In many ways Dwin was still very much a kid. When she got excited about something, she could forget that she had to eat. Or flatly refusing the idea that she was tired and needed to sleep, when - in fact - she was absolutely exhausted and barely dragging her feet. There had been a period in her childhood, when she had been simply unstoppable - 45 minute naps interspersed between peaks of activity. Or not looking truth in the eyes even if it was glaringly obvious. Or telling that she was definitely not cold, even if her lips were turning blue and she was trembling.

Two or three days she had spent on the coast, walking along the shores and exploring. The large mass of water still captivated her every time she set her eyes on it. Sand was another discovery - sure she had seen such along the lakes near her home, but not in such quantities. It was soft to walk on, it was easy to dig and it was so so pleasant to the touch. Now too she lied sprawled out in the pit she had created for herself to protect her from the winds with her eyes set on that thin line, where the water met the sky. All this poetry of life, while her stomach grumbled for food it had not seen in a long time.

Dwin was not entirely blind to her surroundings. When out in the wilds and in danger of becoming someone else's meal, your senses grow more acute to sensing a malicious intent from afar. Even if that intent has only one molecule of evil and thousand of curiousity and cautiousness. She turned her head slightly to catch a dark figure approaching her and, attempting to make as little sound as possible she shuffled so that she was facing the stranger. 

A pair of ears and a watchful green eyes peered above the edge of the sandpit and she locked her gaze onto the man, who was coming nearer. Once within the earshot, she cleared her throat and said loud enough for him to hear: "If you intend to have me for dinner, I have to warn you that: A.There is not much to have. B.You will disintegrate from inside. Choose wisely!"

Dwin was a tomboy by nature and she was immune to being called names, yet being compared to a dead seal did poke at her ego. Once the guy sat down, she pulled herself up so that they were eye to eye. Good thing that the distance between them made them look almost equal in size and she decided to ignore anything else that would contradict it. 

"Worse. Lava," she corrected him with a mischievous grin. "So you will burn. But first all your insides will be clogged by fur," she added. And then you will burn. "May I know the name of the last person I see before I end up your meal?" she asked.

The guy was not a bore and something in the manner he indulged in the game reminded her of Jay. Another thing, when you are out in the wilds or tough and independent is that exchanges with yourself are not half as funny as, when you have a living person opposite of you. 

She was about to reply with something along the lines of "didn't your mom teach you not to play with your food", when she realized that "talking to your food first" was not exactly playing. All things considered it was an entirely new approach to meals and she herself did not know, what to make of it. 

"Dwin!" she did not give her full name, because - while likeable - he was still a stranger, who may or may not eat her. "My grandpa's name was Elwood. Was he your grandpa too?" she asked, because it was a custom of some people (her dad included) to name their children after noteable ancestors. Her second name "Owl" was in honor of her great-grandmother March Owl. Though Jay used to say that it was because Dwin's eyes were big and round and outsized her brains.

"You are not rude to your food, but you are impolite to girls. First you call me a dead seal, now - a gnome," Dwin pretended to take offence, but that stern facade soon crumbled and she smiled. To be honest, she preferred a witty banter over boring, but proper conversation any time. 

"Oh, but why? Elwood is such a good name. I did not meet my grandpa personally, but I heard he was totally awesome," she explained, but it did occur to her that she knew far less about, who her grandfather was, than about Finley, of whose adventures and extraordinary life she had never grown tired listening to. 

"There was also an older brother - Elwood Junior, but he disappeared a long, long time ago," dad had not told much about him and sensing that there was enormous amount of sadness connected to this, Dwin had not pressed forward. 

"Have you had anyone disappear without a trace? Ain't that awful?" she went on, her mind generating questions. She was about to ask more, but - perhaps - this too was a heavy topic for a first meeting. She did not entirely understand the concept of, what were the boundaries of first meetings. 

"Where are you from?" she went for a simpler topic. 

"Here I thought that you were something a bear had chewed on and passed through," Dwin was never the one to turn down an opportunity to trade insults. She was more careful with her fellow female compatriots, but guys - in her opinion - had to have thick skin. If they could not take ragging, then they were not real men in the first place. If "m'lady" was supposed to leave an impression on her, that was a completely wrong chose. Had he called her "Warlord Swanson" (another random pair of words, no need to Google them for deeper meaning), she would even have felt flattered. 

"Sapphique? That's an unusual name for a pack," this observation was more for the sake of small-talk, because the only other pack she knew was Brecheliant and, unless you knew the meaning and the story, it made just as little sense as this one. "What does your home boast with? Mine has a dragon daycare and a forest full of ghosts," she asked, completely forgetting to reply to his inquiry of her where-do-I-come-from?

Val did not take offence, but played the ball right back at her. On the third go he had earned Dwin's respect as a worthy opponent. "Lunch - no, in fact, I am out here to find them the best gourmet treats," she replied. "But I doubt that bear-lunch rejects are something these royal beasts would ever seriously consider. But they might consider that bear of yours. Any chance?" she tilted her head to the side and grinned. 

"Evil ghosts? Well-played, but have you met aliens?" she jumped to the next topic. "I have met exactly three on my way here," she thought of the three wolf-like figures she had encounterd. The stick-insect Skeletor, who she hoped had taken her advice to heart and was alive and well. The dappled-bear-like beast at the Hot Springs. And the odd snow-pile/matted fur dog. 

"Well, I am not going to look for it either, but I will tell one of the mama dragons to scout and do the work!" Dwin replied, just in case Val decided to dare her to find that bear and bring it back to the hungry dragon babies. Because if he did... well, self-proclaimed Warlord Swanson would have to defend her honor and do the job. Good thing this guy did not know the Blackthorn code of honor (basically, do reckless things first and think later).

"Yeah, you have not met a single alien," she agreed, though all of a sudden she had an urge to pad over to the water edge and check her reflection. Odd things could happen to you while sleeping. Like that princess Aurora, who had fallen asleep for 100 years to wake up as a frog. Or something like this. "Oh - are you a man outside and inside?" she asked, recalling an encounter that had taken place few days ago. She was a good soul and had been asked to help. Here was an opportunity to do so. 

Though the encounter with Rykor and the ensuing wealth of information received had left Dwin shaken afterwards, she had eventually recovered. Her mind dealt with the new facts in its own way - cherry-picking, what she thought had been important, forgetting the rest and interpreting the whole so that they fit the young Blackthorn's narrative on, how life was organized and it worked. 

"Well... a few days ago I met this girl or a boy..." here she fell silent, in a rare moment of being unable to quite articulate the encounter, because it had been extraordinary for a lack of a better word. "And she had this most wonderful scent about her - the feeling is like cannon-balling in the water, but somehow ending up belly-flopping on the surface of it. You know - the hit that takes your breath away, affects your whole body and is painful after. And then you sink - kind of like that," she rambled on.

"So - she was looking for a male, told me to send one her way, if I know such," she went on, raking for the details in her head. "And I understand that apparently you cannot go looking for kids in parsley beds on your own - there have to be two. Or something like that," she had almost reached the end of the story and felt relief. "Anyway - she asked for help and I thought - maybe you can? Name's Rykor - know her?" a sigh of relief.

It was evident that Dwin was both, naive, uninformed, had no filter or idea, what she was talking about, and that it had taken a lot of effort to narrate in a way person might understand. It was also very obvious that she did not feel entirely at ease discussing this topic. 

"Oh, well," Dwin shrugged and added a little green checkmark in the box "At least I tried". She was glad that Val did not ask to elaborate on the subject or point, where that damsel in distress was located. Because - come to think of it - what use of her help was, if she could not even remember, where she had met Rykor or where she had (if she had) intended to go. Probably looking for males was not an easy task.

"Brecheliant - a-a-a-a-a-a-all the way there. I would invite you to visit, but with me not being there and my family not knowing you by anything, you are in a very great danger of becoming a snack to the dragons," she shared waving one of her forepaws in the very approximate direction of, where she thought her home was. Suddenly she burst out laughing, because she just imagined her poor, old, peace-loving dad dragging Val by his tail to the lair. Gruesome fantasy, but these two incompatible things - Eljay and being evil - felt hilarious. 

The next question made Dwin pause, think and then ask: "The boring truth or the colorful improved version?" Though - what was the point of asking, even the boring truth would be in all shades of rainbow. 

"It doesn't work like that - it is either one or the other. Both do not mix well," Dwin countered for the sake of argument, not that it really mattered. "Well, I am on my way of becoming the best explorer in the world," she said. "And to do that, you cannot simply sit at home and hope that life will happen to you - though plenty of life happened there as well. But - you know - different stuff," she pursed her lips and furrowed her brow, searching for the best explanation.

"Why and where do not matter really - the path does. That's, what my mom says," she told, not realizing that, if Val turned out to be a murderer on the prowl she had just told that she was on her own and no one knew, where she was. "And you do not always know, what you will find on the way. I discovered three aliens, a wolf, whose pack leader is a literal Lord of the Undead Underworld, that girl I told you earlier about - you sure, you do not want to help? How hard that can be? - oh, and this," she waved to the ocean behind her.

"I did not know this kind of thing existed and it is positively marvelous. I have to admit, though, that I like sand better," she shuffled her feet in the sand and smiled. "Just think, what else is there out in the world, just waiting to be discovered!"

"Sorry, no, but I will tell the next alien, who I meet, to go see you. If they express a wish to meet a man - both inside and outside," Dwin promised solemnly. "Even if you are not exactly they want to meet - you can always make stuff up. Improve it, don't you think? I can certainly tell that..." she looked him up and dow, brow furrowed, scrutinizing every detail. "You looke like a black demon beast from Hell. That's as good premise as any. But - if you give more details, I can make more stuff up," again she was not poking fun at him. It was an honest offer with the very best intentions. 

"The Ocean. This is a good name. Fits way better than this big vast water thingie," Dwin looked over her shoulder at the place that had its own name. She missed the part of seeing the ocean at the night and therefore, when she turned back to face him again, she was on to an entirely different topic. "What do you think, Val," she began, her green gaze meeting his again. "Are there a lot of things in the world that do not have their names yet?" 

"Unlikely creatures make unlikely pairs. Why do you think it has to be pairs? Why not threes, fours and fives?" Dwin's mind at this point was like a mountain goat. It hopped from topic to topic, never staying in place for too long in fear of falling down. "Wouldn't it be fun to have two mums and three dads. Or even better mods and dams?" she looked up, picturing this kind of scenario. Well, she had grown up with more than just two adults in charge of her, but they had been called aunts and uncles regardless of their relation to the children. "Which one you would prefer better - a two or mores?" she asked with an absolute ease of a person, who has no tact and filters. "I think that having a reserve is good. Just in case."

However hard was it for Dwin to listen to the end, what others had to say, Val managed to catch her full attention with his view on the origin of names. It was just as a fascinating thought - the thousand names - as, when you tried to think outside the boundaries of planet Earth, Solar System, Milky way and then realize that you are a speck of dust subjected to chance. "You are good story-teller, you know?" she praised him, smiling sincerely.