Wapun Meadow and every night my mind is running around her

She'd returned to the meadow where she'd left the marmot and gained her first wounds in the wilds, the gashes on her cheek and above her eye fairly healed, causing her only mild discomfort when she spoke. She returned in the light of day, now, leery after Murdock's talk of cannibals and wanting to make sure she didn't encounter one of them in the dark. 

The sky was fairly clear, but it was bitterly cold in a way that had her wish that she'd never come all the way out here. She shivered as she trotted back and forth across the meadow, a habit picked up over her travels that kept her fairly warm, trotting in the manner of a haughty horse, picking up her limbs almost comically high. She searched for signs of the marmot that had evaded her last time, but besides a few faint trails in the snow, came up empty.

Not every day a rabbit almost runs into your jaws directly, therefore Birk considered himself very lucky, when one such careless hopper, had chosen the wrong bush to hide under and therefore never woke from it's beauty sleep. Having not eaten anything since previous morning, the white wolf ate it whole, leaving only some tufts of fur and droplets of blood here and there, where the meal had taken place.

With new energy he set out to explore the surroundings on this side of the familiar mountain range, reasoning that, if he was to stay here for the next few months, until the earth unfroze and snow melted away, he should have at least two or three hunting spots in reserve besides the main one. And the meadow nearest to the place, where he had eaten, seemed like a good choice.

He had not got far, when he spotted a small, odd looking creature, who was prancing back and forth. Upon closer inspection it turned out to be some sort of canid, though very different looking from the ugly and boring faces he was used to. Without drawing much attention to himself, he drew nearer to get a better impression of the curious animal and, if it was friendly enough, find out, what it was.

The cold was not dissuaded by her prancing, and it seemed to find a home within her very bones, settling there in the form of a dull ache. She really ought to return home to Murdock; the promise of a warm den sounding quite tempting, but it was the tiny flicker of marmot scent that had her linger around the clearing a little longer. She wouldn't call it vengeance, no, merely that, if given the chance, she'd greatly enjoy eating the audacious thing. 

When the wolf appeared, she could not suppress the tiniest of gasps; for he was quite different than most of the wolves she'd seen. His pelt was of the palest cream and gray; near white, unflawed. She'd seen dogs with pelts that neared a pure white, but never before seen a wolf quite like this one. It was this awe that had her approach, with a small smile, chirping a quick "hello!"  As she drew near, before abruptly stopping. Illecebra's warnings and Murduck's teachings flashed to the forefront of her mind, and quite abruptly, she blurted, "you're not the kind of wolf that eats dogs, are you?" She didn't think this wolf looked particularly like a cannibal, but then again she had no prior knowledge to place her guess upon.

The odd little creature noticed him too and approached without any fear or reservations. This made Birk falter in his steps a little, because he was unsure of, whether this animal was safe and sane to be around. It soon turned out that this caricature of a wolf was a "dog". The man regarded the animal with a contempletive gaze, wondering, if he had either seen or heard, or maybe eaten one of those things, but nothing came to mind. This meant that the "dog" was a novel term in his dictionary. 

"If I was, you would not be standing here and talking to me now," he replied with a mischievous smile, but in order not to intimidate "the dog" he sat down and mustered up a curious/friendly expression. She was amusing, it had been a long time since he had had fun and for this reason he was not going to eat the jester today. "So - dog - do all look like you or you are one of a kind?" he asked conversationally.

His answer was not the most relieving, but she took it for a good sign that he seemed blunt about it, and her tail wagged slightly in appeasement. He sat, which put the last of her worries at rest, and she plopped down into the snow a short distance from him, tail thumping the snow behind her before coming to a rest and curling around her. His question was different from what she'd heard before, and she answered with a careful nod. "I look like some of them. others are bigger even than wolves, I've heard, and some are only about the size of your head." She was reminded of one of the little dogs she'd seen on the back trail, trotting along with its owner with a little set of things on its paws. She wasn't one to judge, most of the time, but the thing had been a little odd. "some don't have any fur." She added, canting her head as she recalled the memory. Perhaps it hadn't even been a dog, but it had certainly yapped and smelled of one.

There were only two living predators that Birk had encountered and that had been bigger than himself. One was his aunt Jorma - a huge, ugly beast that attacked first and then asked questions - and the other was a polar bear. Now it turned out that this little, silly thing had relatives that could also outgrow the likes of him and he decided that it was better not to mess with her at all. Imagine the trouble he would get in, if one of those big guys came looking for her? No, no, no - he liked to have his handsome face remain unmarred by scars.

"Maybe they had the "itches"," Birk suggested, meaning mange that plagued foxes and wolves, occasionally, if they were stupid enough to eat a fox, who had died because of those little, invisible monsters that were digging burrows in their skin. "Alright. And how did you end up here?" because, he had never met dogs during his extensive travels and deduced that they must have come from vastly different premises of living.

Her head tilted as he offered his own thought on the hairless sort. They hadn't looked especially itchy, rather, they'd been proud, angry little things, but she didn't have a better explanation for their lack of fur. Placing the thought in the back of her mind for later inspection, he focused next on his question. It was certainly a change to be asked how she came to be here and rather what exactly she was doing here, and she answered truthfully. "I left the prairie to come here a few months ago. I met a man - Murdock - who took me here; Easthollow." She gestured vaguely back in the direction of the territory, gaze leaving him a moment as she squinted back towards it. "it's the pack with the big rocks." She elaborated, though they weren't exactly visible through the distance that separated her from the territory.

"I did not know that I had such an interesting neighbour," Birk replied, because he had not noticed Poppy among other Easthollow wolves that he had run accross. Then again he had not been part of the pack very long either. Maybe in time he would find out that they had a pet bear or a porcupine living there as well. 

"I recently joined the aforementioned pack," he explaind, pausing and wondering, whether he wanted to elaborate on the subject or not. More likely not. Not today anyway. "So - this Murdock guy - what does he look like?"

She blinked when the male labeled her as neighbor, wondering if he made his home near Easthollow. But, it seemed,  he was not a loner after all. A recent joiner, then, one Poppy hadn't noticed; nor had she picked up his scent around the pack lands. She ought to be more vigilant, surely, and she responded with a surprised, "oh!" 

He asked next for a description of Murdock, on which she thought for a moment before complying. "he's big and brown - like a tree. and his eyes are different colours, though it's hard to see unless you really look." She offered, hoping it would be a fitting description of the man. She wasn't sure exactly when it had been that she noticed his eyes; perhaps when she felt comfortable enough to look at them for more than a fleeting moment.

Big and brown male wolf - that was enough for Birk not to go and search for the man, in order to look him in the eyes to find out, whether they were really in different shades. Give him time and they would meet each other at one point. 

"Say, Poppy," he changed the subject, as suddenly an idea came to his mind. "How good are you at hunting?" If she was just as light and agile as she looked like, she would make a good team member in taking down a smaller game. And Birk was hungry.

For some reason, she was mildly dissatisfied when the male moved on to different things; she supposed that would have rather enjoyed discussing Murdock. Still, her happy mood could not be dented by such a small thing as this, and she replied after a short moment. "I'm good at smaller prey - I'm quick." She supplied this with a flick of her oversized ears and a slightly curious expression, wondering if he proposed a hunt.

Poppy reminded Birk a little of a fox, just as small and dainty as the sneaky canine itself, therefore he did not doubt that she shared the same skill at killing small rodents. But had she ever set her mind on something bigger - a roe deer, an otter, a beaver? Probably not - looked too naive to the northerner, but in his first impressions he left room for becoming pleasantly disappointed in being wrong. 

"That will do," he replied. "Let's see, if you can upgrade to the next level," he said with a knowledgable grin, then got to his feet, stretched and led the way, looking briefly over his shoulder to see, if the dog was following.

Maybe fade out in your next post and we can have a fresh thread in Easthollow sometime?

A grin flashed across her muzzle as he made his invitation, tail waving like a banner as she fell in behind him with a quick agreement to his proposal. Whether or not they were successful, Poppy was nonetheless thrilled with her newest friend.