Ankyra Sound I ain't ever had a type, having a type takes two

From atop the cliffs, the grizzled she-wolf stared impassively down at the smashed beach, wind ruffling the wild hair on her nape.

So much had happened there. At the time it felt insurmountable, the rage and pain that Grimnismal and its wolves, especially the sea witch, had left her with; now she knew it was only a moment in time. Her life was defined by things other than her failure as one pack's leader. The spunky fire that leapt from her daughter's tongue, the glimmer of Lusca's eye when she beheld them returning for the first time, the memories of both her lost brothers that she clung to on her loneliest nights.

Grimnismal was only one chapter of one young life. Wylla had many others, most of them more successful than that, and she was no longer the childish yearling she'd been back then. Blinking slowly, she turned away, surprised to find she wasn't that torn up over the ruined state of the sound. It had never really been home, and all the emotion she'd spent on it seemed wasted now.

There were few reasons for the wolf to abandon the open sky of the sea shore to lurk beneath a forest canopy, but wicked weather was one of them. Through the worst of lancing ice-rain and fur-stripping wind he had sheltered among the great trees, tucked among their roots with his tail covering his nose. Come the following day, when the weather was fairer, a chance at meat kept him in the timber still.

Successful at taking down a rabbit, Skookumchuck was still intermittently pawing at his mouth and scrubbing his snout along the dirt when a sweep of his eyes caught the silhouette of another wolf stood on the cliff's edge. He angled himself into her scent cone and breathed her in as he drew closer; hooked and reeled by his curiosity and an intrinsic desire for companionship. It had been moons since last he had been in the company of his own.

Hello, he called out, his voice deep and raspy. There was a slight sway to his tail as it hung behind him, and a tentative twisting of his ears. From the side of his mouth protruded a thin strip of hide replete with fur; caught between his molars, it was the source of the discomfort that drove him to raise a paw to his face again a moment after he said 'hello'.

The voice rang out at the exact moment that Wylla's eyes clapped on the black-furred wolf as she turned from the sea, and both in tandem put her immediately on edge. Why was he standing there like that? What did he want with her? Similar suspicions swept through her mind in an instant, just long enough for her to shove her ears forward over her brow and rumble a quiet growl at him.

Time away certainly hadn't made her any friendlier. In fact, being surrounded by just family had likely made Wylla even more of a bitch, considering every single one of them were bitches and needled each other constantly. Misery loves company and Wylla had a lot of that.

What do you want? she asked in a voice that snapped through the space between them. Even the ever-present roar of the ocean seemed momentarily hushed by the force behind that delivery; this was Wylla in her element, after all.

Skookumchuck lowered his head with uncertainty, ears sweeping down and back as he angled slightly away with a lifted paw. His amber eyes searched the space immediately around her. Seeing no prominent reason for her to react so defensively perplexed him. He did not question his nose; he knew he stood on no wolf's ground.

To know you. He answered plainly, standing relaxed with his less of his head and more of his shoulder presented to her. Behind him his tail continued to sway amiably. To get this fur out of my teeth. Skookumchuck inadvertently illustrated this point when he dropped his head momentarily to scrub his snout against the side of his leg.

His goals did not necessarily coincide, but they could.

Uh, what a fucking weirdo. She might not have thought too much of it if he merely said he wanted to know her, because honestly who doesn't, but pairing it with his second statement made it came off as implacably strange. As his ears fell back, hers tilted uncertainly to the sides. She made no effort to hide the confusion from her expression as she asked, uh, what?

Dipping her head was enough to reveal the furry little tuft protruding from his lips, but that was the best look she got before he swung his muzzle down to swipe it against his legs. That sucks, she said, pulling back with a dismissive whisk of her tail. But no thank you to picking that out of your teeth, I prefer my dinners fresh caught and free of plaque, thanks. Try rubbing it on a tree, she suggested, gesturing with a vague sweep of her muzzle to any of the large redwoods around them. I hear it works wonders.

For getting splinters in your nose, perhaps, but watching him try in vain would be a comedy worth sticking around for.

Were she not tolerant of his presence he would have left, but to his eye it seemed she had relaxed some. Perhaps she was assured he was not posing a threat.

Tried that. But the bark scraped his flesh more than loosened the nuisance hide. It had a degree of stretch to it that for all his efforts permitted it to remain where it was. Unable was he to wedge it securely enough to be exert enough force to haul it from between his teeth. It was, after all, no small amount of force that had stuck it there in the first place.

The wolf did not expect her help and was not really asking for it, so he thought nothing of the fact she did not extend it. Name's Skookumchuck, or the hunter called Lucky Shadow from where the fish leave the sea to swim the river.

Tentatively, he drew two paces nearer, his snout reaching forward to quest after her scent. Who are you?

The last thing she expected him to say was that he'd tried that already. What? What an idiot. Wylla's suggestion had been purely for the humour of him scraping his muzzle and not because she thought rubbing his face on bark would be helpful, but it seemed like he was just that desperate. It was a little bit sad, truth be told. She could relate to having something stuck in your teeth but wasn't sure what he thought she could do about it. She wasn't really friendly enough to be helpful just for the sake of it.

But, no, he was probably just a plain weirdo, because he introduced himself in about a hundred words, leaving her with a dumbfounded look on her face. Skookumchuck was a strange name to begin with but what followed was even moreso. It was with a thousand-yard stare that Wylla regarded him then, before quite abruptly blurting, umm, what the fuck kind of name is that?

She didn't answer his question, mostly because it was lost in her bewilderment for that extremely ... grand introduction.

He arched a brow at her.

What kind of name am I supposed to have?

Skookumchuck was inquisitive; his head cocked to the side and his tail idled.

She hadn't offered hers. He had nothing to compare to. The wolves he was born and raised among all bore names like his; the name their mother gave them and a name to mark when they grew from whelp to hunter and gave back to the pack that had kept them fed and protected. The former seldom had meaning. The latter was inspired by the events of the day they took their first proper game.

A normal-ass one, she responded, crumpling her own brows down into a severe frown. Seriously. Skookumchuck could've sufficed without all that other shit about being some kind of lucky shadow. What the hell did "lucky shadow" even mean? Shadows couldn't be lucky, or at least not in her experience. Shadows meant rain was coming. Shadows frightened the fish away. Shadows doused the light... and sometimes that light was desperately needed, so there was nothing objectively good about shadows as far as she was concerned.

My name is Wylla, she said, as if to point out to Skookumchuck what a normal-ass name was supposed to sound like. Just Wylla, because unlike you, I had a sane bitch for a mother. That was when she noticed him poking his snout into her mile-wide personal bubble, something she'd overlooked before, and took a conspicuous step back. No thank you to catching whatever brand of crazy he was infected with.

I see.

Her scorn for his name and her judgement of his mother garnered little reaction from the black wolf. No more than a twitch of his ear. The displeased expression that twisted on her face and the way she stepped back from his calm intent to meet her was of greater interest and meaning to him.

Skookumchuck drew back his snout. This Wylla was a skittish and unapproachable sort and he had no further reason to be in her company if she had no want of his. He turned away, the matter of the hide wedged between his molars returning to the forefront of his mind and inspiring his paw to his face again.

Good hunting to you then.

Unhurried steps put distance between them as he headed on.

Skookumchuck didn't have any comments on the normalcy of her name, leading Wylla to believe he just came from some locotown of wolves with strange ones. Hers wasn't the most common of names and her siblings were even less fortunate—Lycaon, in particular—but at least it wasn't ten syllables long or whatever his full name was.

Ciao, she noncommittally replied, offering neither aid for his bothered molars nor the promise of her future company. She would likely never see him again, with how vast she thought the wilds were, so what did it matter? He was strange and she currently wasn't feeling all that sociable.

She remained in the forest long after Skookumchuck departed, leaving only when night had fallen.