Bramblepoint The mold of your life is in your hands to break

The good thing about this forest was the dense vegetation.  Mal felt more secure with all the places to hide, that it was okay for him to sleep under the arms of a thornbush just as long as he didn't suddenly have a nightmare and stab himself in the head from suddenly sitting up.  That had only happened once so far.  But hey, at least nobody would bug him.  He'd done a little bit of scouting figuring out where the nearby packs were, but he hadn't gotten too close.  He mostly just wanted to know the lay of the land.

As nice as the dense forest was in some ways, it had made it a little more difficult to catch prey, because all the things he could catch could so much easier duck under the most pointed foliage -- so maybe he wouldn't stay here long, but in the short term it was pretty great.  He hadn't run into anyone either.  It really didn't seem like a particularly popular place, so as he set off down a game trail to see what was on the other end, he entirely expected to be the only one investigating it today.  Regardless of what was there, he figured he'd head back towards the lake after this and risk running into someone there.

Forests were safe in a way Saarthal never truly understood until now. She used to hate them; as a kid, she loathed the fact that she couldn't see anyone or anything, she felt lost and alone and trapped, never understanding the advantage of hiding. For she was always seeking, forever seeking. It was this thought nagging at the corner of her mind that drew forth the strange, vague smile, tinged with nostalgia and edged with a strange sort of cynicism that tugged at the girl's lips as she nosed at the dirt. She squinted, then began to wander quietly, paws not necessarily soft on the floor as she followed a game trail...perhaps she should stop digging out the demons of the past or battling the wisps of the ghostly future and focus on the present, but she'd never been good at that. Never been good at not thinking. One day, she felt, it would cost her her life. But until then...food.

Mal approached from the other direction.  He came to a stop when he saw her, tipping his head due to being kind of perplexed that anyone was out here in the first place.  Not anyone he recognized either (probably thankfully).  Taking bets on whether she was secretly a crazed murderer, though.  He'd keep it in mind, just in case.  He was far enough from the sea here that at least he wasn't afraid that she was a complete wacko from whatever the sea air did to people's brains out there.

After being silent for a second like the dope he was, Hey, said the youth, who was such a social butterfly, wasn't he?  Who're you?  He wasn't particularly sure what he thought of meeting another wolf here instead of somewhere more open.  Was she gonna invade his space here?  Should he keep moving?  Hopefully that'd become clear.