Sleeping Dragon You won't make yourself a name if you follow the rules

Now Rosalyn was just plain antsy.  After months of endless wandering it had been nice to be grounded, even for a week or so.  But at this point, her imposed r&r threatened to drive her crazy.

She could use a little stimulation, and the thought made her think wistfully of Red, tucked away somewhere south with her hunky (but gd stingy) mate.  Damn.

She'd be lying if she said she hadn't considered pursuing their glorious leader in such a way - but sadly that had revealed itself a tricky route, as she was taken.  Some didn't mind, Roz included in that number, but she liked her spot here too much to risk it.  Sides, there were plenty of other pretty faces on this rock.

Currently, though, she'd settle for a conversation.  Morosely she stared at the volcano rising up a ways off.  She had just about two options when it came to scenery.... Her current position in the flatland, and the geyser field to the north.

She was distracted from wondering if she should relocate, however, when a squirrel decided that she posed little threat to it and clambered down to dart right in front of her.  It ended up stopping at the base of a nearby tree to dig at the ground, presumably looking for a pre-hibernation snack.  She stared at it a minute, equal parts bemused and annoyed, but made no move to get up.  "Well played," she finally said with a sigh.  There was no way she could catch the damn thing, so why bother really.

The squirrel does not stay in place for long as Thuringwethil trots nearby. She makes no attempt to hide her approach to resting woman with a rabbit dangling from her jaws. She hadn’t seen her newest recruit since the day she came along, if she doesn’t count the meeting, and she knows she needs to keep tabs on the ones considered investments. She’d made the mistake, once, with an unwilling wolf in order for gain and it hadn’t gone well, despite her kindness toward him. Hopefully this brings her another ending entirely to keep her mind open for the future.

Thuringwethil lowers her head only to place the kill in front of Rosalyn before she increases the space once more. Before she makes herself comfortable, she waits to see if her gift shall be received, before speaking.

“How are you feeling?”

The critter's departure was her early warning, and sure enough, Thuringwethil's appearance followed closely after.  

She was a welcome sight, and not only because she came bearing food.  Rosalyn sat up respectfully as she approached to set it down, a smile appearing at the greeting.  

"Sore but improving," she said, stretching said shoulder illustratively.  Soon she'd be more mobile, she was sure.  "For me? You shouldn't have, but thanks."  She was being fed on all sides, a fact that was allowing her to recover but also one that made a distinctive blow to her pride.  Still, she was taking a chin-up, soon-she'd-repay-them approach, and so her thanks was genuine.

Thuringwethil had no qualms in sharing their resources for the same Rosalyn is able to accept them. Soon, when her shoulder allows, she'll put forth her worth ethic just as the others have. Even when they held a captive, some of their resources—albeit puny—was often offered under the guise he would still repay them tenfold upon his release.

It had been a shame his occupancy had ended with the famine, when they could not afford stragglers to leech off like barnacles. 

"You need your strength," she explains. She appreciates the uprighting gesture but she quickly waves it off in favor for her to be comfortable instead. Thuringwethil, on a rare impulse, allows herself to sit in front of her kru.  "Are you settling in well?" she asks, wishing to spend a little one-on-one time with those not of Seageda and what better way to start with someone new.

Rosalyn seated herself gladly after her packmate, nodding her appreciation at the dismissal of courtesy.  Of course she did, but that still didn't mean others had to care about that.  It always took her a little by surprise there were packs out there like this, after so many years of either living life alone or running with wolves as selfish as she.  There you either ran or fell behind.  Apparently not so here.

"I am, though I admit, some things are very different."  She said, never really one to not play it straight.  She wasn't too fond of it when wolves lied to her, so she tended to be blatant (sometimes to her own detriment).  "Your language.. and the marks.  I've never run across anything like them."  And she'd run with some characters.  She'd wanted to pry a bit into the culture here, and what better opening could the leader have given her?  Surely if she wanted information, Thuringwethil was the one to talk to.

Rosalyn gets settled as well and Thuringwethil listens to what is different from what the woman is used to and what she’s finding here. It isn’t the first time she’s come across a wolf that has never seen their ways or heard of them and there have been a number that have been from nearby, or at least familiar. She can’t blame the woman too much and she had been concerned that it might not be where she wants to be. Thuringwethil had offered reprieve in exchange for her service without giving her much information of what she was getting into.

“Most of my wolves here have not, either, but they are some of the best ones I have,” she explains. Wildfire and Dio, for example, as they’d earned their spot in their ranks. “Me and a few others, Gavriel and Rebekka, are from farther north where it is much colder more of the year. Not many know of the wolves there,” she adds with a bit of a smile, hoping it might make her feel a little less left out.

Rosalyn appreciated the attempt to make her feel less out of sorts, and it worked in part.  She was glad that the language wasn't the only one spoken, and that it didn't seem living by their customs was completely necessary (right away).  But for a while a small amount of unease would remain, made worse by her current condition.

"Makes sense.  I've never been much of one for the north."  Even the northern coasts she hadn't explored, though she thought perhaps one day she might.  If there were packs up there, she knew very little of them.  "You decided to come south?"  No shit.  The question was obvious, but in asking she was hoping perhaps for a little more than a 'yes'.  What prompted the switch?

There is a slight curve to her lips when Rosalyn speaks and she waves her tail once before giving in to the unspoken question. While the temperate differences are obvious, for there are more warmer days here than in Seageda, the winters are equally mild. Once they reach through an entire seasonal change, their growth will really blossom. They will know what to expect in years to come and will be able to faces the changes they’d comfortable handled through generations.

“I came to power very young but I made a mistake, one that I have to live with, and there were a few that did not think I was fit for Heda,” she explains with a slight shrug. “They could not get the support they wanted but the seed of doubt had been placed that, eventually, I’d been advised that cleansing the ranks had been the only option,” she tells her. The history of Drageda is no secret and even though Seageda’s demise is still a tender spot, Thuringwethil cannot hide the information from those that serve her. “And South is where we came. There are still others in the north but I hope they will eventually make their way,” she adds and wonders, for a brief moment, if there are any left at all that remain true to her reign and will reunite soon enough.

After a moment, and Thuringwethil lifting a brow in her direction, finds her own need for information: “What really happened at the sea pack?”

Moral of the story - leadership sucked sometimes.  Didn't she know that firsthand.  Hearing the story, Roz nodded companiably.  Thuringwethil didn go into specifics, but Rosalyn got the gist fairly well from what was given. It wasn't an odd story, after all.  Followers were often fickle when it came to loyalties.

"You seem to be doing well here as is, in any event," she said.  Despite how she felt she fit in, the pack's size and command were impressive.  It was a well-oiled machine; hopefully a slightly off cog wouldn't cause too much fuss.

She gave a wry grin when Thuring again broached the subject of her semi-recent 'home'.  If you would call it that.  This time, at least, she opted for the simple truth.

"Spose the captain finally got tired of me.  She ordered a friend of mine to off me, but luckily I'd endeared myself with my winning personality."  She winked.  "Anyway, he refused, and we turned on her.  Unfortunately, the witch had the rest of the pack.  So we were forced out."  Mostly, they were the victims here.

"It wasn't so bad.  When the famine hit, Vlad disappeared and I went south, tried to find my old crew.  But they were long gone.  So instead I came here."  It was a simple story, and not one of her finer telling, but she judged Thuringwethil as a leader with little time for flowery tales and lies.

Rosalyn points out the success she's had in Sleeping Dragon but there is some part of her that will disagree. She's maintained a steady group of wolves, ten or more, and has maintained survival through their hardships. The famine had taken a toll on them but they were stronger on the other side and, despite this, better connected. While the number of her own wolves from Seageda still do not fill her ranks, she's come to accept it. They know where she is when they are able, if still faithful. Trigeda stands strong still and she knows she still has that connection to her home.

When the other begins her story, Thuringwethil listens anyway without putting any judgment forward. A life before Drageda, before the loyalty to Heda, is hardly an indicator sometimes. She never had a terrible gut feeling for the woman, and perhaps a little unexplored feeling she's set side, and let her tell her story. Even if she has questions, she realizes they are not important and tucks them away.

"You will be safe here," Thuringwethil tells her with a little swish of her tail. "We come from a place that knows war most seasons and while it is not the same in these lands, we are no less prepared. A pack to the south of us threatened us with war once, a few months after we'd claimed the mountain. They do not stand anymore, to my knowledge. I took my army to them within a few days and they were gone."

This - shit, what was her title again?  Anyway, she was a brilliant listener, a trait Rosalyn found in far too few captains.  

She smiled when Thuringwethil expressed that she'd be safe here, grateful for the sentiment.  She doubted Caiaphas cared enough to follow, but there were always other dangers, and it was good to hear this pack could defend itself.  It made her think fondly back to the story she'd told Freyja.

"Impressive.  Must have thought better of it."  Smart of them.

"Is that what that was about?" She asked, indicating the new scar on the leader's shoulder.  Obviously they'd fought with someone, for her to have killed recently.

maybe i shouldn't be allowed to post at 4 am???

Rosalyn mentions the new scar on her shoulder and she takes a moment to remember if she’d explained at the meeting what had happened. It is customary to do so but perhaps there hadn’t been clarity. Either way, Thuringwethil does not mention it and instead simply shakes her head. “The scars are for deaths,” she explains, glancing to her shoulder as a number of notched lines cover her. Her fur covers them, for the most part, but they are obvious through thinning of her coat in that area. “A wolf that… I didn’t know much about her but she tried to settle her pack too close to here until we told them to leave. She settled closer to the coast but we never really got along. She came to the borders here and refused to leave several weeks ago.” Thuringwethil doesn’t fill in the spaces, confident enough Rosalyn is able to piece it together.

Thuringwethil reiterated the meaning of the marks, and Rosalyn silently looked at the collection.  She remembered that they represented deaths, though apparently she'd surmised wrong that the other southern pack was the source of the deceased.  It was another.  How many enemies did they have exactly?

"Why do you mark yourself?" she asked, unsure of how the question would be recieved but wanting to know regardless.  "Are they really worth it?"  The words were harsh, but she didn't want to mince them.  In her mind, the dead were not.  They had made their choices and those choices obviously were the wrong ones.  Unless they were some sort of intimidation tactic?

“Someone had to die in order for me to live,” she explains. The marks have their own stories with a meaning personal to the carrier but they aren’t meant to share or a game of collection. They’ve moved into some hazy area that leaves Thuringwethil to question how she should handle the wolves that are not of her home. They are often left to question certain things they do, as Rosalyn is doing now, but all she can do is ease them into what they’ve pledged to. Their old lives prior to Drageda mean little. “It is only the Heda that must be marked in front of the clan. For everyone else, it is far more private,” she adds hoping it may be of some comfort, if it all.

"So you wear their choices," she said, thoughtful.  It still didn't make sense, but she supposed it didn't really have to? Obviously, from the number of scars the leader held, it was a tradition that meant a great deal.  Just another mystery about this pack.

Sensing Thuring had at least some amount of patience, Rosalyn ventured a small explanation.  Her previous words could possibly have been taken out of context, as she meant no real disrespect.  "We honored the dead, of course.  But only when they were deserving."  She smirked slightly.  "Judgemental maybe.      I guess I will learn."  But she'd never been particularly good at learning before, and this place had a curve steeper than most she'd shambled through.

Feel free to archive. <3

Uncertain what to make of Rosalyn’s interpretation of the mark, Thuringwethil looks to one side as if she is taking the alternative into consideration. It is as much their choice as it is her own and her need to survive has, so far, always won. The mixture of decisions that led them there is not often questioned as she takes her own meaning for each mark than another may. Eske had been eager to get her own, where others shy away from the need, but still a ritual they must perform in the incident they have taken a life.

“I do not expect you, or anyone, to know everything overnight,” she tells her with an encouraging smile. He tail swishes behind her a few times but she still makes to stand. “I am only a short call away, should you feel the need,” Thuringwethil adds, if she ever felt the need or had another question to breech. Thuringwethil dips her head in departure once and turns to go.

Her words meant to encourage, and while Rosalyn's worries were not fully allayed, she did feel as though Thuringwethil understood.  Her pack thrived in their unity, and all seemed much more confident in their standing than she.

"Thanks," she responded, sensing there were places the leader needed to be, and that she could always have a conversation another time.  In the end, however, she would choose not to.