Rain, Sun, Wind and Snow

@Summer :)

Autumn had moved on a little, although she hadn't given up on the Shore yet. She was pretty much done with the Wilderness and almost done hanging out in the Flatlands. Now she'd be moving on to the mountains here. She remembered the last time she was on this mountain range she'd met and odd mix breed called Fang and a dark lady. Now she laid on a ledge sunning herself, and hoping that there wouldn't suddenly be a boulder avalanche. The sun feels good. The warm feeling went away. She opened her eyes and looked up to a cloud covering it. Dang it! You better say goodbye to it anyway, it's almost Winter.

Does anyone ever try to eat her? o:

It was purely by chance that the black yearling had happened upon the fox while it innocently sunned itself upon a ledge. It was fortunate for the fauna that the wind was not entirely in Summer's favor, but he still hoped against hope that she'd be too lost in her thoughts to notice his scent. She hadn't yet, but that didn't mean his luck would not run out.

In truth, the Ostrega wasn't even hungry having just feasted upon a pheasant he'd stolen from a young coyote just that morning. But he was not one to pass up the opportunity to claim more for his pack's caches, certainly not with Winter upon them. And so the wolf prowled forward as silently as he could, sunlit eyes glued unblinking to her tiny, copper frame.

all the time!

She scented him very faintly- at first she thought she was probably just imagining it, but it stuck around. She glanced around. She turned head around slowly, noting the things she saw. Mountains. Stone. More mountains. Wolf. More mountains. Cave. Mor- wait, wolf? She turned her gaze back upon a black figure that seemed to be watching her. "Hey bro!" She called out, not realizing he was trying to bring her down. "How are you doing?" She called out again.

Summer froze when the fox turned and spotted him, but only for a moment. Instinct told him that this was the time to spring, before it had the chance to get away. But then something happened that instinct had not expected--it spoke.

The black wolf stared blankly as it called out to him, calling him 'bro' and inquiring about his well being. This was far from expected... Summer relaxed his pose unintentionally, slowly lifting his head as he stared upon the fox as though he'd never seen one before. "Um..." he started, about to answer then question when he stopped abruptly and changed his course, "Why are you talking to me?"

"'Cause I'm sooo booredddd. Whatcha wanna talk about?" She asked him, as if he didn't think that her talking was weird. She was already getting tired of sunbathing. As a jumpy little fox she had a short attention span that would not cope things where she would just lie there. Or perhaps she had only gotten bored because now there was somebody to talk to.

Summer continued to stare as the small creature replied. Apparently boredom had driven her to speak to a dangerous predator that was clearly intent upon killing and eating her dead carcass. His eyes narrowed shrewdly as he thought upon this. Perhaps the beast could speak in the wolf’s language, but clearly its intelligence was far below his, which was not unsurprising. Were there a predator that could hunt him, Summer was certain he would never bother asking it to pause for a chat. He was not suicidal, nor was he so dumb and naïve as to think he would end the conversation with his life.

”Do you often satisfy your boredom by talking to predators?” Summer asked slowly, his innate curiosity overruling his desire to add her body to one of his pack’s caches. After all, they’d get to that part eventually. For now, why not pass a little time learning more about this tiny fauna.

She giggled manically. "Actually, yeah. I talk to wolves a lot, sometimes cougars or crows, and sometimes even an idiotic coywolf." She said, her eyes narrowing at the thought of her arch enemy, the coywolf who might be called Caiaphas, but she wasn't completely sure. Her hackles rose a little but they flattened as she continued. "I haven't met a lot from the Sunspire though. I met Fang, and I "met" a gray wolf who was trying to hunt me. Not sure what to think of you yet, bro." She said with a grin towards the obsidian wolf.

The little fox made it quite clear that she did indeed have some sort of death wish, admitting only minutes into their conversation that she had a habit of talking to animals that would've loved to eat her alive, literally. He narrowed his eyes softly, more in thought than ire. That was until she mentioned Fang.

It had been a long while since he'd given the hybrid any thought. He hadn't liked the man then and he didn't feel as though he would have cared for him were they to meet then either. "Fang is no longer with the Spire," he growled, unable to help his distaste from leaking into his voice.

"Aw, that's too bad. Seemed okay." She commented. He had been sort of quiet when she met him. He had had some odd coloring of a coywolf, of course not near as ugly coloring as Caiaphas. "Well... You guys doing okay in the Spire? I hear Ferdie disappeared." She brought up the topic of conversation, and once more was proud of her gossip sourced knowledge of the wolf packs.

The fox shared her opinion on Fang, announcing that he'd "seemed okay" to her. Summer kept his own opinion of the halfbreed to himself, feeling no need to get into a discussion of character flaws with his dinner. After all, Fang was gone now. Whatever he had or hadn't been was of no importance any longer.

Her next comment intrigued him greatly, and suddenly he found himself paying the critter more heed than he had before. "Where did you learn that?" he asked sharply, partly wondering who was responsible for sharing their pack's secrets, but even moreso desperately curious to see if she had any information that his former packages perhaps didn't on what had happened to him.

Autumn was proud of his reaction- they were always surprised when she knew things of their pack. "A little bird told me." She smirked. "You see, the birds fly over the packs all the time, or sit in trees and listen to the wolves talk. So I pay them in pecans, berries, etc. to give me the info. Mostly crows and ravens, sometimes sparrows." She explained to him. She was glad the birds were willing to tell her for the pay of food. Sometimes she would crack open a nut for them if their beaks weren't made for nut-cracking. They would usually accept the little payment. "I know a lot about many packs nearby." She said. She was a key to the door of knowledge.

The fox was proving to be a clever little beast. Summer was a bit disconcerted at how much she knew about the Sunspire and couldn't help but wonder what their enemies would have to sell to her in order to get their secrets. Or what he would need to do to get theirs.

"Do you?" Summer replied, still a bit skeptical, "I have to wonder how much attention to the politics of wolves a bird would even pay." He couldn't see what good it would do them. Perhaps carrion birds would be a bit more interested, but even with them, Summer could only see them caring about where the wolves were hunting so they'd know where to find some abandoned bones to pick at.

I keep wanting to have Autumn introduce herself but I tell myself not to. But I don't think I'll be able to handle it if they never learn eachother's names!

"I see why you would question it. Most birds don't but the ones I mentioned are always talking. Especially sparrows. Like for instance...." She thought for a moment before saying anything. What was some good talk she could give as an example? "Well, in a pack called Nacho scar door or something Bypass, the mate of the alpha, Shadow, left him while pregnant to return to his enemy's pack." She said. That was what she'd been told. She didn't yet know about the pup's birth, that was way too recent to be to her ears yet.

Nacho Scar Door. Summer listened quietly as the fox spoke, beginning to doubt that the little creature could actually be capable of providing any decent information. He was fairly certain there were no packs named anything so bizarre. And he'd never heard of a Bypass either, nor of a wolf named Shadow or any of it. It would have been an interesting bit of information had he known the other pack involved was the Creek, but sans that knowledge, it struck him as mere gossip.

"Sounds... fascinating," Summer replied slowly, making up his mind that this animal was of no use to him. She was a friendly sort, though, and killing her at this point seemed a little wrong. The black wolf pulled himself up onto all fours and looked down at her. She was quite tiny.

"Well, I have a pack to return to," he said, feeling thoroughly awkward now as he wondered how to go about leaving. Did he say good bye? It was just a fox, but the fact that they'd had a conversation made him feel uncomfortable with being so blatantly rude to her. "It was.. nice meeting you," he said, pausing as he realized he had no idea what her name was. Did they even have names?

Autumn could tell he wasn't too interested in the latest gossip, but whatever, it didn't matter whether or not he took interest to her gossip. If he didn't, it was his problem. Well, not really a problem.... As he said it was nice meeting her, she realized they hadn't exchanged names. Usually that was what Autumn started with. "I'm Autumn. And yours?" She asked the black wolf with a tilt of her head. She had no idea that his name would be so coincidental, going along with hers.

Summer canted his head as the critter responded. Her name being Autumn didn't strike him as being any sort of a coincidence since his own name was also that of a season. Nor did he have any inclination that she would be so fascinated by such, otherwise he likely would have shared his birth name rather than the nickname he'd come so used to referring to himself as.

"Summer," he replied with a swish of his tail. A single ear upon his head twisted backwards to listen to the sounds of the forest as he listened to make sure his road would be clear before he left. He lingered only out of awkwardness, debating whether or not he needed to say good bye now or if he would be good to go.

last post from me! Thanks for the thread :)

Her eyes brightened and ears perked as he said Summer. "Well, I suppose you haven't seen Spring and Winter around, hmm?" She chuckled jokingly with the young man. She remembered he had said he had a pack to get back to. "Well, see ya around, Summer." Autumn said to him with a wave of her big fluffy flaming tail. Then she was off, down the mountain, maybe to meet Winter and Spring on her way to her next destination.

Summer furrowed his brows at her question. Clearly she was jesting at something, but his brain still hadn't connected the dots between their names. Even as she bid him farewell and pranced out of sight, he did nothing more than shrug and head out in his own direction. Not until later would it occur to him, and he too would chuckle a little at the joke. But till then, he let the memory of his encounter with the fauna slip to the back of his mind as he tended to other business.