Wolf RPG

@Mordecai

A brisk, high wind whistled over the spires of the Spine, but its chill reach didn't extend into the bottom of the small valley. The pack was therefore nestled in a sort of dead zone—they were destined to collect heaps of snow, Sialuk predicted as she loped between trees, but would evade the cold wind in the dead of winter.

This was bittersweet, for the plentiful snow would remind Sialuk of the harsh north, but hunting would be a struggle for those not born of Arctic blood. It may even be tough for her, she thought, emerging on a stretch of open, spongy and marshy grassland widely bordering a lake. Temperatures would be higher than her norm, and Sialuk knew she couldn't count on the snow to form the compact sheets of ice she was accustomed to.

Her tailed bobbed horizontally behind her as Sialuk began making her way across the cold marsh in search of waterfowl or other semi-aquatic prey. Her lower legs were soon drenched in muddy water, but she showed no signs of being bothered by it. She'd had worse.

When it came to the thought of winter, Mordecai anticipated a harsh one. Though in reality, he had never been this far north. His parents had come from a slightly northern climate, had lived through a horrible, deadly winter or two, but he had been born of warmer climates. Truth be told, he knew in the middle of the winter he would definitely miss the warm, gritty grounds of Sedona. Not that they had never received snow of course, but the winters there were shorter in comparison to what he experienced now. It was a gradual sort of slide however, and though the days grew colder and colder by the hour, no snow had yet to fully reach the ground.

For that, he was thankful. There were still those last minute preparations that he wanted to do within the Spine, things that he wanted to prompt the wolves beneath him to work towards. They had been fortunate in their hunts, but the need to hunt still remained. So like Sialuk, he too was exploring the marshes for what he could scare up. Deer had come through at some point, their prints in the muddy terrain told him where to avoid unless he wanted to become the next victim of a mud pit. Not that Mordecai himself had avoided being sufficiently muddy — he was coated. There was just no getting around it. And currently, he found in just a few short steps why there had been a sudden scattering of tracks ahead of him that steered well out of the way of the marsh altogether.

It happened quickly in just a few short steps — one foreleg slid beneath the damp, cold terrain. The others were quick to follow, leaving the fledgling Spine alpha to tug angrily against the mud. The worst he tugged to move on, the worst it seemed to hold him. It was a slow going process there, only serving to get him more muddy as he tried to work his way out of one particular mud hole that would have rather kept him. He growled pitifully, oblivious the fact that he was about to be happened upon…

Sialuk's progress was hampered by the sudden change in the ground's consistency. The marsh started out with a fringe of watery grass, but it posed no danger of sticking until she got deeper. The wet edges began to morph into something more viscous, the colour more murky, and soon enough she was wading through more mud than water. Her legs, usually pristine white, soon sported a thick capsule of grey-brown sludge. The long fur at her stomach dragged in deeper spots so that within a matter of minutes, there were flecks of mud climbing her sides and her belly was dripping.

Sialuk forced herself to proceed, certain that smarter prey would take refuge in this inhospitable part of the territory... but she paused when she spied another wolf dead ahead, seemingly struggling more than she was. The going was slow, but Sialuk managed to get within viewing distance of the man, and recognized him as Mordecai, the Alpha Male of the pack.

What would have been funny to a superior wolf now became the terror of a subordinate one. Sialuk's job and desire was to protect those she ran with; she knew nothing of whether her and Mordecai would ever get along as friends, only that he was her superior and it was her duty to aid him. She sloshed through the mud, getting stuck herself for brief moments in spots, and when she was close enough to help, she paused. Sialuk wouldn't dare touch a superior without his express permission; it was law. Seeking permission, she extended her neck with a chuff and clipped her teeth together as though to silently convey her desire to grab his scruff.

Sialuk's figure emerged from the murky depths like an explosion of brightness. At first, being so caught up in freeing himself, Mordecai did not immediately realize what it was that he saw in his peripheral. It was only when he paused at her coming near in her own fashion that he realized who it was, and more importantly, what it was. Not an apparition from the gloom, not in the slightest. She was muddied, but not quite to the fashion that he was. Mordecai was far less dainty and careful in his steps, which was fair to say was the reason he found himself in the current mess.

She drew near as he continued to work at freeing a leg, finding a patch of ground less severe to traverse. Curiously, he grew his gaze around to her as she closed that distance, discovering that he tensed at her proximity to him. But it was fleeting, as he soon understood what it was that she intended to do. Thinking that perhaps the leverage would help, he turned himself slightly, adjusting his own center of weight in a way that she would be able to grasp his scruff. He did not fear her gripping him tightly, or consider that she could have easily pushed him down further into the muck. In a way, he hoped his extension of trust towards her would prompt her to make the right decisions herself.

She hung just out of reach, lest the trapped beast whirled to strike her for approaching. Mordecai did turn, but it wasn't to dole out punishment. Rather, he presented his scruff to her, and without hesitation Sialuk reached out and bunched the thick, loose skin into the glove of her snout.

It was an awkward process. She wished only to aid him in freeing himself, but to do so she had to get closer, much closer than either of them probably would have liked. She set her feet carefully, though they sunk in the mud anyway; it wouldn't do for both of them to be trapped here. With a muffled grunt, the Arctic female pulled up on his his nape, using all the muscles in her neck and shoulders to hopefully give him a needed boost.

She was tense, which in turn made him want to tense up. But to do so would have impeded the aid she was extending to him, and Mordecai tried to hold it at bay. Her grasp was well-placed and gentle, at first. Faint prickles of discomfort turned up in his scruff at first, but it was an efficient motivator. Sialuk's pulling was doing the trick; the leverage was enough for him to free his forelegs, which Mordecai promptly used to pull himself away from the muddy grasp. In this process, he gave Sialuk the opportunity to get out of the muck herself.

For a moment however, the mud did not want to willingly let go of one hind leg — a distinct sound of suction followed his eventual, if not forceful removal from its pull. He stumbled, almost pulling himself back in the original predicament again. One misguided adventure was enough for him, and Mordecai set to hastily finding more solid ground. But not without ensuring that his subordinate was not stuck herself; he lingered, finding her muddy frame with a cheeky forming smile.

Mordecai's body hitched and she almost lost her grip, but Sialuk clung on until the Alpha male freed his legs. He seemed to stumble forward with an awful sucking noise as the mud finally relinquished him. Sialuk felt herself tugged along and promptly let go of his scruff, dancing on her paws until she reached safer ground.

When she looked up again, Mordecai was smiling at her. She let her eyes fall respectfully but couldn't help her own lips from splitting into a grin. She was much muddier than when she began, but Sialuk didn't mind in the slightest. It was easy enough to clean off, and if it dried it would come off in flakes anyway.

"I'm rethinking my decision to hunt here," she breathlessly admitted as she lifted one foreleg and shook a particularly heavy clump of muck off it.

Once they were both up on more solid ground, he caught Sialuk's words and chuckled. While he supposed their marshland might have had interesting opportunities to hunt, it may not have been the best place at all. He tried to shake look some of the mud that clung to him, but was only half-successful at the attempt. It was there to stay, at least for a little while. What did come loose made him thankful he had a little bit of a gap between himself and her, as it went where it pleased.

“I think the only hunting done in that part is the mud trying to catch us,” he said, finding his smile again with a quirk. “I can't remember the last time I was this muddy, honestly. What were you hoping to catch?” It warmed him a bit to know that she seemed to be integrating well enough into their fold. Hunting, whether it was for herself or for their caches, seemed positive to the fledgling alpha.

A fleck of mud flew off Mordecai's leg as he shook it and stuck itself to Sialuk's fur instead. She watched it with an amused smirk, only looking back at the Alpha male when he began to speak. As she took in his words and tried to think about what she'd really been looking for, it occurred to her that this sort of interaction was new. Where Sialuk came from, the Alpha gave orders to the Betas, who gave orders to the pack. Rarely did the Alphas directly interact with their subordinates. As a consequence, Mordecai seemed nothing like the Alphas she was used to. He was... open and kind.

"Muskrat or beaver, maybe," she said with a wry grin, "perhaps a rare otter. Let me guess: all that lives here is toads." Had it been summer, the pair might have found a regal heron hidden in the rushes, but there was nothing now. Otters would be nearer the lake, muskrats wouldn't take chances in the thick, trapping mud, and beavers were much more partial to lakes than wetlands... of coursd, Sialuk knew little of their habits. They were exceptionally rare where she was from.

“And turtles, don't forget those,” he added on, chuckling at her reply. “But I can't say I've seen any beavers around here. Muskrats were a bit more common when the weather was warmer but we might have thinned our their ranks. Otters you might find in larger streams around here.” Truth be told, he hadn't done much in the way of hunting for those at all, but he didn't say anything about that. Any more, about the only thing he had been primarily concerned over were the population of the ungulates that may their way through and around the Spine. For a moment, Mordecai wondered if he should have been keeping better track of their smaller prey.

Pacing in a bit closer to Sialuk, he gave the lands around them a good survey. “If you're still up for hunting, we could see what might be out here. Just as long as it doesn't involve any more muddy traps.” His offering came with a friendly wave of his tail, hoping that their venture so far hadn't entirely deterred her from what she had set out to do. Whatever they could place into their caches at this point would only further reduce the strain that would come once the snow hit… or so he liked to think.

Sialuk's expression was puzzled as she looked to Mordecai, pinning one word out of all he said and finding it foreign. "What are turtles?" she asked, genuinely unsure if she'd ever seen such a creature. Muskrats, otters, and beavers were familiar to the Alaskan bitch because they too resided in Alaska's warmer regions, but turtles were unheard of.

She was so enthralled with this new type of animal, so eager to hear of them, that she only nodded dumbly when Mordecai suggested they continue hunting in the bog. Had she been more mindful, or more worried about getting stuck, she might have suggested another location, but she would have hunted anywhere if it meant Mordecai would tell her about turtles.

Her curiosity of turtles surprised him; a fact that he couldn't have tried to hide if he didn't want to. It really added history to the northerner, especially in an unexpected way. “You don't have turtles where you're from?” he asked, canting his head before giving it a dismissive shake. “Turtles are these… little things. Creatures, anyway. Some of them can be as big as your head or as small as your foot. I've even heard there's some that are seriously huge too,” he paused briefly, searching for the descriptors he wanted. “They have these hard little backs — shells. I've never ate one but they're fun to bat around if they're small enough.” With that, he gave her a cheeky grin; Mordecai had certainly had his fun of overturning turtles a time or two.

“Actually, they're kind of ugly too. We should try and find one.” While hunting would have been a bit more constructive, Mordecai couldn't pass up the opportunity to show her something new. Then again, it was also the thought of finding one to roll around and use more as a helpless toy that appealled to him as well. Play was something he had sorely lacked in since his coming to the Spine; the temptation was almost overwhelming.

Mordecai described a shell and a varying body size and as Sialuk tried to reconstruct the turtle in her mind, she returned several times to thoughts of a crab. It sounded quite similar—it had a hard back, could be small or enormous, was fun to play with—but it must be different. It had a different name. Surely if it had a different name then its essence, its anirniit, must be fundamentally different. That was how things were where Sialuk came from, so she assumed it was universal.

"Can you eat it?" asked Sialuk, taken with his sudden idea of finding a turtle. Sialuk's primary plan coming out here was to hunt, but if turtles were as edible as crabs, then they'd be working and playing simultaneously. "We could cache it if we find one," she suggested slyly, assuming they weren't poisonous, "no one has to know if we shake it up a bit in the process."

His tail began to wag absently as they stirred up ideas of capturing an elusive turtle. They weren't easy things to hunt by any means, but Mordecai felt two heads would certainly be better than one when it came to capturing them. “I don't see why not,” he said to her question, thinking it over. “I've never tried to eat one because they're smart little things too. They can pull their heads and legs inside their shell… and that's when they become fun to roll around.” They even made interesting plunk sounds when dropped off of things, he thought, and felt a certain renewal towards the prospect of everything.

“Hey, if we catch a whole bunch of them, we could make a cache of nothing but turtle,” he said, as though struck by a flash of inspiration. “Think about it, we could carry them and bury them at the border, still in their shells. Could you imagine the look on someone's face if they tried to steal it?” He snorted at the mental picture, though perhaps not entirely understanding if that was what she had meant by shaking up the process when caching it.

The distinction from crabs was becoming clearer and clearer to Sialuk. She had never seen a crab pull its legs into itself and roll around, and so she imagined a rather round crab with a larger carapace. It seemed such an illogical creature that for a moment, she questioned whether Mordecai wasn't making this up... but she had to trust in her Alpha. She believed he was a good man, and good men didn't make up ridiculous, nonexistent creatures to fool their subordinates.

Though she scarcely understood the hilarity of the image that Mordecai presented, she chuckled nonetheless and said, "surely it would change the way everyone views this place." Further excited with the idea of finding a turtle, she bounded a few steps ahead, careful not to let herself get stuck, and then glanced expectantly back at Mordecai, who would surely spearhead the great turtle hunt.

Finding a turtle was never the easiest task, and whether or not the pair would be successful was anyone's guess. If nothing else, he simply enjoyed the chance to bond with the potential shaman, who he hoped was more of a healer than anything. Now if they managed to find a crab lurking about within the Spine, that would have really been something. With a quirky smile to accentuate how he felt in regards to her statement, Mordecai chose then to lead them onward. "Let's see what we can find," he suggested, not adding that he hoped they'd stay out of the muck for the rest of their time together.