Whitebark Stream [m] would you love me if I ruled the world?

Dione had gathered her things from the bypass and left at dawn. She told no one she was going, and she was unsure that anybody had noticed.

With two elk hides draped over her pack and her most prized bones held tightly in her jaws, she came to the stream with a clear eagerness in her step. She spat out the bones, throwing her head up with a long howl that called for @Veteran to come meet her. He was the one she had chosen, the one she wanted.

They could stay here together until her season passed, guarantee that the children she delivered were his rather than a stranger's. Dione was eager, and while she would never say it.. grateful for her own fortune in their recent reunion.

Her eyes drifted to the nearby Duskfire Glacier. She wondered if it held anything more for her.

Veteran didn't know what business Dione had to conclude at the Bypass last night, but there was a pessimistic part of him that worried it would involve a conversation with someone who might talk her out of leaving. He answered her call with equal parts relief and eagerness. 

He drew up beside her and inhaled deeply, drinking in her alluring scent. "Your trophies," he remarked, taking note of the possessions she carried. "I have a spot where they can be kept safe." He had put his spare time last night to good use, setting up a temporary densite for them at the edge of the woods that sheltered the spot where the stream branched off from the Qeya River. 

I'm glad you came, he almost said, but at the last moment he chose different words. 

"You look beautiful, Dione." And she did. Draped in the hides of her proudest conquests, she had never looked more formidable, or in Veteran's eyes, more desirable. He wasn't sure he could wait until they made it back to camp. Ever so gently-- reverently, even-- he nudged his nose beneath the hides, his hot breath meeting the nape of her neck as he eased the hides down her spine, baring her shoulders. He paused before he removed that hides completely, meeting her gaze in a wordless request for permission to proceed further.

Veteran joined her soon after, Dione had no doubt that he would come. With promises of preperations made, she was all the more pleased.

Only my best. Sooner or later she would want the hides replaced with furs, and the bones would lose their appeal for antlers. Everything in rotation.

He barely needed to make the request for Dione to shake off the pelts on her own. She was trying not to be impatient, truly, but she had already been waiting for far too long. Licking the back of Veteran's ears, she waited a long moment before speaking again. You know the promise you're making to me, right? She asked.

Breathing in deep, she let his scent fill her senses and take her mind. Her third try at making things work, and she desperately wanted it to. She didn't want Veteran to fail her.

Her hot tongue was on the delicate skin behind his ears, which made answering thoughtfully all but impossible. 

Promise? He had already told he she could have whatever she wanted, but she was clearly seeking further reassurance. An ever-patient rumble sounded in his chest as he pulled away from her touch to meet her gaze. 

"Tell me the promise you need to hear, and I'll make it." The things they were about to do.. He was experienced enough to know that they shouldn't be done if she had any doubts at all.

He's sweet, Dione wonders how he hasn't melted on her tongue. If you stay, that's all I need now. For how short time with children could feel, it was undeniable that they were forever. She needed to know that Veteran would at least be here for the temporary part. And if that temporary part worked out, she needed him to be someone to walk beside her through this new chapter, and some day into the next. Til death parted them, as it always did.

Dione nudges his shoulder, a signal that she's ready to leave for what he has prepared. It isn't really his words that she needs right now — she already trusts Veteran with what is most precious to her; the future.

Would you like to fade out in your next post? We can set up a thread heading to Great Sky after, assuming that'll be home base for now!