Otter Creek oh woman, how could you do this to me?

@Issun

it seemed a lifetime ago the girl had last visited otter creek's braided ford; she had not meant to wander, but found her thoughts preoccupying her as they often did -- and suddenly, her heels had carried her to a distant realm she had visited before.

the creek was but a fraction of the frothy turmoil it was in the spring. soon the snowmelt would bolster its girth, and the water would tumble a muddied grey out into the rest of the flatlands. for now the creek was iced over and diminutive; indra walked across the glassy shards of the bank and listened as the splinter of ice sounded down the frozen muskeg.

after the brief visit to the hollow, issun traveled east along the frozen waterbed. he walked at a quick pace, as if he was escaping from some unknown presence. by the time he reached the creek his paws ached and begged for a break.

he slowed to a hault and his body sank to the cool earth. issun looked around and caught sight a glowing pelt amongst the dreary surroundings before him. the male slid up and followed the stranger until he was close enough for her to hear him chuff a greeting.

indra dared to only test the ice one more time, and as she pressed weight upon the surface she watched a translucent web of fissures snarl along the mottled glassy ice. unwilling to risk her hide she swung up the bank a little further, and it was then she was aware of a wolf following her.

at first only an ear was pulled back to betray her knowledge, but as they continued she felt uneasy, and she whirled upon him, her gaze cold and clinical. she could not trust anyone -- especially not a male -- and it showed by the light flare that lifted the hackles along her shoulder. he chuffed -- it was enough to abate her defensive posture, but not enough to slake her suspicions -- she studied fully the depth of his features, his expression, the stark black that cloaked him and the grey that speckled his ears in a flea-bitten pattern. "what do you want?" she asked, unsure for the nature of his approach.

her defensive stance alarmed him slightly, causing him to take on a more friendlier approach. the last thing he wanted was to be attacked.

he shook his head, “nothing, just wanted to say hello.” he could barely recognize his own voice. what once was strong and confident was now hoarse and frail from the lack of speaking. “it’s just that, i haven’t seen anyone in awhile.”

he answered her readily enough, and she apprised him with a mistrustful gaze as she sorted the hoarseness of his voice. from his scent she was not sure she could detect anything, but she was hardly an expert tracker. he seemed offput by her defensiveness and she sighed, trying to settle the heightened quill of hackles around her nape, and perhaps clear the cold scowl that worried her features.

so much had happened as of late to put her on edge, she could hardly help it -- and last she had been in the flatlands, not so far from here, ithrik had attacked her and left his mark permanently on her hide in the form of her amputated tail. she glanced about them, trying to chase such thoughts from her mind and at least salvage what had already turned into a terse interaction with a wolf she didn't know.

"oh," she said, looking along the bank with her amber gaze. "okay. hello." she shifted, knowing she needed to rectify things quickly. "um.. are you from here?" blackfeather was not so far away -- and she hoped he wasn't from there, given her sour interactions with their kind.

”nope,” he answered. “i’m a loner. go where i please and all that junk.” and it’s trerrible, he sneered to himself. he found being alone this time around was much more excruciating than the last.

“so what about you?” his voice was growing a bit stronger the more he went on.

their encounter grew less tense by the moment, as did the measure of huskiness that laced his words. so he was a loner -- indra was not sure she envied that lifestyle. she had lived it herself, up until not so long ago -- and there was a certain safety in having a home to call your own and packmates to bolster your weaknesses where your strengths failed.

he asked after her and she flickered her gaze back to him warily. "i'm indra." he hadn't asked for her name, but she would provide it anyway. "i... live over there, in that valley." she gestured behind them -- while it could be dangerous letting a stranger know where she lived, she had found a newfound courage in her ability to stand for herself -- day by day, the girl grew less demure.

"is it what you like, being alone?" she was eager to turn the conversation back to the subject of him, having very little comfort in being in the limelight.

”oh, name’s issun,” he chuckled. he peered over her shoulder to see where she gestured to. “huh, cool.”

he pondered the question for a moment, searching for a proper answer. “well, i thought i did. definitely preferred it before.” back before he despised the thought of having responsibilities. “now it just drives me mad.” he hated being alone now. the silence was louder than ever.

he looked behind her and she silently followed his gaze; bearclaw was not discernable from the distance, but the general direction of it was -- she saw the long arm of cold blue mountain range that rose like fins in the distance; the glacial ridge that flanked her home.

she looked back to him as he mentioned the troubles his isolation had brought; was he inflicted with some sort of mental malaise -- should she fear for her life then? she studied him with this new information, but no judgment seemed to pass her features.

"loneliness does that. you don't have a family?"

he shook his head. “not around here anyways. haven’t seen my family in year or two.” his family probably wouldn’t be thrilled to see him either. he was very different back then, a lazy waste of space. the years of experience had bettered him.

“do you have family?”

He revealed he had little interactions with his kin - other than Laurel, Indra had not seen her blood in a year or two either. Thinking of Reek and Jhala and Saena all at once evinced a scowl over the Redleaf's features. 

"only my sister." Indra revealed, the glower still present on her feminine muzzle. Being a rather poor conversationalist, she expanded no further. It was a sore spot for her, and she wondered why she ever brought it up in the first place.

her grimace didn’t go unnoticed. it bought him to wonder about the relationship between indra and her family. he wanted to inquire about it a bit more, but held back his tongue.

“ah, i never had siblings.” he never knew what it was like to have siblings. there had been wolves near his age he had looked up to when he was young, but he was a litter of one. “she live with you?”

indra only offered a sad smile initially in rejoinder; to her a world without laurel was hardly a world worth living. perhaps that  was why issun was so mad -- he had no other half, no support or rock -- in his paws, the redleaf was sure she would have suffered a much worse fate than simply driven mad.

"she does," indra answered after a quiet pause, as she ruminated over the scant information their somewhat tight-lipped conversation had yielded. it was not enough for her to trust him -- not enough for her to invite him into bearclaw. perhaps the suitable deportment for the redleaf girl was not 'recruiter'. "you don't miss them?"

he shook his head. “they hold no importance in my life,” he sighed. not anymore at least. he made his own family with the wolves around him, back at moonlit. so much had happened to him back there that he hadn’t the time to even think about his biological kin. it bought him to wonder what it was like back in the small woods he grew up in.

he stood in silence for a moment, taking in the surroundings one last time. “i should be going,” he announced as he took a few steps back. “it was nice talking to you,” he said with a small smile. it was refreshing to finally talk to someone again.

“i hope we meet again in the future.” and with those parting words, he was gone as soon as he’s arrived.

indra didn't argue when the man suggested he should get going -- while a small part of her felt it funny her presence wasn't intriguing enough to warrant him to stay, she also knew there was a reason behind it: she was very off-putting company outside of her home.

she offered only a thin smile and a dip of her head in reply -- she was all too eager to get back to laurel anyway. she stayed long enough to see his form dematerialize into the dark depths of the forest, and then she too headed for home.