Wolf RPG

@Mordecai

Cthulhu stumbled in a hungry stupor through a magnificent pine forest. A part of her was overwhelmed at the grandeur of the young conifers, but mostly she was lost to the world. She'd been alone too long and scrounged too long and come up empty too many times. Cthulhu almost permanently trembled, if not from cold then from starvation or anxiety... and she blinked in and out of reality.

She slumped against a tree with spindly legs aching, unaware that she'd begun to climb a slope. Neverwinter Forest's edge extended into an ancient ring of mountains, the new forest changed abruptly into one that was age old... yet Cthulhu pressed on without noticing the marked increase in webbish moss and fungi clinging to the trunks, nor the increase in size of trees. She scarcely noticed she was climbing higher, and she definitely didn't notice the smell of wolves growing stronger as she got higher up the short mountain.

He extended his range that day, wondering if there were those who chose to steer clear of the Spine because of its claim. While their numbers were slowly bolstering themselves, Mordecai knew it would be tricky to hold it all together. Leadership was an extra of which he had no expertise, and he sorely found himself wishing he had watched his family more carefully in the way they had carried themselves, the ways they had attempted to inspire and coax cooperation from even the unruliest of beings. It was not a perfect science however, and of this Mordecai was acutely aware of.

He meandered, almost leisurely, through the lower climes of the sloping terrain. The places where the forest became thick and wild, places that he felt he could leave himself to ponder and think. Even hold still, if he allowed it. But that day was not today, and something in the wild told him his thoughts were going to be disturbed. Minutes later they were, and he caught sight of what he could have only described as a sickly, skinny slyph on her travels. A part of him suggested that he steered clear of her, but instinct overrode that as he moved to intercept her; a single but crisp bark to gather her attention.

As Cthulhu looked up in response to the sharp sound of a voice, she found that her vision was blurry and her head felt full of something viscous. Her ears were ringing. These were surely signs that she was being possessed by some otherworldly being, a monster no doubt, though Caiaphas' claim that she was a godly demon did come to mind. She didn't have the capacity at the moment to think much of that, for she'd just noticed a larger male wolf, surely the one who'd caught her attention, and her faculties left her.

She crumpled on the ground, subservient. Mordecai could kill her in one fell swoop if he chose to. Cthulhu was almost too hungry and exhausted to care if he did, though there was a small part of her deep inside that fluttered fearfully at the notion of death. She didn't want to die—she didn't want her soul to be taken by monsters and tortured in the underworld. She didn't want to be stranded without an afterlife. Limbo was not for her... yet she was beginning to draw close to the brink of life. Even she knew it.

She opened her eyes slowly and stared up at Mordecai, but was unable to summon the strength to lift her head and ask him pitifully, as she had asked many before him, if he would spare her food.

She crumbled towards the ground not very long after spotting him. Mordecai moved in swiftly towards her, his steps calculated and driven by a curious concern. It was on closer inspection that he saw perhaps the state that she was truly in. Her svelte figure leaned more towards malnutrition, her eyes sunken and pleading with him. To say that the thought of putting her out of her own misery did not cross his mind was untrue; a more vicious beast within him considered it. Her disjointed path across the landscape had not been some ruse or disregard, it was merely a struggle to find something. In this case, as he grasped the concept of her most present desire, it was food.

“Can you walk any further?” He prompted gently, though he had his doubts she was willing to muster the strength. But he knew where food was surely found, and knew well enough that they could spare something. Though the Spine remained small compared to the summer, they had been fortunate in their hunts over the last few weeks. But he did not want to leave her lying there, not entirely. While the woods around them were familiar to him, Mordecai did not have a running tally of what lurked within them.

His swift approach made her heart hammer weakly in her chest. There was no question of his intent, she thought; he couldn't possibly intend to spare her with such confidence in his step. When he drew near, Cthulhu flinched and tried to curl tighter on herself. Oh, if only she could seek refuge in the earth, in a hole in the ground, and be safe from this merciful end...

But Mordecai didn't reach out his snout to slash at the side of her throat. He didn't crush her beneath his weight. Instead, he offered her pity, or something suspiciously like pity. Cthulhu was a weak creature who fell prey easily to pity, false or otherwise, and as he asked if she could stand, she latched hopefully on to his momentary care. "Cthulhu can try," she whispered into the floor. After a couple less-than-stellar attempts, she managed to gain her feet, though she shook terribly.

Her eyes went back to Mordecai then. She noticed only obvious things about him—he was bigger and healthier and could probably kill a deer by himself, while she was small, matted, and pathetic. Other details passed her by, either because she simply didn't notice or because she was unable to from where she stood.

Her speech reminded him of Sitri, though there were more than just obvious details that separated the two. She rose, slowly and shaky, and stood beside him as meekly and frail as a newborn deer. It may have been quite a sight for an outside viewer, but to him it only marked how eerie the balance between those in packs were fairing versus those without. Mordecai did not need to guess that she had no where to be, it was evident in many niches and nuances in her overall language.

With a gesture for her to follow, the tawny Ostrega moved to bring her closer to the Spine, and nearer to a cache he had left purposefully to ward off less curious parties. With any luck, it wouldn't have been disturbed, but if it had then they would simply have to go farther. “Is Cthulhu your name?” he opted to ask then, keeping his pace slow and steady for the fragile slyph.

Getting what he could out of her, the fledgling alpha offered her some aid, before letting her go on her way.