Bramblepoint Bring that summer on your shoulders

Shrike's journey had at last brought him back to where it first started. After having searched the lands formerly clained by Neverwinter Forest, and the areas surrounding it, he'd moved on, with a heavy heart. If Allure had come back, he'd missed her and her entire family. Perhaps they had relocated within the area, searching for a better place to spend the winter- or the family had fallen apart, and he'd left just as the worst was beginning. He could find no sign of Cypress, Kaskara or any of the others he'd lived with once, and so he trailed his way back through woodlands which had grown and changed over the cuorse of the year, but were still vaguely familiar. 

The cool autumn breeze ruffled his grey coat, teasing the dark guard hairs that were growing longer for the winter months to come. It was noon, he guessed, but the shadows were still long, a sign that the days were getting shorter. The nip of frost he'd seen on the morning after the last full moon had confirmed what he'd suspected- that winter might come early, and it could possibly be a tough one to survive on his own. Though he hardly expected a warm welcome at the Caldera, he felt it was worth investigating the area to see if he recognized any familiar scents that were still friendly to him. 

His main adversary, Fox, hadn't passed through Bramblepoint in some time. He's meandered through other surrounding territories, and had picked up the scents which belonged to Finley and Elwood, and perhaps even Raven- but as far as he could tell, Fox hadn't been in the area. Perhaps she was sticking closer to home- but that'd be an area Shrike would likely avoid until he knew whether it was safe. The last time he'd seen Fox, she'd been extremely angry with him for turning down her grief-fuelled advances, and had banished him from Redhawk Caldera. Peregrine was gone, he knew; and so he believed were his ties to the wolves in the pack, at least through blood. 

Still, he didn't think it would hurt, terribly, to meander around in the area, picking up scents both familiar and strange, until he was able to find someone who might have some answers for him.