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+--- Thread: Northstar Vale after many miles (/showthread.php?tid=66338)
after many miles - Easy - September 21, 2025
Her tongue lolled after the climb; it was less pleasantly exhausting than it used to be and more just regular exhausting, as many things were getting to be. Old age hadn't claimed her yet, but she could certainly feel it creeping up.
"Keep up," she called behind her, peering down at where they were still making their way up the last, steep incline. They'd found a long stick somewhere along the way and had occupied themselves ever since with alternately 'helping' each other carry it and trying to tear it out of each other's jaws. It was not (she bit back the urge to tell them this again) a good use of their teeth.
Traveling with her boys had a way of making her feel both older and younger.
Speaking of boys — Easy lifted her head to give another long howl, hoping that someone familiar would answer. Her cousin Meadow had once lived here, but when she cast her mind back... it'd been nearly three years ago, hadn't it? She wished she'd kept better track of the other woman.
Easy padded further into the vale, perking up when she heard a distant howl in return. It was too far to make out the intent behind the tinny call, but she thought she recognized the voice. It would be days still before she found the caller, but she set off at a jaunty pace anyway, eyes out and ears swiveling in search of other, nearer wolves.
Tagging @Blue Ridge for reference. If they are not immediately near each other, Easy has at least been howling to let him know the general direction of her and the boys.
RE: after many miles - Disa - September 23, 2025
After saying goodbye to Beau and with a belly full of duck, Disa headed east. She climbed the mountain in a slow zigzag and paused often to admire the increasingly spectacular view of the valley below, wondering which field or forest or peak she would eventually call home.
Perhaps here, she thought upon descending into paradise several hours later. It could be this place.
The vale was a work of art - but empty. The longer she wandered among the trees, the less it appealed - a silent, beautiful bowl, hidden away and visited by few. An place for a largr family.
So she was surprised to hear a howled conversation, with one side coming from someone relatively close by. A search eventually revealed a large woman dressed in the colors of beaten metal and wearing pair of contrasting orangen eyes that were visible even from a distance. Disa made what she hoped was a friendly noise when she stepped into Easy's eyeline, ears sitting high in her head.
"Do you live here?" Disa called, raising her voice enough to carry it the twenty meters that separated her from the fire-eyed stranger.
RE: after many miles - Easy - September 28, 2025
With the boys lagging far behind, it was easy enough for the blackbear to assume friendliness in others. This stranger did not appear aggressive, at any rate, so Easy felt no need to display aggression in turn.
Still, her tail flagged high even as it waved in invitation. She clearly held herself in high esteem.
"No, I'm just passing through," she replied, padding closer at a steady pace, watching for signs she was drawing too close. "My home is back the way I came — a week and half again that way." She pointed her nose toward Round Valley.
She studied the wolf with a bright, friendly gaze, confident enough in her size and experience to judge the encounter completely safe.
"Do you live nearby?" she asked, politely interested. "Or just exploring? It's a beautiful valley — it's a shame to see it empty again."
RE: after many miles - Disa - October 04, 2025
Passing through. Disa felt disappointment give her heart a cold squeeze. Her ears sagged for a moment, but she rowed them back into place and met Easy's wave with one of her own - tail neutral, body relaxed.
"No," she told the approaching woman, "I'm trying to find a group to weather winter with. At the very least, " Disa added, so as not to be thought of as a foul-weather leech. She pulled her weight, but groups didn't always work out.
"Have you come across anyone?" she asked hopefully, then, with a look of genuine confusion, "Why are you passing through?" Looking for someone lost? She could hardly be here for a casual jaunt so close to winter.
RE: after many miles - Easy - October 04, 2025
That was a good enough reason for Easy, who would not have thought less of Disa's desire even if she'd only been interested in material comfort during the colder months. A girl had to look out for herself, after all.
"No one you want to meet," she said wryly, glancing back the way she'd come. Blue Ridge and her own young sons were somewhere back in that directly, but she was thinking mainly of the cross-eyed Speckletooth. As nice as the young man had been, Easy wouldn't have hung her survival on his shoulders. She doubted very much that he'd last through the new year on his own or with a friend.
She moved past Disa instead of stopping, but her steps were slow so as to invite the woman to pace along.
"I like to visit my family around this time of year," she said with a happy whisk of her tail. "My nephew has lived with a pack called Moonglow for a few years now, and my son and my grandson are bopping around here, somewhere. I think they're going to start a pack of their own."
It wouldn't surprise her. She saw a lot of Dutch in Katmai, and she saw a lot of her own father in Kindle. Both of them were far too silly to truly resemble their elders just yet, of course — but Easy wished them every success.
"My name's Easy, by the way," she added. "What's yours?"
RE: after many miles - Disa - October 05, 2025
Grandson. Disa snuck a closer look at Easy's face when the larger wolf slipped past, but there was nothing that particularly screamed elder - only a serene confidence that the younger wolf assumed came with time served. Six, maybe seven winters?
"Disa" she replied, and followed, walking a little faster than Easy to keep up. "Are your son and grandson good wolves?" Whatever that meant. If they were starting a pack, it was worth getting some information from the literal source.
RE: after many miles - Easy - October 07, 2025
Easy knew the answer right away. They were good boys. Of course they were good. It felt silly to seek her opinion at all, when they were hers, and she couldn't very well answer differently — but she supposed he had been very lucky. She supposed that not every mother or grandmother could be completely and wholly enthralled by each and every creature that came of her singular bloodline.
She shot a small, secretive smile at Disa.
"They're good," she said simply. "They're all of them very good wolves."
Her nose twitched. She could tell a lot from a wolf's scent, but their distant past was not usually one of those things.
"Have you ever had children?" she asked Disa, curious about the young woman. She almost didn't look old enough, but perhaps that was just her size.
RE: after many miles - Disa - October 21, 2025
Good wolves. Disa nodded absently, eyes ahead as they trekked through the vale.
"Have you ever had children? Easy asked, and Disa found her face contorted by a mix of unnamed feelings. "No," she answered. Children were the way - she knew it, and yet could not imagine being anchored down by a clutch of mewling babes. "Children are.. I do not like that they suck on things," the younger wolf decided, speaking very much like a wolf that had yet to go into heat. She shot Easy a look. "Did you not think they were gross, when they were small?"
RE: after many miles - Easy - November 07, 2025
Easy laughed, startled by the woman's reasoning even if it made perfect sense.
"The first time around? Certainly," she replied, recalling her horror at the realities of motherhood. But she recalled the good times as well, and the love and the wonder and adoration she always felt when she looked at her children. At any age, but in those first several weeks most of all.
She cut a sideways glance to the woman.
"Not just the sucking. Cleaning them all the time. The birth, of course. There are parts of it that are quite unpleasant," she admitted. "But I got used to it, and on the whole, I've enjoyed motherhood."
But it wasn't for everyone. It hadn't been, in fact, for her own mother.
"I think it's nice to try at least once," she offered. "Maybe somewhere you have the support to pass them off to someone else once in a while. Once they get to be a bit older, they're just like you and I. Only less respectable, because you've cleaned their own sick off their faces — and plenty of other things besides."
RE: after many miles - Disa - November 17, 2025
The seasoned mother's straightforward honesty put Disa at ease. Easy did not balk at her questions or make "that face". She made the idea of motherhood sound if not appealing, then at least interesting - and once (or if) the biological drive hit, Disa wasn't sure she would have a choice.
A stray beeeze tickled the branches above their heads as it whispered through the vale.
"If you do those things," Disa went on, "Eat their vomit, allow them to suck, play with them, take care of them," she was silent for a few steps, brows bunched, "Will they be able to tell that you don't really love them? Can't, " she corrected, and turned her weirdly flat eyes on Easy, whose heart seemed to light her being from within.
RE: after many miles - Easy - November 19, 2025
That was certainly an unexpected question. Easy wasn't sure how she felt about it, but children were a woman's right, weren't they?
"Maybe," she said, trying to imagine going through all that without love to drive her. Instincts were strong — but instincts could shift. She did not think a pup would survive without love and instinct both. That, however, was for the young stranger to find out.
"Children are like you and I, only smaller and stupider," she told the woman. "If they are well cared for, if they are provided for, if they can feel the warmth of your body — perhaps that will be enough for some. For others, they can be given all the love in the world and still grow to resent their mothers."
Her tail swished. She thought of her own mother, and how unsuited the young woman had been to the task. Easy still found love for the women in her heart, even if it wasn't the love of a daughter for her mother.
"If they grow to be adults, they will have the opportunity to find their own happiness," said Easy. "They may choose to love you or to hate you. They may choose neither. They may say, 'I know you have done the very best you could for me' and choose any of these things."
RE: after many miles - Disa - November 29, 2025
Disa nodded along with Easy's words, her frown deepening. It sounded like luck of the draw no matter who you were or how your brain was wired.
"Thank you," the young wolf said, slowing to a halt, indicating that this was where they would part ways. Her small, sharp ears twitched. "For just answering."
RE: after many miles - Easy - November 30, 2025
Easy stopped, too.
"Motherhood is your right, if you want it," she in parting, answering what she felt as a question unspoken. "What children make of their mothers is their right, too. Be well, Disa."
She offered the woman one last, warm smile before turning to go her own way.