With the recent success of the pack hunt, Root makes an attempt to not let it get to her head. The herd she forced closer to the hollow had been the one they'd taken down. She finds herself outside the borders with careful steps lest she stumble across a feline scent she knows to avoid. The snow crunches beneath her feet, unable to prevent the sound without taking painfully slow steps, but her senses are on edge. The girl glances back and forth every so often as she tries to decipher one scent from the next.
She feels comfortable settling in to her new home and having a new relative, even if she doesn't know the woman that well, helps give her a sense of familiarity. Juniper knows things about one side of her family that Root is unaware of and at times it makes her miss her own. She wonders what
@Jazz might think of their new relative. The flash of their bodies the last she'd seen them still cross her mind and she tries to settle them, tries to find a distraction so it doesn't hinder her progress, but her heart weighs heavy this morning.
The meadow she finds herself in is covered in a blanket of snow and there's no particular covering. If the cougar came out of no where, she'd have a head start, but with the slight wind blowing by doesn't indicate anything in particular. There are no traces of a herd yet, no breaks in the snow, nothing they would have left behind. Root inhales a long, cold breath and exhaling billowing smoke in front of her face. The lack of tracking material doesn't slow her down, though, as she takes the first few steps to cross the meadow.
Jazz doesn't know where to go from here. There is the appeal of the freedom, and she's found that she can do moderately okay on her own on most days, but its lonely. The company she's met so far has been very hit or miss, some not even worth remembering, while others.. maybe. She dwells longest on that black male at the frozen creekside. But beside that, she's seen crows she'd rather spend time with than some of the other canines around.
She had to greet the snow-covered field with the beginning of a grimace, for she'd pulled herself from sleep not long ago and was slow to warm up to the particularly brisk day ahead. Bedding down in the cover of the forest just south of here had certainly paid off.
Hunger dug its presence into her sides, though, and was motivation enough to spur her forward without too much more delay. She pinned her ears, sighed, and dutifully got going. She did plan to eat today, after all.
Progress was slow at first. The cold out here was more bitter than in the cover of the trees. Once her blood warmed up enough, she picked up a steady jog to cover ground and aimed straight for the center of the meadow. She knew of a creek, and had scrounged successfully there once before so she'd visit it again. It's one of the very few places near here she's begun to establish any sort of familiarity with, so relatively speaking, she's comfortable and unassuming as she delves deeper into the meadow.
Jazz hesitated at the first hint of wolf scent on the cold air. She narrowed her eyes on the horizon, skeptic and now feeling a growing sense of worry.
As she moves through the meadow, a form slowly starts to materialize in front of her, causing her to freeze. She worries first a cougar is out there but eventually she sees the ears upon the other’s head and the wolfen body to follow. She exhales a long breath she’d been holding, relief filling her body that she’s not about to have an outmatched battle with a creature she’s been trying to avoid. The risk out in the open is enough to keep her on edge.
The other wolf stops getting larger—they must have stopped—and Root takes a few hesitant steps forward. She used a lone wolf to help drive the herd toward the hollow without too much reward on his part and the thought crossed her mind again. The only difference is is she didn’t have a herd she’d already been following.
When Root makes it a few steps and the shift in wind draws the scent of the other to her, she comes to a stop again. Familiarity washes over her but it leaves a sinking feeling deep in her stomach, boiling over and making her feel a little dizzy. She thinks about her parents suddenly and shakes her head, trying to rid it from her mind if only long enough to figure it out. The girl stumbles forward to close the distance, green eyes trying to focus on the form ahead.
She silently mouths something but it goes unnoticed and eventually the silvery body begins to settle into her memory. The features distinguish and her eyes widen and a few more staggering steps forward, she tries to close the distance between her and who she thinks might be her sister.
Soon enough, the scent gives her more information but Jazz was still confused. This recollection burned, somehow, although the relief that came too was distinct. It was still jarring to have it go against what she thought to be truth. The silvered female crept forward, eyes trained on the figure approaching. Wolf, tawny.. and, sister? Her breath caught in her throat and her whole chest felt painfully tight.
She whined first, not sure if this was true or if this was some sort of trickery. The scent said so (although pack scent was different than she'd always known) and of course, her face was painfully familiar. Jazz's tail waved but disbelief kept it in moderation. She'd been so sure she'd be dead. While the silvered sister had not stuck around long to actually see that be the case, she'd seen enough to not need to look back as she fled the scene.
"Root..?" she managed to ask in a tiny voice. Her eyes were wide, and stance quivering in tension and anticipation. Truly, this had to be real. She clenched her jaw to make sure, and indeed, she remained just as she were -- face to face with her sister, alive and seemingly well. "I... you're alive..?" she struggled to say, yearning to reach for her but afraid to still.
Root?
Her breath lodges in her throat as she closes the distance between them, hearing a muffled you’re alive? before her shoulder and face buries into the silver tones of her sister’s fur. Root doesn’t give the other a chance to back away, proving to each of them they are both alive, both here. A cry escapes her before she finally takes a step back to give the woman some space. If she’s as overwhelmed as Root, she can only imagine what’s going through her mind.
“Jazz,” she whimpers, her nose reaching out to touch her again. She wants to close the distance, afraid she might lose her if she’s not careful. “I came back and they were—they were dead. I thought you were there, too, but…” she trails off, swallowing hard. Jazz hadn’t asked for an explanation but to finally get it off her chest made the shadow on her back a little easier to carry. “I couldn’t have stayed.”. Her voice cracks, a plea for understanding.
Root steps back and takes a few breaths, trying not to overwhelm herself more than she has already.
“I can’t beli—you’re alive!”
tbh she probably pissed herself
AWH, BB..
Warmth followed on the heels of the contact between them, and Jazz exhaled a big breath she'd been holding to mutter incoherently against the tawny furs of her sister. Her muzzle had snaked her into an embrace the second she'd had a chance, although she didn't even remember how it happened exactly. She was so overwhelmed with relief and surprise that it was all she could do.
Her eyes burned and mouth felt so dry as she peered back at her sister when explanations began to come. Her ears swung back anxiously and memory of it all still stung so much it slowed the wave of her tail.
"I just ran," she admitted, swallowing thickly despite the dryness in her throat. Would her sister fault her for it? She had turned tail and ran without looking back, the coward's route out, without knowing that anyone else had managed to survive the incident.
"It happened so fast. I.. didn't even think about it, I just couldn't stay either..!" she whined, despairing more openly than she ever had.
"I thought you were with them, too. I was so sure you were," she shook her head. Weakened by such vicious fear, a kind she'd never felt it before, Jazz could only flee when it had all happened. Not her proudest moment, by any means, but her self-preservation had been worth it.
Shaken by dredging this up after the realization of such a shock, she moved to lick her sister's cheek -- to hopefully comfort her and herself at the same time.
"And you're alive! We're.. both alive, and here.. and I just.." she muttered, squeezed shut her eyes and then whined again. Jazz knew words would fall short, and she certainly held no ill will towards her. If anything, she felt like she had been the scumbag to just bolt and not look for her afterward. This was only magnified in knowing that Root had lived.
Jazz went into her own explanation and it’s not entirely different from hers. Jazz had been there when it happened when Root showed up late, bodies slain and she’d been unable to process exactly who she’d seen. Even if she tries to go back to that day, thinking about herself watching, trying to figure out which hollow and dead gaze belonged to whom. Root exhales, heavily, and leans into the silvery woman and just listening to her talk.
“You would have been killed too if you’d stayed. I saw what they did,” she whines again. “I’m so...” she trails off, unsure of what she wants to say. She’s thankful her sister is alive, but happy? Glad? At least someone else has survived, someone familiar, someone that knows what it’s like. Juniper could only understand and offer so much, even if she’s felt loss too. It isn’t the same.
Root closes her eyes and takes in a long breath, holding Jazz into her senses. She smells the same as she had before but having gone weeks without her, assuming she had been dead, she knew it’s not something she will always have at her disposal. She’d felt loss during her flight and she knew she could easily lose her sister again. Root clings to her, leaning in carefully so she’s somehow still touching her, even if only a little.
“I found a place to stay. They’ve been good to me. You should meet them,” she offers, opening her green eyes to see the same silvery form she’d thought she’d lost. “You’d like it.”
Her cowardice had been justified. Jazz nodded and exhaled slowly. Root was right, and she'd always known that to be so. Sometimes, it still did make her feel greasy for ditching out on everything she had ever known just like that. She'd been very attached to her first and only home. It felt like a betrayal to leave without a second glance. But, it was either that or death. Jazz had opted to survive.
She doesn't want to remember in detail what had happened. Her ears pinned back at Root's words, not even able to imagine the horror she'd seen if she'd come in after Jazz had already high-tailed it away, and suppressed a shudder. "It had to be terrible. What little I saw was," she knew there was a sad look in her eyes, but she was ready to look forward and appreciate what she did still have -- not that she had known before just moments ago.
"What's it like there?" she asked, curious for more information about this place Root seemed to speak highly about. "I've been staying.. just around. Wherever I can but it's cold. I was offered to join up with a pack in the mountains. I was going to go see it, since I had no other ideas," she mentioned, not knowing how much of Taggarik she could say just yet. Winter was taking its toll as much as she hated to admit it, so living alone wasn't going to work for much longer. She was getting by, but it did involve a lot of scraping.
There’s a part of her that wants to linger on what happened, to mourn with her sister, but she’d spent so long getting through it herself and pushing it away that something holds her back. It would have been easier with a shoulder or someone to keep her company on lonely days where she didn’t think she would get through. But she’s here, on the other side, moving on, and she doesn’t know where she should be as her sister stands across from her.
Root isn’t sure if Jazz wants to come to where she’d taken up shop or if she wanted to go do her own thing. She glances away but the closeness of her sister remains, wanting to keep her within sight or touch somehow.
“It’s safe,” she tells her, or so it makes her feel. Their cache had been raided not long ago but there hadn’t been that much damage. “It’s fairly new itself but they have been very welcoming and I—” she stalls, glancing back to her blue eyed sister, “—we have a cousin. Juniper. She came to the borders one day and she… she’s a Saturnin.”
She goes quiet again, holding her breath and nudging her sisters nose. “Will you come?”
Safe. Without a doubt, an appealing notion after watching her every move for . Jazz licked her dry lips thoughtfully. She did want it. She'd need it, sooner or later, because winter was only going to worsen.
Her ears swiveled and she tilted her head. "A Saturnin... here?" Proof of the family's expansive reach, no doubt. Jazz was curious. She had been stung the most by the absence of family since leaving home. "Yeah. I want to see it," she said, squeezing her eyes shut with a sigh. Some relief, but some new-found impending dread. This would mean meeting the leaders -- presumably, and their set of rules. She'd grown used to.. well, not having any. And there always loomed the chance that they'd want nothing to do with her. She knew she looked like she wasn't really worth much at the moment -- mainly why she'd been surprised the dark male had offered her a home at his place after basically seeing her exist and nothing more. It would take her time to get back into a halfway productive role..
But, she did want to be with her sister. That seemed light the brightest hope she'd known in days right now.
All the girl can do is nod her head.
“Yes. Juniper,” she introduces with a wave of her tail, unsure if she’s actually said it once already but with the sudden excitement that courses her, she can’t be bothered to remember.
“On mom’s side,” Root adds off hand with a nod of her head. Even with their loss, a familial face is nice to have. They could come together as a family, even if they hadn’t shared the same things.
“Come on,” she urges, wanting to get back to Lost Creek Hollow as soon as she can. As much as she wants to stick around and catch up for the last few weeks they’d been apart, finding something stable would benefit them. They’d have a long road ahead of them to find something normal once more but Root’s in it for the long haul and she can only hope her sister feels the same.
Root nudges her shoulder eagerly, wagging her tail, and tries to soothe the sudden burst of energy through her chest.
We can continue this thread if you want to. They can catch up, or we can do it later. I'm going to go ahead and start the new thread with the others, yeah?
ya we can continue a little bit i think!
Juniper, a name that fit so neatly within what she understood to be Saturnin naming convention. Of course, they didn't all adhere to this, but plenty of them did. She was no exception, even if she was not the first manifestation of this name.
"Do you know where she comes from? I mean, I know the family is basically from all around," she gestured with the words. Still, it was good to know of family around here and this information soothed the worry aching in her chest more.
She then nodded and followed after her sister, ready to get moving towards something new.
"What else should I know about the new place?" she asked between breaths as she began to adjust into her best traveling pace. She didn't want to dwell on her worries about being accepted there, so opted to just hear more about what her sister could share.
Root hadn’t spent a lot of time with Juniper since she joined and once she’d gotten back, she’d make an effort to do so. The woman is family and gives them a little connection to the side they saw only briefly. She had her own little family in the valley but once in a while a visitor would pop up, however often they stayed to themselves. “I don’t know,” she says with a frown, shrugging her shoulders a little in consideration. “It was more overwhelming than anything, I think, and… I don’t know,” she murmurs. Her frown remains upon her features and she hopes to brush it off, but it’s difficult to pull away. Living away from the family she’d grown up with hadn’t exactly been easy.
“It’s called Lost Creek Hollow,” she begins again, turning her head to the side to see her greyscale sibling. “Led by Mordecai and Harlyn,” she muses. There’s a beta, but she hadn’t seen him and his scent had become faint. “I led a herd of deer near to the pack and we’d hunted it successfully,” she adds, her frown finally fading into a grin.
Jazz nodded slowly. Overwhelming was very understandable. Admittedly she was interested in meeting some extended family for herself when she got a chance.
She knew there was probably more she could ask about, considering the sheer volume of things that were different now, but she had to narrow it down somehow. However, information about the pack seemed paramount. Her next home. It was good that it seemed Root was already comfortable there and had done well with the pack. Knowing this did give Jazz hope for her chances there already.. but she certainly didn't want to get ahead of herself.
She'd memorize the names -- for the faces and the place. It was only the beginning of what she'd need to learn to catch up and then find herself a niche there among the Hollow residents. Jazz followed along, feeling a little more nervous the closer they got and she tried to mentally rehearse what she should do when faced with a leader. But if everything went okay, it could be the beginning of something great for her so it would be worth it in the end. Hopefully.
jk since i kinda ended up steering this towards a fade i'll probably pop up a new thread for us really soon after i catch up