Blackfeather Woods galaxies formed from gravity

Familiar words reached his ears and, for a moment, he forgot where he was. He saw himself in the northernmost reaches of the world, rarely using the common tongue and favouring his native; that was years ago, back when he was much younger. It was so easy to be sucked back into the past, lured in by a language unrecognised by most of the company he kept nowadays. And to have such a friendly face behind the words, too—he couldn’t believe it. “Atjiganngituk,” he admitted with a chuckle. So long had passed since he’d last spoken in his native language with someone other than one of his children that he found it to be terribly strange—but appreciated, all the same. In the presence of someone like himself, he lacked caution and his usual, stoic facade, able to relax despite knowing nothing about her.

“Auka, mânngat,” he explained. In truth, he was the only Inuk dwelling within the pack, for they had not come from the north—not the founder, Meldresi, anyways. There was a possibility that some of the current or past residents—Bane, for example—came from the northern regions, too, but he’d yet to hear any of them speak in Inuttut. This he did not share, using his time instead to ask, “Atikit?”