Broken Antler Fen i want to be better

the fossopa follows the tentative directions given to her by thyri and the scouts of crogeda that had escorted wanheda most of the way home. she is a scout by nature; mapper of the constellations. the stars, atla has been taught, were just as crucial to scouting as the land was. praimfaya's scent is long gone; but giving up is not something that atla has been raised to do.

if you stop fighting, you're dead is what salem had told her time and again.

she suspects she has entered the teekon wilds; proven only when she sees a landmark described to her by the crogeda's own scouts; a tree who's rough bark is marred by the claws of a bear; clearly the ursidae's own private scratching post. a soft snort passes from her black, leathery nose as she just barely contains her own laughter at her joke.

another patch of light snow has begun to kick up and it is by the fresh-water source that atla decides to rest. it seems as good a place as any to take stock of her surroundings, find something to fill her belly and take a nap. there was no immediate rush to find wanheda and it would be a lie to say that, that was her sole purpose here. beneath the ironclad purpose was a flutter of excitement at being in a new place, at exploring and meeting new faces and cultures.

Goodnight often dreamed of settling down. He realized that he would be into his third year come summer, and more than a year of bachelorhood had left him feeling sated but terribly lonely. He hadn't been able to stay long with any of the packs he'd crossed or allies he'd made along the way—he simply did not have a will strong enough to remain—which made him wonder if he would ever feel that way, about anything or anyone.

Or if he'd simply be destined to travel his entire life; searching for new and greater things until his legs gave out from under him. A part of him dreaded that kind of perpetually roving existence, but he also wondered often what it would be like.

Today he was thinking of a life opposite to that. As he plucked a half-buried antler from a powdery grave, he imagined what it would be like to bring this chew toy to his children. If his wife would even allow it, or demand something less pointed: like a femur. He chuckled to himself, trotting forward and gnawing thoughtfully on the abandoned headpiece while seeking an ideal place to lie down and whittle away at the bone in peace.

He moved towards the scent of water, and drew to a halt when he noticed another had beat him unto the very spot he was headed. Goodnight dropped the three-branched antler and stood at attention, giving broad wags of his tail so that the other might take him for friendly and beckon him to join them at the waterside.

lucky for her, it wasn't long before atla got a chance to meet a new face. it was the sound of approaching footfalls that draw her attention. atla turns to face the stranger, an agouti pelage that, to atla, appears to be made up predominately of silvers. like gyda ...or so she's been told; being unable to remember the short time she spent with her biological mother atla cannot say for sure. her golden gaze flickers from him to the antler at his paws before it volleys back up to his face once more; taking note that he stands at attention but the wags of his tail suggest that he a friend and not a foe.

though atla knows she should be more cautious; more stony and unwelcoming of strangers as her father and milk-mother was ...as her brothers were ...she cannot make herself approach strangers with the same level of distrust. she liked meeting new wolves too much, even if there existed a rough and hard-to-understand language barrier. atla always too stubborn to let her shortcomings beat her down.

hei, she offers in a friendly greeting, inviting him to come nearer with a small gesture of her muzzle.

As she encouraged him forward, Goodnight's tail beat faster, eager to have company despite moments ago looking for solitude. In truth, though he liked his life of freedom and relative quiet, he almost never passed on a chance to socialize, as his warm-blooded genetics bade him. He didn't trust her a lick — idling over the thought that her mien could be that of a she-devil in wait — but the ranger was fairly confident in his ability to defend himself, and she didn't look like trouble besides that. Not obviously, anyway.

He snatched up his antler, and trotted nearer.

He had to lift his chin higher than normal to keep his toy from dragging or digging uncomfortably into his chest, but he dropped it again once he'd come near enough to chat quietly, and bowed his head slightly in silent appreciation of her hospitality. Goodnight kept a wolflength between them, so as not to crowd her space (or give her quick access to his own flesh), but he studied her unabashedly; taking in her cocoa hue that he had mistaken for black at a distance.

"I'm called Odyssey," he introduced with a soft smile that was by far warmer than any of his cool, dark features combined.

atla watches as the stranger draws nearer, keeping a decent amount of space between them. he introduces himself as odyessy and she tries to contemplate how she would pronounce it. in the end she gives a small nod to communicate that she heard him; fear of not wishing to butcher it. atla. she offers with a soft wag of her tail. for a while, as she tries to gather the individual words in her mind, sorting thru them, she is silent. yu brana hir? it was simple enough...so why was there always that barrier? you brand new here? she asks, words tentative only because she is unsure of her translation.

Her foreign accent was the very next thing Goodnight noticed about her, and the thoughtful pause she took before speaking again did not go unobserved. He smiled encouragingly as she posed her carefully worded question, though was inwardly glad she wasn't as difficult to understand as some others he had met in his past. The wolf nodded at her question, tail still wagging from mild delight. "Very new," he answered — not bothering to mention that he had been here before, when the prey was low and the lands were uninviting. "How long have you been—?" He hesitated. She might not understand that. It was better to use words she'd already used on him.

Clearing his throat, he asked: "are you new here too?"