Red was once again in the forest — her forest. Well… that was what she thought of it. It was her forest. She was the one going back at least once a week to discover more and more about it. She had caught fish in its lake and watched birds in the boughs of its aspen trees. She had even created a temporary den in one of its hills, in case she decided to stay overnight. And she still didn’t have a name for the place. Sighing, she lay down beside the lake, trying to come up with something. When inspiration refused to strike for the hundredth time, she got up and decided to go for a swim. It wasn’t all that hot today, and clouds came through every now and then and blocked out the sun. But the water looked so nice and inviting that she couldn’t refuse. She waded with joy into the clear lake water, smiling as a slight, but pleasant, chill went up her legs.

She swam out to the middle of the lake, and then sort of paddled around aimlessly for a while, lapping up water if she got thirsty, since it was right there anyways. But after some time, she grew bored and went back to the shore to lie down and dry off. That was when she realized she was quite lonely out here all by herself. She had never had much company out here, since no one really knew about this forest. She wondered what it would be like to have a pack here. It was certainly big enough, and she’d had no trouble hunting. There were at least two or three herds of deer who called this place home, and plenty of smaller critters, as well. And it was protected all along its southern side by a giant mountain.

The closest pack to it that she knew of was Swiftcurrent Creek, but they’d have to travel a hell of a long way just to heckle whatever pack ended up calling this place home. What was she saying? She wasn’t… planning on leaving the Sunspire, was she? No, that was ridiculous. Ferdie and Jace and Summer and all the rest of them needed her. With her gone, there would be one less Warden to protect the borders, one less Gamekeeper to keep them fed, one less Outrider to bring them news. She couldn’t up and leave. Besides, who would go with her and be Alpha? Red certainly couldn’t become Alpha. No way! She was a submissive wolf, not a dominant one! With a shake of her head, she dropped her head to her paws and decided to take a nap, figuring maybe these crazy thoughts had something to do with her being tired…

Red’s nap was immediately interrupted by the unmistakeable sound of a wolf’s chuff of greeting. She scrambled quickly to her paws, half afraid of what was to come and half welcoming of the imposing male before her. And yet, before she really even had a chance to be afraid, she was lost. Lost in this wolf’s face, with his serious expressions and deep green eyes and the scar that ran along the side of his right eye and traveled down into his neck. She found herself tracing it with her eyes without moving her head, and then suddenly realized what she was doing and shook herself. It was quite rude — and oftentimes dangerous — to stare, and that is exactly what she was doing. Quickly, she averted her gaze away from this wolf who so completely intrigued her, flattening her ears against her head in embarrassment and fear.

This male held a noble air. He was both frightening and awe-inspiring, and his gaze seemed indifferent to the world. He felt like an Alpha, so she did the only thing that felt natural. She lay down at his feet and stared up at him with big eyes, wondering what in the world he was doing there, greeting someone as low on the totem pole as she. The forest and its many wonders were temporarily forgotten while she lost herself in this male. Her need to submit was strong and she could not resist her natural instinct. If Ferdie, or even Jace had been there with her, this need would not be as strong. In fact, it would probably be entirely absent. But as long as neither of those two wolves were here at this present moment, then the male directly in front of her was entirely in charge.

And she liked it that way.

Red watched in unrepressed awe as Kieran shook his giant head at her. To be completely honest, most of what he said meant absolutely nothing to her, as his brogue was nigh indistinguishable from gibberish to her untrained ears. However, she did catch the last part, “… are Kieran O’Malley, who ye?”

The coywolf pieced together these two bits of information slowly, as she was mainly preoccupied with continuing to stare up at the massive, muscular, handsome wolf in front of her. When the words sank in, it finally clicked: His name was Kieran O’Malley, and he wanted to know who she was. Timidly, she whined out the name Red, sticking to her body language to communicate. It was often hard enough trying to speak around wolves who didn’t make her heart go aflutter, but around this male in particular, suddenly her tongue felt heavy as lead in her mouth.

Not understanding his previous words, she was unaware that he wished she would stand, and so continued to lay at his feet. Though, she suddenly felt too nervous to look up into his face, especially since doing so to a dominant wolf was often a sign of challenge, and might get her in trouble if this imposing male decided to turn on her. She was suddenly wary, wondering what he wanted with her. She began to awkwardly scoot back away from him, realizing that if he decided to attack her, she would be too small to truly fight him, and her best bet would be to get a head start in running away.

She sat up a little, but kept her body close to the ground — half in fear and nervousness, and half in deference. Regardless of his intentions, he was still far above her on the chain of command than she was, which she knew by instinct. Bigger and stronger usually trumped smaller and weaker. This was the natural order of the world.

Still… perhaps he was friendly. One could always hope. With a questioning tilt of the head, she made a whining sound, which meant, “What do you want with me?”

Red watched cautiously as he sat and seemed to relax a little. He spoke more gibberish to her. She caught the words “sorry” and “scare” and that helped her calm down. So he wasn’t going to harm her, then. She supposed she would have to take him on word alone, which she didn’t mind doing. She’d done it before. Besides, now that he was sitting, he seemed much less frightening, though his eyes were still serious and his scar was still obvious. Hidden in the green depths of his eyes lay some hidden tragedy. He seemed to carry a burden inside, though she couldn’t guess at what might have happened. Perhaps the tragedy and the scar were tied? She would never know because she would never ask such a thing. Let alone the fact that she hated talking. It was just rude to ask about something so personal right after you met someone.

Red had pretty much no idea what Kieran said the next time he spoke, but he seemed to stare at her expectantly afterwards, and she pulled her ears back awkwardly, trying to interpret his words. After a few moments in which she struggled with her brain, she shook her head and gave up. Deciding that she didn’t care if he was talking about something totally different, she gestured with her head out into the forest, and then looked back at him. She trotted past him, and then looked at him over her shoulder, barking lightly: “Wanna come explore?”

Having already showed Kieran the lake, which was the forest’s major attraction that Red knew of, she was sort of just meandering around at this point, sniffing at the trees and bushes, and watching prey animals scurrying around. Mostly, though, she was wondering about the male who followed behind her. What was his story, and how had he wandered all the way to the forest, and just happened to bump into her? It seemed strange, the way the world worked. Whatever gods or goddesses might be up there watching over the world worked in mysterious ways, or so the saying went.

For lack of anything to do, Red promptly sat down and smiled at Kieran, hoping he would suggest something. If not, she figured it was probably time to be heading back to the Sunspire. Despite never wanting to leave this forest, she knew she had to. She still had a duty to Ferdie and her other packmates. Thinking on this, she cocked her head to the side, waiting to see if the Irishman would have anything to say.