Moonspear kinsister

more had come, but there were no eligible women among them, and so chakliux kept to his hunting.
he wanted a lodge full of children in the spring to come, and set his mind toward that goal. his hunt today had been unsuccessful, and so he busied himself digging a cache and singing a loud, ribald seal hunter's song.

The song caught the attention of Tullik.

She hadn’t been around the pack much, mainly searching the high trails around the mountain peak, readying herself to teach it. But today, she came into the lower parts of the Spear to catalogue every passage leading up.

As it was, she had been loping around the side opposite her ulaq when she heard it. Loud and bawdy in a way her grandmother would have given her a clean cuff on the back of her head for saying.

She started giggling, following the trail with a happy waving of her tail.

You sing very well! It was the Northern man she had spoken to some time before, looking far better than he had in that sick den.

his brightberry eyes fixed to tullik as she approached. "woman who walks mountains," chakliux greeted the young woman, remembering the last things they had said to one another as he lay healing beside quennell.
"i have not seen you in many days," the seal hunter commented, holding himself proudly and with a curious light in his vibrant stare. "where does the stone call you, sandpiper?"

He was strong now, standing on his own two feet, his eyes clear and bright. Moonspear had healed him. Tullik was glad for that.

She drew closer with a sweep of her tail, as to not be shouting over a distance at the poor man.

Many places. The dips where small prey hides, the peaks where only the birds may hear your words. It was a fine mountain, sealing some hole in her heart for craggy peaks.

I mean to teach this come summer. It is safest when it is warm. She tipped her head to the man.

I have heard you have a son now. My congratulations.

tullik came near, and he saw she was like a fox changing beneath the snows. she intrigued him, and moreso as a woman of the snow who did not come from the line of kukutux. "thank you. he is a strong boy."
a daringness touched his eyes. "perhaps you will come to my lodge to meet him." a thought was forming. but first he must see how nasamik welcomed a new one to the home she controlled as seal hunter wife. "you can teach me today. i know the ice." chakliux boasted.

She blinked, then laughed, not twinkling delicate as a lady, but just as hawing as her father.

If you think you can handle ice and rock! She was confident in selecting a path that didn’t kill them both, but served as a humbling. Mountains served no egos.

I would love to meet him. I’ve been meaning to bring a gift for him, but I did not want to intrude.

his teeth flashed in a grin. he patted down the soil of the cache he had half-dug, meaning he would return to finish it another time. "i want to feel the cold. it is becoming too warm!" chakliux hooted, rolling his shoulders and preparing to climb where tullik showed.
"already i am teaching raiyuk to be a hunter. to bite. to smell. he will like things you bring him for this learning."

It was easy to forget another knew her struggles with the heat. She bayed her own laugh in response.

I do not want to imagine summer! It will take us both down at the ankles! Perhaps she would spend the summer at the peak of the Spear.

She already knew she would not, but it was a thought, wasn’t it.

Tullik led the way gamely, confidence in her stride. She had learned this mountain over the months of her being here, and she was sure she was close to learning it all.

I have a few bones he may enjoy chewing on. I will bring them. She said over her shoulder, half focused on Chakliux as she eyed the mountain, mentally charting their course.

"this is good." chakliux enjoyed the mind-image of tullik playing in the clearing outside his lodge with raiyuk. he saw how she traveled upward easily and followed suit with great focus.
"when you are not in the snow, what are you doing, tullik?" the seal hunter asked, taking a moment to marvel out over the height they had come.

She hummed to herself as she walked, an old memory that sat thick on her tongue like sap from a conifer. She didn’t want to think that she was perhaps the only one to know it now.

I track the movement of the goat herds, sometimes. I enjoy seeing how high I can climb on a sheer slope, as they can. Her entire life was mountaineering, and Tullik frowned at the thought that she had nothing else she enjoyed. 

Well, she was a fair bit boring.

Watch your step here. The rocks are picky about how much weight they will carry. As if to demonstrate, a series of small pebbles rolled off down the side of the cliff. Tullik winced to herself.

it felt familiar; it drew the tilt of his ear and then the shine of his eye. "you speak of the mountain as a friend," he commented, focused upon where he placed each paw. it would not do to slip in front of her, even a little.
"there is nothing else you want in your life?" the seal hunter teased, tossing a bit of snow her way. his gaze danced; he meant to tease as well as question.

The snow splatted against her flank and she turned in mock offense, eyes twinkling even as she huffed the man’s way.

Hey! She swatted at Chakliux with a wide swing of her paw, her face quickly blooming into a smile.

The mountain is my friend just as much as I am wary of it. I give it much respect. It can provide and it can kill and I always remember that. The smile slipped from her face as she frowned at her paws.

I do not know. The mountain has been everything to me since I could walk. I dedicated my life to one such mountain. And she had failed that mountain. Her ears began to wilt back at the thought.

he saw the look upon tullik's face, but forged ahead with great boldness. "maybe it is time to come down from the mountain."
here the seal hunter stood fast, the high winds raking through his pale nape; he set his berrybright eyes on her thoughtfully.
"you are unmarried." by the ways of many tribes in the north, by now a man would have already spoken for tullik.

Her face pressed into a grimace, brief but present, before smoothing back out. The periwinkle of her gaze sought the magenta of Chakliux’s, the wind tugging at her fur as much as his.

She sighed.

I am. I was to be, once. But he is…very long gone. The son of a friend of her father, gone just as the rest of her family, her friends.

"i am sorry to hear this." but he was not.
chakliux boldly stepped forward. "i seek a second wife. you should be with a man of the snow." his eyes were radiant upon tullik. "keep it in your mind."
in the next moment, he flashed her a grin and set off higher, pretending to slip upon ice buried in the drifts.

A second wife, her?

Tullik’s eyes went wide, looking for all the world like an eagle viewed from the front, shellshocked expression and all. Away Chakliux went, and her eyes tracked him until he seemingly slipped.

It snapped her out of her reverie enough to laugh at the sight.

Be careful! She called, trotting away to catch up with the snow colored man.

The suggestion buried itself in her mind and sat there to be unearthed when she had the time. But it would remain with her for some time.