@Ike

After a brief stop at the Sleeping dragon, where Dwin had spent two days sleeping and recharging her batteries, she felt good enough to continue her journey. There was a choice to continue in either of four directions. North was out, because the girl never took the same path twice, if she could avoid it. East welcomed with a line of thick forest and there was a river to cross on the West. Therefore it left South with open fields and surprisingly thin blanket of snow. For a while there she ran as fast as she could, until like all not experienced long-distance runners she was out of steam and was forced to choose a slower pace. 

The strong wind soon became an other issue - it was difficult to move forward, when the masses of air pushed you in the opposite direction, not to mention that it wasn't easy to keep your eyes open to see, where exactly were you going. Therefore, once she spotted the first clump of forest ahead of her, she turned eastwards to have at least some sort of cover. Another river-crossing - this time safer than the previous one - and she was finally in an area, where the rogue element was reined. Not eager to spend another night in an open field, she sought out shelter in a small forest.

She did caught smell of a pack nearby - there were trails leading in every direction in the vicinity, but for now she was too tired to make an acquaintaince with the settlement. Dwin would do that tomorrow. Today she settled down to groom herself first and than catch up on sleep. She crawled in and made herself comfortable and nearly invisible under a thick bush. There she curled up in a ball and fell asleep.

If during her first stints out in the wilderness Dwin had stuck to all the important rules of survival, then the longer she spent time outside, the hungier and more tired she was, the less she cared about all of the possible risk factors that may lead to an untimely termination of her life. What will be, will be - she told to herself and up until now the fate had been graceful and the fortune had smiled on her. 

This, however, did not mean that she did not feel a sense of alarm and embarrassment, when she happened to wake up and realize that she was not quite on her own there. Dwin sensed that she was being watched first and only then did she open her eyes to stare back at the pale wolf. For now she did not move or say anything, assessing the situation and giving the other chance to make the first go.

Ike - that was the man's name - did not appear to be dangerous, therefore Dwin made the decision to cautiously unroll and slide out of her hiding place, stretching her stiff limbs and spine in the process. Though she was very hungry, she did not oblige on the offer to take the food right away. Mom had taught not only to not follow strangers to strange places, but also be careful, when accepting food gifts from people she did not know. There were wild legends about people being fed cursed stuff and being turned into various beings. Not of their choice - let's be clear of that.

"Nice to meet you, Ike of Kvarsheim," she dipped her muzzle politley. "I am Dwin from Bercheliant. That's not near here," perhaps, it was not wise to tell that she was all on her own and far away from home, but still. "Food does not come for free. What do you want in exchange?" she asked, testing the waters for any possible vile tricks.

Depending on the day Dwin could be either super-social and think less about the potential dangers that could ensue by engaging with unknown people or she could feel that she would not be able to trust anyone. Today - while still in need of good hours of sleep and therefore a little grumpy too (within acceptabel levels) - she listened to Ike's offer with a grain of suspicion. Nevertheless, she pulled the gift to her, deciding to cross-examine it for poisons and drugs at a later time and when far away from here. 

"What happened - why did she get lost?" Dwin decided to keep the conversation focussed on the loss of the man's sister. 

Dwin had considered once about sneaking away from Brecheliant in the darkness of the night and then reappear just as mysteriously, but, while listening to Ike's story, she felt relieved that she had told about her plans. For whatever reason then it had seemed thrilling, now she realized that going away without a word would have caused great pain to all of them. "Not knowing is very bad, I guess," she said in a sympathetic voice. "She sounds like she was a very good sister. I believe that she still is too and that all is well. But - did you go looking for her? Did you ask around?" 

Dwin was about to suggest that Ike's sister could have gone to a different dimension, but this kind of explanation sufficed for a hypothetical situation and not a real one, where people involved were hurt. She did not know, what to say after that and this was a very rare situation for her to be in. Eventually she decided to inquire about simpler things. Such as: "What is Kvarsheim like?"

"There is another language besides the common tongue?" that was news to Dwin, who had not travelled much beyond Brecheliant before setting out on her first big journey of her life. There had also been little exposure to wolves that did not belong to her immediate family circle. "Is it similar to the one we are talking in now or it is entirely different and hard to understand? What is your favourite word in that Kvarsheim language?" she asked.

Though Ike claimed that he knew very little of the foreign tongue, Dwin thought that it was quite a lot. -Hallo- and -Eeeekoorna-  and -Kaneena- and -Dadeer- she repeated each new word under her breath, while listening attentively to, what her companion was telling her. The last sentence was too complicated for her to repeat and she sighed. "Well, how much words do you need to live anyway?" she suggested playfully. "Saying - Hunt! - is way more straightforward and concise than me wrapping this in more layers of politeness and emotions." 

"Could you share more? Single words, please," she asked, fully immersed in the subject of learning a new language. 

Dwin listened carefully to Ike revealing her the basic vocabulary of the tongue spoken in Kvarsheim and knew right away that she would not remember most of the words, if any at all. It was a pity that there was no way of having a wolf-equivalent of writing things down to return to them later. In that case she would read and learn the words by heart gladly. The thought of joining Ike's pack for the sole purpose of learning to speak a different language did not occur to her. Besides she had left Brecheliant to be free of any obligations and responsibilities. 

"What is Iceland?" she asked, when the man mentioned "Icelandic" as the origin of the language. 

"Ah, oh well..." Dwin sighed, feeling a little disappointed. "Life wouldn't be as interesting, if we knew answers to all of the questions, would it?" she suggested and yawned. "So, I assume that before Kvarsheim you lived somewhere else? Wait... or born somewhere else? Did your family speak a different language as well?" she asked, because she had got an impression that Ike was a well-integrated non-native. Maybe he had been a simple "John" in his previous life and he had received a new name, when he had joined the current pack. 

"So Hebrew is another language?" Dwin asked in a surprised voice. It had been a discovery that the common tongue was not the only one spoken here. There was not only one more. But two! "Soooo... you come from a Hebrewland?" 'cause in her mind the name of the language was tied to the land of origin. So - if icelandic came from Iceland, then she had to be absolutely correct on her assumption too. "Is your dad kind of a king of Hebrewland? Are there more of you there?"

Ike was a goldmine of information. Or a geyser. He erupted new tidbits of stuff Dwin had absolutely no idea of every time it was his turn to speak. Iceland. Hebrew. And now dogs. "What are dogs? Kind of serfs or slaves?" she had heard about packs, who practiced this kind of thing, but it had always seemed to her as an ancient and barbaric pracitce that no longer was done. Perhaps, she was wrong. 

"Or are they kind of an alien? Does this mean that you are one part alien? What does it feel like?" she shot next three questions like a machine gun. 

Dwin regarded Ike with exactly the same expression one would, if their companion revealed that they played bingo with aliens on Saturday evenings, not to mention movie nights and barbecuing beasts from another planet. She had no reason not to believe him, but he was giving her so much facts of stuff she was not familiar to and had no references to turn to that she began to doubt him a bit. Talking nonesense in a smart way required skill and craft. Doing it with a straight and earnest face was even more of a feat. 

She hesitated to challenge him on the subject though. Because - as she had told Reverie, sometimes a colourful lie was better than boring, grayscale truth. Besides - lies were bad only, when they harmed people, but she did not see, how Iceland, Hebrewland, dogs, huskies, percents and whatnot could cause any trouble. So - she decided to play along. "What are percents? And those number thingies you mentioned. Are they kind of ranks?" she asked one question this time.