AW!
The Private wandered from her home in the Strath today.
She was well familiarized with the ins and outs of her mother's kingdom by now, and grew bored every now and then of patrolling just the Strath and the Sweep.
Sovereign walked through the Hinterlands with confidence, feeling large and in charge, especially with her promotion into the adult ranks of the Saints.
She felt like she could take on anything, any challenge.
Added with the childlike desire to meet new friends, hope and ambition was weaved into the confident strides of the youth, who had yet to fully learn how to discipline and hide her emotions like her mom could.
Two years of a loner’s life have left her frailer than she would like to be. Occasionally, when the opportunity arose, she had been able to shelter with a pack in exchange for medical care for one of their wolves, but other than that, she has been on her own. She is thinner now but not yet to a dangerous degree. Natshana has come back to her cousin’s prior home with the intentions to settle at long last, which should see her in better condition in the coming months.
At present, however, she is merely gathering herbs. Her head is low, buried in a rather acrid scent when something stark-white catches her eye. Natshana lifts her head, spotting a wolf not yet to her first year. She sets down the herbs she had been holding, curious to see a child without her ward.
”Are you lost, dear one?”
Are you lost dear one?
Sovereign perked her ears and looked at the larger woman.
She hoped one day she would grow up to be as tall..or as tall as her mother...yeah, like her mother!
The girl was silent for a moment before she answered confidently with a big grin
"Nope! Not lost!"
Sov hadn't encountered an adult stranger before, but the woman didn't seem to be a threat...
but in all fairness, Sovereign was not yet fully trained like her mom or her dad. She couldn't always tell just yet if someone was dangerous or not.
"Ah," Natshana regards the young wolf with somewhat veiled curiosity. There is comfort in the assumption that, if nothing else, she appears to know where she is going. Still, it is odd to find a pup this far from any guardians.
"Do you have no caretakers with you?" she asks with an upward incline of her brow. "There are many dangers out here for all of us but especially for those not even at their first year." There are no threats in her words, simply honesty. While Natshana has no plans to harm this child, there are many who would see her lack of supervision as an opportunity.
"I'll be okay." Sovereign answered with happy confidence and a wave of her tail.
She knew in her heart that her mother or her dad were probably following, watching hidden in the terrain.
The youth didn't wish to potentially out their presence, if that was the case.
She was not yet as serious as her parents were either, instead still innocent to death and killing, which ran in her blood.
Therefore her innocence was bound to be tainted, sooner or later.
"I suppose you will," she seems amused more than anything else. "What are you called?" Natshana goes on to ask, interested in knowing if the pup's name matches her boldness. Then, after a moment's pause, she decides that she may at least try to make use of the precocious stranger's time while she's here. "Have your guardians taught you anything of herbs or poisons?" she queries shortly thereafter, prior to nudging her recently collected bit of herbs in front of her with one sweep of a paw.
The child frowned ever slightly at the amusement of the adult.
Why was it so hard to believe?!
But the youth wouldn't say anything about that, instead offering her name when the older wolf asked.
"Sovereign. That's my name." And she was hellbound to live up to it, like a true warrior, like her mother.
Sovereign came a few yards closer to the woman, sniffing at the flora that was presented. Loking up at Natshana, she shook her head.
"I was offered to be taught how to heal wounds by one of my pack's healers, but I don't know anything about herbs and poisons." She answered.
After all, her young mind only saw the goal, and not all the smaller steps it would take to get there.
She had yet to understand fully that she would have to learn much and train often to get to where her mom was.