He listened with piqued interest as she delivered perhaps one of the most common sensical thoughts he'd ever heard. "I never thought of that," he said, grinning. "I wonder why anyone'd choose." He hadn't ever experienced the pressure of family beliefs; even if his parents had had them, they'd died long enough ago that any ideals they had about him would not have stuck so fast.
That led him to wonder if Hydra and her family had any gods. Which got him thinking about her family's reception of him. "I'm glad your here. You and Liffey and Hydra," he said suddenly, stretching as he said it to relieve an ache starting up in his forelegs.
"You are very quick to pass good judgements, even if you have known the person for a very short period of time," Wraen observed, but she too was glad that Gannet was here. He was nice and intelligent - just the kind of relative you are not ashamed to have. Perhaps, aside from these two there were more good seeds in the Redhawk caldera bunch?
"I could be a mass murderer or a blood thirsty vampire, you know," she suggested, baring her teeth for a moment and then smiling down at the young man.
Gannet smiled back, this time catching the joke. It was easier when she spoke in impossibilities. "Even if you are, you're nice." He said, then looked down. He didn't want to upset her at all by speaking badly of her family, but he couldn't help it. "Some aren't."
Then again, that was sorta a fact of life, wasn't it?
"Nice in the sense that I don't go around breaking people's legs?" Wraen asked, rather carelessly joking about a serious matter. Invisible ears could be listening to her everytime and everywhere. But at this moment she wanted to be open, how she felt about them hurting Gannet, after all - they knew well, what they had done.
"Maybe. And are you just as nice, cute and innocent as you look like or is there a hidden darkness inside somewhere?" she took the turn to ask questions.