Moonspear Where the doctor had to pull out all the bone chips

Finding her place was not as simple as she once assumed it may be; travelling beyond the mountain was hardly her thing, nor patrols or much anything else besides finding new crevices to call her own. But recently she’d taken a liking to hunting—more specifically, small game. It was easier than large game and something she could do on her own—additionally, certain animals often led her to new hideaways as they sought to escape her. It was the latter she was most interested in, of course, and what had her trailing after the scent of a raccoon.

.. And he, in turn, was trailing his aunt. Caelum often studied adults to see what they did, so that he could do the same thing. He followed Yama that day. Though he did not know what she was doing yet, adults often did useful things and so he guessed she'd, sooner or later, start doing useful things too and it would make sense. Meanwhile, the dark boy followed with intent burning in his golden eyes, small triangle ears perked forward attentively.

That she was being trailed after went momentarily unnoticed, her focus honed in on the task at hand. She followed the trail until the creator of it was revealed—and then she gave chase as it sought safety but, ultimately, the raccoon did not fall victim to her jaws. It did, however, deposit her near its burrow.

A burrow that was then found on accident—when the agouti girl fell into it, too caught up in her attempts at relocating the raccoon to notice it was there. A sharp yipe the only sound to escape her, body seemingly to have vanished—

When she set up a chase, Caelum followed. He couldn't keep up entirely, his chonky body not built entirely for the endeavour he was following, but whenever she rounded a corner he set up a sprint and then when he came 'round the corner he could see her again, even if the distance between the pair of them was getting bigger each time. He saw a flash of something she chased in the distance which spoke to his instincts and made him want to go after it, too.

Before he could join in the chase and before Yama could catch the prey Caelum saw her suddenly vanish in the distance. Her disappearance was followed by a yelp and it caused a bit of malfunction in Caelum's brain, who didn't really understand what was going on. He stopped in his tracks at first, a small distance away from where she'd disappeared still, small ears erect as he stood and waited.

Then when response did not come immediately, Caelum neared again and chuffed -- hello? -- while he continued towards the hole to check if his relative was still in there somewhere.

Sore from the impact, she shook herself the best she could in the compact space. The girl was somewhat dazed, mind still processing what exactly happened, when she heard a chuff—which, at first, she did not respond to. Slowly and carefully, she raised her head to peek up out of the burrow, and there she spied the child.

Doing a quick glance around and finding no one else, Yama hoisted herself up and dragged her body from the trap. Once out, she gave a proper shake of her pelt and looked to the boy, to whom she returned the chuff; she likely would have said more, if not the embarrassment felt keeping her quiet.

Surprised, he looked at the empty space where his aunt had once been. Caelum blinked as he waited for a response. Seemingly out of the blue, her head poked up from the earth and Caelum stumbled back, startled, while she shook her pelt. She chuffed back and in response, he chuffed again — it was an automatic response that showed how startled he was — and he stretched his neck to inspect the hole she had fallen into. Aha, so there was the rest of her body, then!

Out she spied the child, whose expression left little for the mind to wonder about; surprised, perhaps as much as she’d been upon taking her fall. “Careful,” she warned. “You wouldn’t want to fall in there.” As if to further encourage him, she took several steps away from the hidden trap. “It’s not a good hideaway...” came out, almost absentmindedly, whilst she shook her head. Perhaps further emphasising her lack of socialising.

She told him to be careful and Caelum glanced back. It just seemed like a hole. It wasn't like he intended to fall in there as well, having learned from seeing his aunt fall in. Luckily for Yama, Caelum was not very socially apt himself, so he was a good subject to practise on without receiving any judgement.

You try to hide? he asked, blinking owlishly, and then looking back at the hole. It didn't seem like a very good hiding place to him.

A question, which made her brows scrunch together. She had always considered her hideaways to be places for her to relax away from others—but was she hiding, too? Carefully, she shook her head.

“Not exactly...?” she answered. “Maybe... what are you doing here?” So used to moving about without running into others, she was curious.

Yama seemed confused by his question, which in turn confused Caelum. He blinked owlishly a few times. She then asked what he was doing here, which to Caelum didn't add up. He blinked another few times as he remembered that he was following adults to see what they were doing so he could learn. That's right — he was here to study. Learning, he answered eventually with a satisfied nod of his head.

Learning came his reply, following a brief silence. Slowly, her brows pinched together as she couldn’t help but ask, “Learning what?” She couldn’t recall seeing anyone else with him, nor had she seen him when her search first began. So what on earth could he be learning, out on his own?

When his aunt stared at him quizzically and asked 'learning what', Caelum tilted his head. His sharp yellow eyes stared at her and it was hard to tell what he was thinking or feeling in that moment. He blinked a few times, before he repeated: Learning.

Silence.

It felt like forever beneath the child’s gaze, only for the answer to be not the least bit more insightful. Trying to swallow her uncertainty, she shuffled her paws and said, “Oh.” Yama could not read him well at all, which only added to her discomfort towards being there. “Okay,” she added with a small nod. Slowly, she started to turn, eyeing the path beyond the hole. Did he want to join her...?

Caelum could not make much sense of her response. He blinked as he watched her, waiting for things he might learn from her. Nothing came though, and she eventually said 'oh, okay' and turned away from him. Caelum was not very good at reading emotion so he did not sense any of the discomfort that she was feeling. When she went on her way, Caelum followed behind her and observed what she did.

The sound of footfalls at her hind gave way to his joining, something she wasn’t yet sure how to feel about—both because the child made her uncomfortable and because, too, she was not accustomed to having anyone else along for her searches. Honestly, the last to accompany the Ostrega was likely her father—after that, her hideaways were kept entirely to herself, as she no longer had someone she wished to share them with.

No matter, she continued forward, nose to the ground. But when she could not pick up on any scents worth pursing, she stopped and glanced back at her companion. “Do you smell anything?” she asked, pawing at her nose and then jutting it towards the ground in the process.

Caelum followed, a silent shadow to the adult. She appeared to be tracking something, a thing of which Caelum took mental note, and which he copied as he followed.

Upon her question, he lowered his nose again and sniffed around, mulling around the scents he had picked up throughout their short journey so far. Grass. Wet. Caelum paused a moment and his nose twitched as he sniffed the air. Rabbit. He glanced in the direction the scent lead and looked back to Yama to see if she agreed with his assessments.