hopefully knaven and bijou would want to move on soon, the boy thought, hiking a leg to spray the distinctive mayfair-cairn scent over the edge of a gnarled redwood. this place was far from uninhabited, and there were only three of them. thus far, he he had kept close to his siblings and away from what appeared to be two small groups of strangers.
but this afternoon, with an autumn storm rolling in from the sea, lionel mayfair had gone out to scout for one of them, prepared to defend if need be, but more curious than anything.
It did not particularly surprise Wraen, when she came across scent paths that did not belong to her own group, though she would have preferred to have Sentinels for herself only a little while longer. In few weeks time they would be moving forward again and, since it would be a long time still, before she saw this place again (if ever at all), she wanted to cherish it alone.
But her wish for solitude was balanced by her curiousity about people, who passed by. When chance (let's not pretend that there wasn't any intenion behind it) presented herself in a form of a young straggler, Wraen went over to greet him and find out, who he was. She stopped few strides away from him, standing with an air of confidence and friendly interest, giving him an opportunity to decide, whether he wished to introduce himself of go away.
murkwater eyes met the glint of apple-green. intrigued enough by the rare color to steal closer, lionel let his eyes probe the weaknesses of the sinewy feminine body before him. and, if he was being honest, which for the mayfair was a dubious state, the woman who had come close was attractive.
but she was not one of them, and so the goldbrush was watchful, observant. "hello," he said, with all the mannerliness that deirdre had plugged into his siblings and himself. "can i help you?" never occurred to the boy once that she and her group had been here first.
While Lionel assessed the value and quality of the sworn spinster before him, Wraen took time to do a quick visual check of her own. First impression - the young fellow reminded her a lot of Niamh. Not only the golden pelt, but the confident demeanor he carried himself with. If he was in any way similar to her former packmate, she was sure to have a very amusing encounter.
He did not disappoint, because his question earned a mildly surprised look from Wraen, because up until now she had not been aware of being a visitor at the place she temporarily called her home. "Well, I was going to ask you the same question," she replied with a mischievous smile that gave a notion that she knew more than she was willing to give on. "But you beat me to that, so you deserve an answer - knowing your name would be nice," she said.
"lionel mayfair," the rogue answered, charmed by her interest even though she had not yet given her own title. "you're new." he remembered umbra and sunhawk, the unlikeliest pair of wolves he had come across so far. and now this one, with eyes that brought to mind fragrant green fruits.
chiding himself for his sappiness, lionel stepped away and sniffed at the earth for any tracks. "surprised we hadn't come across each other yet."
Lionel's observation made Wraen laugh, because she had thought the very same thing. If his statement meant, what she thought it meant, then both of them had co-habited the sentinely without knowing about one another. "Well, I have been here for few weeks and it is the first time I see you here too," she replied with a playful smile.
"Do you live here? As in a permanent settlement or a temporary stop on the way?" she asked.
lionel mayfair grinned. "that depends on what we find." a hint to indicate he was not alone, though he did not think the apple-eyed she-wolf would be, attractive as she was. "what's your name now," lionel teased, not wanting to answer more until he had her title.
the woman's laugh was golden and effective; amusement bobbed warmly to smooth across his heart. "if i said yes, would it make you consider staying?" words tantalizing and curious as his murkwater eyes watched her gently.
"Wraen," she introduced herself, leaving out the lengthy family name that she no longer felt was necessary. It meant something for her and Maia only, not for the rest of the world. Why should they know - why complicate things?
"As charming as you are - not likely," Wraen shook her head, knowing that maybe in few weeks the Sentinels would have worn out its novelty and charm and she would be ready to see the rest of the wilderness that she had not visited in a very long time.
"Do you know Lasher?" she asked, now remembering, why did the surname seem familiar to her. "He was a good friend of my parents years ago. When this forest had not been ruined by fire."
as charming as he was. this provoked a swagger in lionel's next step, one that nearly took him into a gopher hole. shrugging off the stumble with a wave of his tail, the mayfair glanced toward her apple-hue eyes with a surprised expression overtaking his features. "lasher. yeah. he was my mother's father."
how did this pretty woman know that name? lionel peered at her a long moment before surveying the ruined forest with a twist of his lips. "i never met him though. did you?" friends of her parents were not 'friends of hers,' but he felt the need to ask all the same. "is that why you're back here?" same as he and his siblings; drawn to this wretched piece of woodland for no reason but that it was in their blood to do so.
It took a little longer than usual for Wraen to decipher, just what kind of relative was meant by "mother's father" - grandfather, you dummy! "I might have, but I do not remember it. I was very small, while we still lived here, and when I returned a year later, nobody was here and nothing was left either. From what I can gather, the forest burned down, but I have no idea, what happened to all of the people my mother and father knew, while they lived here," she explained.
"I am not here because of your father, but rather..." she looked around, her gaze traced the ruins of the once proud forest lovingly. "... because of my parents. They have passed away a long time ago and far away, but this place is the closest I can get to them. But we - me and my friends - do not intend to remain here for much longer. We might travel south of here for the winter months," Wraen told.
"Who are you with here? Direct siblings or others from the Mayfair clan?" she asked.
"direct ones," lionel mumbled, put out by how much she knew about the place he had only just touched. her parents had been here. his existed miles and miles from this burnt copse of once-proud trees. the stag suddenly felt very small, exacerbated by the fact that the first individual he had met outside knaven and bijou was going to be leaving.
"yeah, i'm not sure what we're doing either. just looking. but we're sea-obsessed," the boy joked lamely, kicking at a moss-covered pebble, "so we will probably stay ... close." what was he saying, really? goodbye? please don't go? did it matter?
The young wolf sank visibly, when Wraen gave her lengthy insight in her family history and she was endeared by that shyness. "Oh, don't take it to heart too much - you have stumbled across an old crone," she grinned. "As old as the world. Almost," she joked. "Cheer up!"
"So - sea-obssessed - what do you mean by that?" she went on to the next interesting subject. "Do you worship it as a goddess - some wolves do - or is it so that once you get in the water, it is impossible to fish you out. Or... do you belong to merfolk? Those with fish tails?" she tilted her head to the side and prepared to listen.
lionel disagreed that she was a 'crone.' he wasn't entirely sure what it meant, but the word sounded knobbed and ancient. unlike her pleasant face with its granny-smith eyes. his mope was ended by her description of merfolk, and suddenly the gold ears were up and trembling.
"those are real?" young, impressionable, tempered by skellige's logic; lionel had grown up with a witchmother and a pragmatic father. it gave him an imagination with limits, and this woman's claim exceeded them. "have you seen one?" he asked excitedly, quite forgetting to answer her questions.
"Umm... no. Those gals prefer to show themselves to men. They sing beautifully to lure get their attention and, when they are in the water, they grab them and... well, depends, what your taste in stories are. In one scenario, they get eaten. In the other - their souls get stolen and taken away. In the merriest - men are taken to the land of merfolk, where they are catered, groomed and loved forever and ever and ever," Wraen explained.
"So, I suggest that, if you hear alluring singing coming from the waters - run to the woods," she chuckled.
"But there is another story from a different part of the world about merefolk. They look a lot like seals and they shed their skin, when they come ashore, and hide it somewhere, while they roam the lands. There's a tale of a man, who fell in love with a beautiful mere-woman, and in order to keep her, stole and hid her pelt. She remained with him, bore him many children, but her gaze was always turned to the sea, where her brothers and sisters played and sang.
Many years later one of her kids accidentally found her mother's pelt and came down asking her, what it was. Without hesitation or a goodbye the woman grabbed her pelt and returned to her folk. While the man and the children were left mourning the mother they had lost," Wraen told.
Story is not mine - Kópakonan (Seal Woman) from Faroe Islands.
this woman, wraen, he soon discovered she was a storyteller. and a very good one. lionel blinked, ears thrusting forward as she began to describe these mysterious folk.
it seemed that they were focused on using men as an all-you-can-eat buffet, which chilled and titillated the boy. she had said they were attractive, after all; he tried to reason with himself that being killed by a hottie was better than being killed by someone who also wasn't easy on the eyes.
but it was her last adaptation that left lionel frowning knowingly. "wow," he muttered when she had finished. "my mom, she told me about these things called selkies. they did ... they do the same thing." was he in more danger because he was a man? and was this yarn-spinning chiclet someone to fear also? lionel snorted. "but they don't throw their skin. that's - that's weird." weird. sickening. "how do you know all this?" suspicious.
"Well, the sea and the ocean are a big place. There is a vast number of creatures that call it their home," Wraen pointed out. "There are kelpies too, but they prefer rivers and lakes - apparently saltwater is not to their taste," she added, looking over to, where waves met the beach.
"I would love to tell you that I was born this way, but that would be a dishonour to all of the people, who have taught me," she said, realizing that in a short passage of time this was not the first situation she had utilized the same words. "I meet people and, if they are willing, I ask them to tell me a story. Like now - what did your mom tell you about selkies?" she asked.
kelpies. selkies. sea-folk. and all real, from what this one said. lionel's eyes had fair began to bug right out of his head; he gave a few rapid blinks of shock to moisten them. once the orbs had settled back into their sockets, he drew a suspicious breath. "well she told me they came out of the water," the mayfair began, trying to remember.
"and it's like, they're beautiful. they take whatever form you're macking on, you know? like for me, it would be like, maybe a chick with green eyes." haha smooth. "but anyway, you see them and they're whatever you think you really want, and you go up to it, and then it changes and grabs you and drags you under the waves where it sucks your brain out of your ears." he frowned at the retelling, wilting slightly to think that a kelpie was really real.
Wraen smiled all through the description of the mythical creatures and flinched only at the very end, because the beautiful picture in her mind had a hard time to reconcile with savagery. Then again didn't wolves pretend to be all gracious, kind and handsome, not a single speck of dirt stuck to the soles of their feet only to turn into violent beasts, when it came to the bloodlust during hunt or a particularly heated argument that ended in violence? A food for thought - certainly.
"An interesting story, though I would like to point out that it is virtually impossible to suck brains through ears. Doing so from the base of the skull - when you rip a head off - is way more practical," she said, though it was not that often possible to decapitate something so smoothly to get to the tasty treat that was the brain inside. "Anyway - thank you a lot for sharing this! It is something I will store for a session during the ghost season," she thanked the fellow.
lionel's eyes fair bulged out of his head; he stared unspeakingly at wraen's clarification. and now, if he had not been suspicious before, he certainly was now. there was no body of water close at hand, none lionel could remember. but if she was not a selkie, perhaps she was another of these monsters their conversation had just focused on.
"what is the ghost season?" the stag asked anxiously, becoming more unraveled the longer he spent in her presence. it sound. an unholy thing. and if she was not one of those cryptids, perhaps she only communed with them. "h-how do you know so much about these uh, individuals?"
"Don't worry, friend, I am not going to put a charm on you or drag you anywhere," Wraen teased, when she saw that the young man had grown a little suspicious of her. She knew then that she had shared a tad bit too much - as she usually did - and a proof that old habits die hard or are nearly impossible to kill.
"Ghost season - well, it depends, what you believe in, but right after the fall equinox - that is a smart way of saying that the days are getting shorter and hours of darkness longer - spirits of the dead are allowed to leave the underworld realm they live in and visit the living, who they have left behind," she explained.
"Some leave food out for them to feast on during the night, but more often people reminisce about the loved ones, who have been claimed by Death. Because leaving food out is not wise. Some with other religion might consider it a free meal and not feel eternal damnation from the ghosts they have cheated," she added for a comic relief.
"And then, when the daylight gradually takes over the night hours, the spirits return to their present home again," she finished.
wraen seemed to catch on; lionel found himself relaxing a bit, but remaining wary on the off-chance she was a pretty cryptid to enjoyed lying to unsuspecting boys. but as she spoke, he became aware she was a more educated sort, a wolf who put away every bit of information she learned until a later time.
like knaven. like their mother.
these similarities were too great for lionel to dismiss; he cast his cautions windside and settled carefully to his golden haunches. "so they're allowed to visit all season?" he asked, arching a brow. he knew of the time she spoke; the mayfair just wasn't sure he was ready to have ghosts wandering through autumn.
"That they do from the fall to winter equinox. It's the darkest time of the year and, since they no longer can enjoy sunlight, it is more comfortable for them to travel that way," Wraen explained. When you looked closely at most myths and traditions there were only few that you could not find any real life explanation for of, why were they there. In this case - when the weather grew cold and lands became barren, when the Death reaped so many souls, who had either not survived the freezing temperatures or succumbed to famine - it made sense that alongside their master the dead walked the Earth too.
"But this is true only if you believe in it. If you do not - then it is just a fancy story," she said. "It applies to all supernatural beings. Magic too."
he 'hmmed' in response. skellige had never considered such things worthwhile, at least not in memory. but his mother had sworne by them. "my mom said lasher was something like a witch," lionel mumbled at last, thinking of the grandfather that lived on only now through powerful memories.
"maybe that's why the forest burned." if a witch died, it would make sense that something bad might happen. he supposed, lionel quickly amended inside his head, unwilling to commit yet to any particular portent. "do you think he visits?"
"A witch - interesting..." Wraen remarked, trying to remember, what her own mom had told about Lasher and coming up with virtually nothing. Well, apart from, what she had already told Lionel earlier. It was probably because Osprey told, when she had been asked to do so, and it was not surprising that her little young self would have hardly interest in a grown-up man from her parents' past, when there were more exciting characters to rave about. No real life witch could compete with a hyperbolized dragon that the collective imagination of Wraen and her mom had come up with.
"That's a theory. Though there is also a belief that the world is a chaos, there is no order, no justice and things - both good and bad - happen randomly," she suggested. "And we will never find an answer. As for, whether he visits - well, I am not the one to say for sure - I never knew him and I would not sense his presence, even if he was standing right next to me," just as she said this, a gust of wind blew handful of sand in her face, making her squint and lean down to rub the grains fo sand out of her eyes.
"This - could have been him or my granny MO. I never knew the latter either, but I imagine that would not deter her from haunting me," she joked, shook her head one final time and sneezed.
lionel could not help himself. her lexicon, wealth of knowledge, and dry humour had confused him until delighted, and he chuckled gayly as wraen made some pithy comment about the soil blown her way. "whoever it was wanted you to know!" the boy crowed, moving closer as if to block a bit of the wind from his new comrade.
"we could get into shelter," lionel suggested vaguely. it was time that he moved off to locate his siblings, and relay the fantastical things that the she-wolf had told him, but skellige's pragmatism sang in his seabound blood. action first, talk later, and he wondered, waiting to see if she would accompany him elsewhere.