Wolf RPG

The river led him north, emptying out in to the soil in a manner that made the earth soft and pliant beneath him. He did not enjoy the first touch of his paws against the mud, and was urged by his own personal narcissism to turn tail; yet there seemed to be no other way. Renoir thought to climb the nearest ridge and find a route along the mountainside, or perhaps to go further east -- but the daylight was wearing thin. It was during this deciding moment that something sprang free of one of the marsh trees. The boughs creaked with the weight of it, and the movement caught in his eye. The boy's hunger overrode whatever sense of propriety he held about himself, and thus he plunged headlong in to the mire; he struggled for some time to reach solid ground, but emerged unscathed -- soured by the smell of his coat, but otherwise fine. Whatever had piqued his instinct to chase had vanished hastily enough.

He grumbled epithets to himself, a mixture of his Cajun and the common-tongued vulgarities he had heard lesser beasts speak back home. If only maman could see him now - or hear him! Renoir looked less like the angel she so loved and more the fiend. Even after shaking off the excess water he felt unclean. The evening was beginning to settle around him - the air was biting cold - but he had to keep on going. It was easier once the land was firm enough, flat enough. Ren strode as confidently as he could across the field, dragging his heels by the time night had fully consumed him; though once his paws felt the firmness of stone beneath them, he was roused from his tired stupor and looked vacantly down.

It was unwise to leave home so heavily pregnant, but it was a brief, faint whiff on the breeze that drew an irresponsible Saena from her home in the deepening gloom. With brow furrowed into concerned lines, the woman picked her way among the precarious stones with her head bowed and nostrils flaring. It took some time, but she found what she wanted eventually.

Her lip lifted into a sneer as she inhaled the days old scent of Lunar Eclipse printed on the stone where the wolf had stood. Esaro's scent overlaid it and suspicion began to brew in her head. The deserter had been near, much too near to her pack given the circumstances of her departure, and to say she was disappointed that the scents pooled on lingered on the stone was an understatement. There was nothing she could do about it now, but it solidified her resolve to ensure her borders were secure.

As she lifted her head, turned and prepared to head home, she was met with the sight of a bright wolf moving about in the twilight. Hackles prickling alertly, the female smoothed back her ears and growled a low warning. It served two purposes, the first being a warning to stand down, as if Renoir had done something wrong when really she (he, as Saena may or may not learn) hadn't.

The grass had thinned to nothingness, leaving an exposure of bedrock riddled with feldspar and quartz. Upon seeing this, he swept his gaze backwards as if to make sure he had been on the right trajectory - and then forward, to see if ever the stonework ended. Renoir noticed the shifting colors of the stone and the odd, natural patterns within it; he was studying this when the rumbling of another wolf sounded on the wind. With some grace, he turned to regard the stranger - and upon seeing the raised tail and affronted gaze, he dropped his own.

A small whine was his only verbal response, ducking his head and looking away from her, at the rocks. He found comfort in their hues and tints, the texture of the moraine beneath his toes. Ren took one step hastily, and then tempted fate with a shy look upon the woman who opposed him. She was a beautiful thing - ripe and round like an overripe peach - which made him wonder why she was out here, instead of off in a den somewhere.

Pardonnen, he breathed, hoping that she was not about to do something silly or combative in her current state - 'ave I.. done something wrong? If so, he would do his best to remedy it. Thus far it seemed as if he was imposing on something, and that made him think - perhaps the moraine was of great importance to her.

A part of Saena, recently awakened by her mate's betrayal and the loss of three pack wolves, desires to flex her muscles and endanger herself for a thrill. She almost does it, too. Her shoulders tense and her paws press firmly against the stone and had she a tail, it would be lashing. Alas, a much larger part of her knows this is foolishness and that she is acting rashly. Her pregnancy prevents her from going further with the plan and just as Renoir speaks in a tongue quite unlike any she's heard, the alpha female straightens and banishes her aggression as best she can.

"No," she curtly reveals, but she almost wishes he had. Then her foolish need for a rush might be satisfied. Pressing back her ears, she averts her eyes from Renoir and mumbles a rough, "sorry," for her behaviour. "My pack is near to here and a lot has happened lately," she tacks on, an unsatisfactory explanation for acting like a total bitch. Renoir is close to it but he isn't encroaching on it and for her to behave differently is unfair of her.

She flopped her hindquarters down on the moraine and peered back up at the effeminate wolf. "I can't let you get any closer to it," she tells him, "unless you've an intent to join us." Her attempts at recruiting in the past have amounted to nothing and the current tenants of the maple wood have been collected by chance, so she expects Renoir to decline as so many others have, but Saena leaves the suggestion out there just in case.

How odd. If she were the matriarch of her pack, the queen, then why was she here and not one of her subjects? Her answer does not give him much to work with, and he only gives a sullen little shake of his head - no, he was not here to join her. Though maybe — his head shaking halts suddenly, because Renoir begins to think about it in earnest. Does she not have anyone to protect her? To do these tedious, dangerous tasks for her? The thought tugs at his heart, and he does not attempt to depart just yet.

I promise not to, ehm, get too close, yes? As he murmurs this Renoir looks over her head, obviously trying to get a better look at the land she is so adamant to defend, but doesn't quite know where to put his eyes. He gives up a moment later, and resumes his focus upon her. Are you — pregnant almost falls out of his mouth, but he waffles a bit, not able to make his tongue speak in the common language found in this region; in giving up he switches gears: Fanm dous — are you oke? 

He did wonders what has befallen her to make her so territorial, thus the question. No woman in her condition should be out in the world like this, he thinks.

Renoir speaks with an accent and inflection that are foreign to Saena's ear. Being a native of the area, Saena speaks with her own accent, mirroring that of the Redhawk-DiSarinno clan but morphed by time away from them. She's not able to tell her accent, and wouldn't even be able to tell the subtle differences in a Redhawk-DiSarinno wolf's voice or in fact in any DeMonte or DiSarinno's voice, but Renoir surely can hear the difference as she can hear his. She presses her ears to the side, flared open, to listen more intently, and only realizes he's asked a question after an uncomfortable silence stretches between them.

"Oh," she says with a start, then clears her throat and abashedly says, "yes, fine. Well, no." Contradicting herself isn't the greatest impression so Saena starts again, working her tongue over her lips once or twice before letting him know that, "a lot has happened to my pack lately. We have enemies all around us." She was embroiled in tension, and the source of much of it, but she doesn't realize it so she doesn't tell him.

Canting her head and trying to ignore the welling aggression in her breast, for clearly Renoir poses no threat to the Phoenix pack, Saena casually asks, "so what are you doing around here, anyway?"

Her answer leaves him wondering about some things, but is enough to answer the question of who she is. He was right to assume her status was high among her people, and thus the boy's posture lowers further, his tail sweeping across the grass as it curls slightly beneath him. The mention of enemies makes him more alert too; Renoir's worries for her, and himself, blossom to something great. 

—so what are you doing around here, anyway? she asks in a calmer tone, and he gives a tiny shrug of his butter-toned shoulder. There isn't much of a story for him to tell. At least, not one he is comfortable speaking aloud. The memory of his baby sister's marriage and his attempt to circumvent the laws of the land were sad things; her absence too, disoriented him, making him more pliant — especially to women like the one standing before him. Still, Renoir has been taught to be courteous and he cannot fathom being silent for long.

Telling her something doesn't necessarily mean telling her the truth, after all. Though what comes out of his mouth is not entirely false. I am a vwayajè. Mwen looks, sees, studies - dere is much beauty here, as he says this, the boy's eyes light up and his brows raise; his tail does too, wagging a few times behind him before returning to the grass. Your 'ome, it is a beauty too? Many colors? If she came from the woods beyond them, she must bare witness to all manner of wonderful things.

The lift and fall of his shoulder is not missed, and Saena assumes that's that. She glances beyond him briefly to the towering moraine and the stationary berg beyond, surveying for activity before she prepares herself to leave, but as she's focusing on the glacier, the butterscotch sylph of a male responds. She doesn't understand what he calls himself, but manages to glean some understanding from his description of his lifestyle. A scout, perhaps, some kind of mental cartographer in wolfish terms. "Me too," she shares, "or, well, I was once." Those days are behind her now, she thinks sadly.

Letting her hind legs splay out to the side of her, the alpha female re-positions herself for comfort as she digests Renoir's next question. "The greatest beauty of this area," she tells him, though there are many beauties in the taiga, and that's to say nothing of the wide wilds beyond. "I think so, anyway. The trees are red and orange and yellow in autumn. A sight to behold." Redtail Rise would've been the most beautiful in her eyes if it still stood, but it stands charred and dead, unfortunately. Others would say the glacier is the most stunning of sights in the taiga. The sprawling plains to the west are moreso to others, and the red-orange wood near the mountains is nothing to sneeze at.

But for Saena, her home is the most splendid of all sites, and her plan is to live and die in it.

Oui, avantur ou te dwe gwo— he began, enthralled by her description of her home. He tried to imagine what it must be like, but Renoir's imagination is limited to the sights and sensations he has experienced. A forest of fire is not something he has ever seen, as his home was perpetually green and dark, with moody shadows and lack of variation. Perhaps that was why he sought different places? Hastily he corrected himself, hoping that his brief foray in to his native tongue has not dissuaded this fine woman from conversation - Ekzkiz mwen - It is 'ard for me to speak da words so easy. But, ou sounds like... Ou love da forè very much.

Renoir's tone takes on a babbling quality to her unrefined ear and confusion claims her expression. Her tongue presses against the roof of her mouth as she mentally attempts to repeat the words he's spoken in an effort to glean understanding, but all it sounds like to her is gibberish. Beautiful gibberish, for there's something lovely about the language the fair man uses, but gibberish nonetheless.

He speaks something else in the same tone, and then utters again words she can understand. As he speaks she glances over a narrow shoulder at the maple wood and she nods. "It's my favourite place in this world," she agrees. Once, her plan was to reclaim Redtail Rise if ever it recovered from the fire, but now she knows she won't bother. The maples are home for her now. "Do you have a place you love so much?" she asks him conversationally.

His own beloved place? The boy's ears flick at the question, and his features become more sullen, brooding. Once he'd had somewhere. Once he had a home with all the beauties that fate could afford, although nothing made the place more attractive to him than the presence of his family. Thinking of them now, Renoir almost loses track of the conversation as he drifts in to memories — but he does catch himself, and sadly answers, Non, not any more. There was no great catastrophe which drove him from his home; nothing as divisive as a fire or a storm, at least. His own attachment to his sister had been his downfall, but Renoir would not elucidate upon his past to this stranger. Finally, he pipped up with: It is good to meet ou, though they had not exchanged names - he felt their time together beginning to dwindle because of his mental distance - Maybe mwen will come back 'dis way, see ou and da foret? But he made no promises; and seeing the state of the woman's roundness, Renoir did not expect such friendliness should he return this way.

Not anymore, said Renoir, revealing that there must've been a place once before. Saena knew the feeling, though gave no indication of empathy or understanding. Although the maplewood was now the most cherished of locations for the Alpha, she felt the keen cut of loss when Redtail Rise went up in flames, and remembered it with a wrench of the heart. Renoir said nothing of specifics, but she hoped his loss was not as sudden and final as hers once was.

She thought she should say something, but Renoir spared Saena the awkwardness when he dismissed himself politely. "Nice to meet you," she declared, even if their meeting had a rocky beginning. The woman-boy was charming and gentle-mannered, a nice change from the wolves surrounding her of late. To his offer (or request?), Saena merely said, "maybe," because she'd long since learned that absolutes were unwise to state, and she shared Renoir's train of thought. The Phoenix pack didn't tend to entertain guests, but perhaps Renoir could be persuaded to stay should he wander back this way.

With a light dip of her head and a chuff in farewell, the Alpha turned back the way she came and waddled for the warmth and comfort of home.