Lost Creek Hollow Gateway

It was dark and misty, quiet. Dampened sounds of the valley filtered through the dense canopy of branches and lush carpet of undergrowth: the distant tumble of the rapids and waterfalls and the howls of activity from the three surrounding packs. The afternoon sun hung lazily overhead, muted by thick foliage.

A petite she-wolf rolled over in her makeshift nest, squeezed her eyes firmly shut, pushing memory of sight and smell and texture to the back of her crowded mind. Fragments of grass and moss clung to her dull pelt, the shadows of her ribs visible against its silver-blue hue. She couldn't count them--yet--but the life of a loner had left her leaner, more angular in her cheek and hip bones. Two seasons ago, she had been trying to lose weight, but prey was always bountiful in her homeland. She also had a pack to share it with.

Exile and isolation seemed to be taking its toll on her mentally as much as it was physically. She could feel the ache in her heart as acutely as the ache in her muscles; for being forced to leave her family behind. For forcing her family to burden themselves with her pain. Her one mistake. She ached for the soldiers she will never fight alongside, the hunters she will never share the glory with, and the healers she will never assist again. However, if there was one thing the wolf valued, it was her dignity, and she was losing it every second she layed on the ground. Not that she had much left after--

She will stop thinking about that.

She hauled herself to her feet, stretching like a cat. She would go explore the woods some more, hunt and move on. She came to Teekon to escape one life--now it was time to build a new one.

He couldn't stop dreaming about her - about everything - and while he knew the horrific visions of his mate and pups dead should've been most pressing on his mind, he found his thoughts straying constantly to the red pup that fueled his nightmares. And so, while he was heading for Easthollow (ostensibly) to see if Krypton would be willing to oversee the birth of his children, he was also hoping to see Adeline. Perhaps seeing her safe, whole, and grown would help put an end to his night terrors.

He kept a brisk pace, hoping to be back in his own territory by this time tomorrow. Sunspot had been left with Khoe - she'd be better help than he would, should she whelp early - and it'd seemed unwise to bring Dawn so close again to her estranged brother, so today, Grayday travelled alone.

Still, he felt no fear when he caught the lean scent of a lone shewolf. His eyes - worse than ever - scanned the hollow, but her form did not jump out at him. With a flicker of his ears and a steadying huff, he pressed forward, unwittingly heading straight for the wolf he was now on the lookout for. In the gloomy half-light that filtered through the canopy, the woman's dusky coat was the perfect camouflage.

Luckily, the rapidly-intensifying scent trail had him peering into the darkness, and he stopped a few dozen yards away. Squinting a bit, he finally caught a flash of movement, and a moment later, he'd picked her form out of the shadows. A querying woof broke the silence between them. Hey.

The she-wolf treaded onward, scanning the trees and surrounding undergrowth for vole or squirrel. Summer afternoon wasn't the ideal time to hunt, but it kept her paws busy and her mind alert until she could figure out where to go next. She couldn't mope in the woods forever.

​Woof. She turned around, ears pointed forward and head slightly tilted out of curiousity. She detected the wolf easily; a male by scent and size, and she trotted forward, leaving enough distance as to not draw attention to her small figure.

"Hello," she responded with an answering bark, straightening her posture--a learned response when addressed by a superior. This wolf clearly wasn't a loner, even from this distance she could detect the scent of the plains Morningside had claimed as theirs. She regarded the pack wolf warily, readying herself to fight or flee if he was setting a trap. She disregarded the irrational thoughts running through her mind--that this wolf had tracked her from where she came from and exile was too merciful a punishment. He had come to finish the job. Ridiculous, she scolded herself. The blue she-wolf held herself confidently and firmly, her piercing gaze betraying none of her thoughts.

He shifted uncertainly at the sound of her voice, but held his ground as she drew nearer. The male's nerves were quickly calmed as his eyes adjusted to the light, and he saw that her coat was a pretty blue-grey instead of black. Furthermore, her scent was one he didn't recognize, and by now, he knew Kelina's scent very well.

"You smell like one helluva trip," he commented, already curious about where this woman had come from, and about where she had been. For a moment, he yearned for that sort of freedom once more - but he could never go back to that sort of loneliness. However, he noted that this wolf, though a bit on the lean side, did not appear to be suffering too badly. If she was lonely at all, it didn't show through her stoic demeanor.

The loner assesed the brute now she was close enough to make out his features. He was much older, attractive, but the cloudiness in his eyes suggested his age catching up with him. He was watching her closely, not leering, unlike many men who had approached her before. Though she wasn't the tall doe-eyed fae sought after for sport, she had her admirers in the past. No, this man kept a respectful distance.

At his observation, the she-wolf raised one delicate eyebrow. "You could call it a trip," she responded, her voice cooling a few degrees. She wasn't keen on sharing her life story with a stranger she just met--they were only having a colloquial chat.

"I haven't properly introduced myself," she stated, quickly changing the subject. "My name is Katya Balthazar."

His ears flickered at her reply, and at the clear change in attitude. It only further piqued his interest, but with a tolerant sigh, he set that aside.

"Grayday," he replied, failing to supply a surname - the concept was still somewhat strange to him. "From a few hours that way." A tip of his nose pointed to the cuesta. "And if you're heading that way, you'll want to be on the lookout for a purple-eyed bitch with black fur. She's been attacking wolves - women, mostly - and we haven't been able to track her down, yet."

He wanted to tell the woman to avoid that area entirely, but it didn't seem like his place. She seemed capable enough, but Kelina was not a threat he wanted others taking lightly, and the woman was awfully small. Too small to be alone out here, claimed his paternal insincts, which were running rampant right then, as he waited for his youngest children to be born. "Have you eaten, lately?" he asked, glancing toward Easthollow and quickly deciding that he had time for a hunt. It was too early, after all. Khoe surely wouldn't be laboring any time soon, would she?

Katya nodded in understanding. She was right, he was from Morningside. "I'll be careful, thank you, Grayday," she promised, grateful for the information. Knowing there was a rogue terrorizing the valley wasn't reassuring, but the vulgarity the other wolf used made her wonder if there was something more to it. He seemed polite enough, though Katya didn't quite trust him, but the curse almost seemed out of place coming from this grizzled wolf. She shrugged it off--she was making pointless connections. She barely knew him, she reminded herself.

She was taken aback by his question, but an almost imperceptible smile played on her lips, out of irritation or amusement; she wasn't sure herself. "Actually, you interrupted my hunting with your idle chat. I would enjoy catching something with you."

Unaware of the affect his words had on Katya (it was just a word, to him, and if it had negative connotations, Day reckoned the ought to be applied to Kelina if they applied to anyone), the male simply wagged his tail, glad that the warning hadn't be written off or ignored. "Good," he replied, and then grew slightly sheepish at her next quip.

"My apologies. Didn't see you 'til you were right in front of me."

And then, the least he could do was help her get a decent meal. She didn't seem starved, but the male still thought she was a bit on the thin side, and that just wouldn't do.

"What are you in the mood for?" he asked, wandering a few feet away to sniff at the base of a tree. Nothing of interest, though a raccoon had been by a few days prior. They were in the area, then - but Day had never liked tangling with things that climbed trees. "I don't think I have time for a deer chase, but there are wild turkeys closer to the edge of the woods." Plus, it was in the direction he needed to be going.

Katya nodded in agreement. "I noticed they like to roost in the clearings where the trees are farther apart. They will be easier to catch with the two of us." She cleared her throat. "But I can hunt them on my own, too."

Katya preferred to lead hunts, unless they were after large prey, but the pack wolf had a better grasp of the territory and habits of the animals in his domain. Still, survival is an art she considered herself to be damn good at, and hunting is strategy for the most basic of needs. Any animal could kill, but a sharp mind is just as important as sharp teeth when your life hung on the line.

She followed Grayday at an easy pace. Their combined strides made a strange rhythm on the grass; his steps in two-four time and hers three-four time. One went faster than the other, but they still covered the same amount of ground.

Day nodded in agreement. "It's 'cause they fly," he supplied. "But they need a running start. Can't take off in dense trees, and they're too damn heavy to fly far. So they go for sparse forest."

The male pointedly ignored her comment about being able to hunt on her own. That's not the point, he wanted to say, but he supposed that not everyone felt the need to socialize as much as he did. She didn't look lonely, he reminded himself, and thus, the male decided not to speak any further on their short jaunt, as he gleaned that she might prefer it that way.

As soon as they got to the edge of the woods, the scent of turkeys was everywhere. Day lifted his muzzle and curled his lips, tail wagging as he took in these smells. Feathers! He turned his eyes back to Katya, head tilted to the side in a what now? sort of gesture.

Katya loosened her shoulders and crouched, feeling the supple bones in her neck release tension she hadn't known she was holding. She glanced once at Grayday, an eager expression on his face. Realizing she would choose their target, she scanned the rafter of turkey, completely hidden in the tall grasses she peered out of.

"There," she breathed, following a gliding bird with a slightly faltering wing with her snout. "The tom with the weakened wing. It's male, but injured, it should not be too aggressive. It's big enough to feed both of us."

Sorry for this lame-o.

Day gave a tacit nod at Katya's suggestion, eyes narrowing in on the smudge of movement that'd seemed a bit more clumsy than the rest. As he padded to the left to try and head off the rafter, he tried to decide whether the woman's serious demeanor was annoying or endearing. This would not, by any means, be a difficult hunt. Turkeys were clumsy, slow, and virtually defenseless against a full-grown wolf (let alone two), but Katya had briefed him with the utmust sincerity.

It didn't make much sense to Grayday, but he supposed he was happy enough that she seemed competent.

Having reached the other side of the clearing without alerting the turkeys to his presence, the male glanced around to see where Katya had stationed herself. Likely, he wouldn't be able to spot her, so the male settled for making himself look as ready as possible, and let out a quiet, querying boof  - Ready? 

A few of the turkeys raised their heads to glance around, but a moment later, they'd gone back to their foraging.

Katya gave Grayday an answering chuff. Ready.

The silvery form shot from the dense brush into the clearing. She was upwind from their target, but the turkey didn't seem to notice her until she was on top of it, delivering a swift bite to its thin neck, tearing through tendon and throat. The rest of the rafter began to scatter, honking. One darted stupidly and brushed her flank, and she hooked it with a claw, unable to resist the opportunity.

Katya looked to Grayday, her face warming in embarrassment. If she had known how clumsy the birds were in a panic, she wouldn't have been so rigid about the hunt. The fat uncoordinated turkeys were far different from the wary osprey and eagles she had mastered hunting in her birthplace.

Grayday shot into the clearing a moment after Katya, and reached her just as she took down the first turkey. Truthfully, Grayday was not too hungry, but he still snatched at the first turkey that passed him, even as he saw Katya snatch a third out of the corner of his eye. He was distracted just long enough that the still-flailing turkey in his jaws had time to flap its wings right in his face, and all of the sudden, his left eye flared with pain.

"Damn it," he snarled, snapping his jaws down in a quick killing blow before dropping the meal uncerimoniously on the ground. He pawed ineffectually at his eye, and when that didn't help, he tried blinking rapidly to rid himself of the sharp, burning sensation. It didn't fade completely, but enough that he could focus again on Katya, despite even further diminished sight and a very red, watery eye.

"Nice," he grunted, seeing her two turkeys and undamaged face. He missed her own chagrin in favor of his own - he wished he could've been a bit more smooth in front of the silvery shewolf, but there was no going back, now.

Katya heard a curse from Grayday before his jaws clicked shut, dropping his kill on the ground. She simply shrugged at his praise, never one to take compliments well, and inspected her prey. "It was luck," she responded, after a beat. "The other bird just leapt into my paws."

When she looked up again, a crease formed between her brows at the male's bloodshot eye. "Your eye looks irritated. Are you okay?"

"This one, too," he agreed, setting a paw on top of his catch. He let out a little huff at her next question, feeling silly all over again. "I'll have someone take a look at it when I get home," he assured her, but truthfully, he was not too concerned. How much worse could his eyesight get? He was one step away from blind already, and at least he still had his right eye. At this point, all he could do was wait for the inevitable - what was a few months more or less?

Without further comment, he tore into the turkey below him. He was not hungry, but it'd been a few hours since he'd last eaten, and he could always use a little more to add to his reserves. He was back to his usual bulk (having been sorely depleted after his altercation with the snake), but nobody knew when the next crisis would hit.

When there was just a shell of a turkey left (he'd saved the skin and feathers to take home), he lifted his head to regard the woman, still trying to read through her stoney facade.

Katya's concerned expression didn't fade, but she lowered her head and began to eat daintily and efficiently. She considered telling him she knew more than a little about the right herbs to bring down the redness and itching he must feel. She didn't believe for one second that he would get any treatment for his eye, and she didn't appreciate his attempt at pacifying her with a lie.

Men, she thought, they really are all the same. However, she let his feeble attempt at reassurance slide in order to save her breath.

Realizing Grayday was watching her, the woman met his gaze levelly, licking the blood and sinew off of her teeth and lips. Only the skulls and breastbones were left of her two birds; they were too large to snap in her smaller jaws. She cleared her throat.

"Thank you for hunting with me," she barked politely. "I'm certain I distracted you from your other obligations. Pack life must be busy in the warmer months."

Before he decided just what he wanted to say to her, Katya looked up and caught his gaze. Once again, it unnerved him that he could detect nothing about her state of mind. She's pretty, but that stare could skin beavers, he thought to himself, giving the woman an absent-minded wag of his tail.

"Yeah, pretty busy," he agreed, thinking of the several weeks he'd just spent sitting on his ass, staring at his pregnant mate. "I'm on my way to see a healer, actually. My woman's due to whelp in a few days, and I don't want her to have to do it alone. Aside from my sister, we don't have anyone who knows herbs, and she's not too confident she can help with the delivery. So I'm gonna borrow someone from Easthollow."

He tippied his nose in that direction as he spoke the name of the pack, wondering if Krypton would even come. "Well, that's the plan, anyway," he added, his voice a bit weary. "What about you? Busy? Or would you rather me not ask?"

Damn those eyes. He had no idea what to say to this woman.

Katya nodded, head tilting slightly upwards at the mention of his mate. "It is good to see a man who adores his family," she remarked softly, to nudge him into talking about his pack. It had been a while since she heard good news, and she wouldn't have minded if he wanted to drone about his soon-to-be parenthood. He had a nice voice. Grayday reminded her of Oisin in a way--her former mate would have been about as old as he was now. 

Her eyebrows raised when he spoke of his relationship with Easthollow. "I didn't know you were on friendly terms with another pack. They don't mind sharing a medic with you?"

She was moderately successful in keeping the surprise out of her voice, at least in her own mind. Things were different here, she kept having to remind herself. While she knew tension was a given when packs competed for prey and herbs, and a pack's first obligation was to their own, it was hard to imagine loyalties extending beyond those boundaries.

At his question, the she-wolf shook her head slowly. "I'm not busy, but why do you ask?"

Day grinned at her words, not really sure what to say. Luckily, the conversation plodded on. "Friendly enough," he said with a shrug. "I used to be the beta of Easthollow, and my son still lives there. I don't know if the medic will come, though," he admitted. "We're not as close anymore." A frown tugged at the corners of his mouth, but his eyes revealed the true pain behind these statements.

He didn't know what he'd do if Krypton didn't come. He supposed Khoe would just have to whelp with Sunspot's help, whether or not they were prepared. The world didn't stop spinning for anybody, and this would be no different. But he hoped she came.

"Curious, mostly," he replied, having no better motive for his questioning than this. She didn't seem lonely. "I try to talk to all the loners that pass by." Especially the ones close to home. Though he did not say it, his meaning was probably clear. The male's ears flickered in thought. "If you're looking for a pack, I could always use more hunters," he added.

"If they don't come, I'm positive your mate will be fine," she assured him. "Women have children every day--it is as natural as the tides. She is very lucky to have you." At his suggestion, Katya eyed him skeptically, unsure if he was offering because he only pitied her. She knew she was small and a woman, unequipped in her skill to hunt or assimilate herself in this land. It was different from anything she'd ever known, but she still had many things to learn. She wasn't partial to sympathy--giving or recieving--but he seemed to have good intentions, and the protection a pack could offer was also hard to overlook. He didn't specify a long-term commitment, though Katya Balthazar would be damned if she didn't commit herself one hundred percent.

She was being spoiled by his companionship and she knew it. He had a sincere presence, like the wind or a wide river. It had been so long since she had talked to anyone, really talked; their meeting and hunt had put her mind at ease.

At this moment, she trusted her instincts. While not a believer in fate, she did follow her womanly intuition, and it was saying yes. Her stomach was full, her mind clear, and she was steady on her feet. She did not want for anything in this moment than to trust Grayday, and for him to not regret his proposal. "I will, I mean, I am," she answered. "I would be honored to align myself with Morningside."

"I'm sure you're right," Grayday agreed, reluctantly releasing some of the tension in his shoulder. After all, Khoe had done this before. He wagged his tail, feeling a bit more light-hearted. "Well, I should probably show up at Easthollow alone, but if you follow my scent back to the river, you'll be at my pack's borders," he explained. "If you call for someone and tell them I vouched for you, they should let you right in."

He nosed the remains of his turkey toward her. "You can wait for me, if you want, but if you decide to go ahead, would you mind taking this back? The kids can play with the feathers."

Sorry for the lame post. Trying to get one in before work XD

Same here. Thanks so much!

"Understood." Katya gave him a small, indulgent smile and wagged her tail lightly back. Nerves gripped her belly, but it was infinitesimal compared to the excitement that propelled her paws forward. She clasped the remnants of his meal in her jaws--which would justify her showing up on Morningside territory if they didn't believe her word. She doubted that would happen, but it also gave her a sense of purpose.

She didn't mind showing up on their land alone, in fact she preferred it that way. It would give his pack a little bit of time to size her up without the pressure of a leader. She sniffed the air once, finding Grayday's scent most concentrated to the northeast.

With a final dip of her head, she briskly loped towards the river, dissolving in the dusk light as a shadow.