The autumn air greeted the long-legged wildfire before any of the familiar scents did. It whisked leaves from the boughs of the trees and carried them against the backdrop of blue until they fell far from where they had originally grown.
As Piper passed into the wilds again for the first time in a while, she wondered if those leaves ever found a way to return to their home. Even though she had been gone for months, the feisty Redleaf girl knew that she had overshot her mark and had missed where she might have been able to slip toward the entrance of Bearclaw Valley. She did not think that her family had returned to the secluded hold, but something in her bones had ushered her in that direction in search of signs of familiarity.
The further into the fen she trekked, the more Piper felt her worries spring up inside of her.
The image of her sweet mother left alone filled her with indescribable dread. When she had first left, her only intention was to find Lucas and Wyatt and return them home. After some time in the wilds, the phoenix had discovered that such a task was much easier planned than accomplished. When the dream of finding her brothers had finally died, she hadn’t the strength to return home.
Pausing at the foot of a small stream, the Redleaf girl lowered her crown and drank until the dryness in her throat had been quenched and then dipped her forepaws into the cool waters with a sigh.
Norah had caught a mouse for her breakfast and the only thing that prevented her from gulping it down after two or three chews was that its coat was bright white. A whim of Mother Nature - she had created something beautiful - and it had failed to thrive. Its pelt standing out stark against the brownish grey background. So much for standing out in the crowd... The poet in the she-wolf sighed, the practical wolf pushed it aside, tossed the dead mouse in the air and it disappeared in her jaws a second later.
Had the "black sheep" produced offspring? Norah looked around, amused by the thought, but not expecting her luck to be stretched this thin. No one appeared, so she did not dwell on that thought much longer. Got to her feet and began moving southwards again. This time in search of water. A wolf can live a week without food, but water it must have. When the song of water lured her to, where the stream still run strong, not intending to give up to the ice, she caught sight of red-furred she-wolf, who just as her had stopped there to have a drink. "Good day!" Norah greeted her with a quick glance and a polite smile that did not reach the cool silver gaze of hers. She then went a little distance away and leaned down to quench her thirst.
A stranger appeared from the wilds, issuing a greeting in a joyful manner. The wildfire drew her head up and offered a friendly wave of her tail. The pleasant ‘good day’ wasn’t something that Piper heard often, so she took a small amount of delight in it. She wondered what kind of personality she would find in this unknown figure.
“Hello hello,” she returned with a sharp smile.
There was a scent of other wolves on the coat of the wolf near the water. The Redleaf girl did what she could not to draw too close, not wanting to invade her personal space and all that jazz. The girl was interested to know more about where she came from and whether or not she knew a thing about the packs in the area. It had been many months since she had last been in the wilds and she was unfamiliar with the claims that had transpired in her absence.
“You live nearby?”
One thing that struck Norah immediately was the barely contained enthusiasm for her rather careless greeting. She finished her drink and then trained her eyes on the girl, taking in more information about her now that she had come close enough to be properly appraised. Her appearance and her words suggested that she had been on her own for a while, probably voluntarily, because Norah did not pick up the nervous aura of a person, who was lost, or the image of a mildly suspicious person, who was either on the run or had been exiled.
"Not exactly," she shook her head. "Its way up North. A place called Moonspear," Norah beckoned in the general direction of the pack lands and let this information to sink in, just in case the girl knew anything about it. "You seem to have travelled far," she suggested, intent on drawing more information out of the other.
The pack she spoke of was one that Piper was unfamiliar with. Something in the name sounded like she might have heard it talked about in passing, or maybe she'd harassed a member of their ranks a year or so back... she couldn't remember well enough to make the thinking worth it. When the other girl commented on her state - looking as though she had traveled from far away - the young Redleaf cast a quick smile and wavered her tail. She had been moving since the day she left the wilds and she had no intention of stopping.
Oh well I was born in a pack here called Bearclaw Valley and my brother went missing when we were all real young and I just sorta... went off to find him and didn't really come back until now,
she offered with a shrug. In that moment, Piper could not help but to think of her mother and what it must have felt for all of her children to leave her. The fiery ranger had every intention of going back to Easthollow to see Laurel, but she was searching for the strength that would let that happen.
Norah had been correct, now she tried to guess the girl's approximate age to find out, exactly, how long had the nomadic ways been in practice. Not a retiree - that's for sure. Not a yearling either, but something in her character - either the aura of naivety or innocence made her younger than her actual years too. The impression Norah had garnered by now was of a young adult, who had not yet quite grown or at least learned to walk the gown-up shoes.
"Is there a family that still waits for you at the Bearclaw valley?" she asked. "Or have they too dispersed?"
Oof, coming in with the hard questions! The wildfire felt herself blink a few times as the wolf across from her inquired as to whether or not she had any family waiting for her in the valley.
The bearclaw pack had been her home for as long as she could remember and yet she knew that she was not likely to see the inner walls of that place again. The time that they had claimed it had passed and the Redleaf family had dispersed into the wilds. Piper wasn't exactly sure how to convey this to the woman she'd only just met. It felt weird just dumping her life story out in the middle of the woods, right? Yeah, that was weird.
Uh well they aren't there anymore. My mom might belong to one of the packs in that area, but... she might have moved on too,
the fiery figure answered, feeling very aware that she seemed like a rebellious child who had left her family in search of glory. I mean it's complicated but that's the skinny of it.
Norah did not see anything wrong in running off in search of glory, because she had done this herself and her mother had even cheered her on. In the end, though they had been best friends, still were, they were too similar in their demeanour and ambitions. A kingdom could be ruled by one queen at a time, make it two and mayhem will break out. By going her separate way, she had opened up a room free of tensions and disagreements. There she could meet Helga time fromn time for a pleasant outing, a long conversation over a good meal and fine wine. Even the most self-sufficient person in the world needs that one good friend and in this aspect Norah truly felt sorry for the fiery girl. Because she did not seem to have any. But it could well be that she was wrong too.
"What are you going to do now - free as a bird, not tethered anywhere?" Norah asked out of pure curiosity and also to keep the conversation from dying. People loved to talk about themselves, she was good at listening or at least pretending to do so, even when the subject did not particularly interest her. "Winter's coming. It might be wise to join a pack to survive," she suggested.
Norah was right about this, of course. As Piper thought about the long hardships of winter months, she realized that it would be much smarter for her to align herself with another pack before trying to venture through the frigid world on her own. It was hard enough to keep herself looking as good as she did in the summer months; she didn’t really want the added pressure of starvation looming over her head. It would definitely put a hard stop on all the fun she’d been having.
“Do you think there are packs out there that would take someone temporarily?”
The wildfire inquired to her current companion. She was curious to hear Norah’s thoughts on the matter and whether or not the other she-wolf believed it was a reasonable thing to seek when joining the ranks of an established group. Piper didn’t really want to mess around with actually pledging herself to someone else’s cause. She’d learned early on, such things were better left in the arms of those they were intended for.
Dunno if I wanna tie myself down just yet, you know?
"Then don't be honest with them," Norah shrugged, not seeing a problem there. "Don't lie, but don't give any promisses either, be vague and leave room for interpretation," she elaborated on the subject. "It has worked for me on a number of occasions," if people misread her vows upon joining, it was their problem, not hers. But then again, whenever she had aligned herself with one pack or another, she had been very careful of remaining obscure in the shadows and not draw particular attention to her. Her appearance was not that remarkable, it was easy to blend in. Pleasant manners, more keen on listening than revealing facts about herself. Always blending in the colourful fabric, never making herself too significant.
Piper understood after a moment, and she eyed the girl across from her with a curious expression. It wasn’t that she was against lying, but she hadn’t thought that a stranger would be so ready to offer that as a solution. It would probably be the only thing that would work well enough to get her in the door of one of the local packs. At least, if she was going to avoid having to face the disappointment she’d surely leave with her mother… she’d have to do that.
“Alright I like your style there, slick,” the wildfire remarked with a firm nod. “You got any recommendations for packs? Any you think are real swell?”
There was some spark in Piper (whose name Norah had not yet learned) and the grayscale girl gave a toothy grin in response. She did not consider her proposition as lying - rather than leaving an escape route, if such was needed any time in the future. "Can't make that decision for you," she shook her head. "And I don't know any, save for Moonspear and their offshoot right at the foot - Firefly glen. The former harbours older generation and the latter is full with young gals and chaps," she explained. "Though a person I recently met described her ideal pack the same way someone would describe their perfect partner," she was referring to the encounter with Keyni. "That's a way to look at it, but - in my humble opinion - makes pack searching way too hard. Having low expectations has helped me in most cases - far less disappointment."
They chatted for a while longer and then left on good terms.