Tuktu Hinterlands Resonance

Hoping for everyone to join in on a big ole howl to commemorate our Tuktu power-annex! ;)

@Quixote @Towhee @Finley @Elwood @Tegan @Niamh @Phox @Clover @Cinder @Camilla @Rye Black @Kite @Vasa @Owen

@Sequoia @Kiwi @Eljay @Wraen @Tulimaq @Colt @Finbar @Maia @Corinna

It would be a long time before Wildfire felt properly happy again. But when she woke to another day of clear skies and blazing winter sunshine, she couldn't help but feel a little more hopeful than the day before. She uncurled from her makeshift nest near the copse's western edge, beginning a tireless march around the borders. She helped herself to some breakfast on the way. By the time Wildfire returned to the point where she'd started, she felt more invigorated than she had in several days.

Stepping over the invisible (to the eye, if not the nose) boundaries, she moseyed into the neutral territory between the plateau and the copse. She swallowed a lump in her throat as she crossed one icy stream, then another. Grouse Thicket now sprawled off to her right, the frozen bog to her left. Wildfire drew in a breath of air so frosty, it made her lungs burn.

Tossing her head back suddenly, she howled as mightily as she could (which wasn't very), trying to reach all the Redhawks' ears as well as her Firebirds. It was at once celebratory and mournful as she recognized the packs' mutual loss. Hopefully others would join the song and remind everyone listening—including those outside the stalwart sisterhood—of the force present in the hinterlands.

Although Sequoia grieved for Bat, she knew there was little she could do for her now. She had been torn from them too soon, and although the details were still fuzzy to her, the news was that Bat was lost to the river, surely dead. Her own voice was bittersweet alongside Wildfire's (and the others who would surely join in) as the piebald girl let her howl ring in their official formation.

Kiwi still wasn't talking much, but over the past little bit, she'd come to place the blame for what had happened squarely in one place - Tegan.  

This didnt much help her own shoved down feelings, emotions that would likely fester over the coming weeks, but it did help her move forward.  So when her mom howled, she joined in almost immediately, her voice ringing loud and clear with the challenge and pride of their new home.

Ooh, hey, a pack thing! Maia glanced up, then beamed.  This was so exciting!! She'd never imagine she'd be part of founding a place, and yet, here she was.  She thought back to her conversation with the one girl and wondered briefly how her own group was going.  Too bad Wraen had found this place so quickly, but Maia was pretty happy with the view so far.

She cheerfully joined in, too far removed from the sorrow of the other packmates to even realize there was something to be sad about.  As she did, she heard another voice, older and male.  Ah, yeah, that one guy she'd seen from the pack meeting probably.  So many new faces, and she was so terrible at remembering names!

vague colt cross mention here bc yep

This had never been part of his plan. To be here among allies and claiming a forest for the sake of another, to be one of the middling recruits and not the master of his domain... Yet the sound of voices rose anyway, and the moody man endured a few moments of the song's growing strengrh before he cast back his own broad skull. Wildfire may have believed in fate; her argument had been compelling and left Tulimaq full of speculation, but it was his own will that brought him down this path. As his voice joined the others, a deep and commanding howl that resonated through the forest, he pledged himself to the woods and their embrous Sovereign. Fate be damned, he would make it work.

It went without saying that Towhee didn't hear the chorus rising in the east, powerful as the winter sun. She was sequestered on The Roost, currently, doing her best to avoid everyone as she worked on sorting out her feelings. It was probably for the best that she was oblivious. It would've created a whole new slew of emotions while she was trying to deal with far too many already.

But X heard the howl from his perch in Grouse Thicket. He looked up from his meal, a sliver of rabbit gut swinging from his beak as he cocked his head. Another joined the first, then another and another. The hawk couldn't help but abandon the carcass and take wing, uplifted by the swelling song. He spotted a red figure down below and circled casually overhead, lending his own shrill cry to the ballad.

Eljay had been wandering around the west side of the Copse, trying to find a suitable place to make a makeshift den he could go to when he would get cold or wet to warm up, when he heard Wiffle's call. Eljay stopped his search momentarily to join in the chorus and call along. There was an uncertainty to his voice because he was not too sure he could echo the exact sentiments Wiffle's voice so clearly and beautifully carried, but by the time he joined in it did not matter much; many voices were already sounding, a lot from his side of the Tuktu Hinterlands, and so it would unlikely go noticed to anyone that his voice wavered bits and pieces.

Wraen also joined the chorus of voices, picking up the mood of the song, but not exactly following the reasons behind it. In time she would find out, but for now she sang with the rest, feeling happy and excited. A yet another start for her in her life and she hoped that this was to stay so.

Later on that day, Elwood and Finley would be having a conversation with their children -- both biological and adopted -- about their move to Sun Mote Copse. But when Wildfire's howl rang out, they were still Redhawks; and, really, even once they migrated, they would still be Redhawks. The move wasn't meant to divide the two packs, but to bring them together.

That message was clear in Wildfire's song, and from the edge of the plateau nearest the copse, Elwood called out in reply, his voice joining with those of Firebirds and Redhawks in tandem.

Tilting his big red ears to listen, Owen really mistrusted the lively enthusiasm he heard in many of the voices who'd been discussing this whole Firebirds thing and who were now howling up a storm all in chorus. He himself was really not that enthused still. He didn't know how to deal with all of this—and frankly kinda resented it taking away his Eljay AND Niamh too now, it seemed. Those were his puppysitters. He did not think it was fair he be asked to share them, no matter what Eljay said about them always being welcome to visit, and especially so soon after Kite's episode witht he pond it worried him. Yeah, sure, heightwise at least they were all just about full-size, but upon the prospect of losing them he was more convinced than ever that he actually needed them to stay right here where he was, in the Plateau.

Owen glanced up and saw X wheeling high above, lending his distant cries to the wolves' harmony. He could see Elwood not that far away as well, though Owen was a little resentfully thinking that old dustymusty former-leader Elwood of all wolves oughta be over with his new Firebirds already and not here, with his new packmates making such a racket while staking their claim. But, well, it was Redhawks expected to join in too, and maybe plausible deniability of being the wolf who broke the packs' cohesiveness was important...which meant Owen himself oughta do something about this right now too. With a deep, heartfelt sigh, Owen lifted up his head and joined in, his own voice puppyish and wavering and once in a while creaking in its efforts to match all the adults' throatier and richer calls. - Yeah, I'm here too, - he resignedly signed to no one in particular as he halfheartedly sang along.