Spotted Eagle Mountain This old new sensation

The lake is blue and the mountain watchful. In the east a bank of cloud rises up silently from over the cut of stone, reaching out with spindly pale talons for the desert beyond. He prowls, a darkened silhouette among the trees, content enough to huddle up under the shed of leaves with a downed hare between his jaws while his apprentice recasts herself for her task.

The wind here scintillates with wolf-scent. He expects not to be alone for long.

His paws had him drifting farther from the snow forest. Fallen Sun's leg had finally healed, just in time to explore the mountains he had stumbled into. The scent of wolves permeated the land, bringing both unease and a sense of excitement. 

It had been long since the young male had found himself in the company of his brethren. 

Such a scent grew stronger to his nose, and, curious, he followed swiftly.

Appearing among the giant rocks is the face a young wolf, looking not unlike a lost spirit in search of a grave to haunt. What fortune then, to have come upon charitable Seth! He rounds his body aside, making a space beneath the shade of the white spruce for him to join, if he wished.

“Come,” he purrs, waving the boy forward with an outstretched paw. “Dine with me, stranger.”

The young wolf tilted his head curiously, eyes scanning the wolf for signs of hostility. His ears swiveled, searching. This wolf was darker than his blurry image of his parents and showed no signs of being aggressive. 

.

In fact, the stranger made strange noises from his mouth and it merely piqued Fallen Sun's interest in him more. His paws found themselves nearing the black wolf, sitting near him. 

.

Questions that fizzled into no words mounded themselves in his head, escaping only in a small whine. Did he smell food? That was a more pressing question, and he hoped this wolf had some.

Dry leaves crunch under paw in late spring forests, bones pop under teeth that pull them apart, particularly a little bunny’s skull when it’s tugged from the spine and placed like a fine delicacy at the paws of his guest, floppy ears and all.

“You must be hungry. Eat, visitor. Īrē rā nōfer,” he runs a pink tongue over his dark tresses before catching a hare’s leg with his lips and giving it a heavy bite. The sacred marrow he allows to melt in his mouth, like butter over gums.

“What is your name, traveler?” He asks, with little expectation in hearing it based upon the boy’s silence thus far.

Seth will not mind this. He does not disfavor the quiet.

The stranger's words fell on unknowing ears, the boy's teeth cracking on the rabbit's skull. Bone and flesh were gone almost as quickly as the hare had appeared before him. 

He would never turn down free food, not for a moment.

Fallen Sun turned to the other wolf, tilting his head slightly. He managed a slight chuff, unaware of the meaning behind the noises. 

The young, brown wolf's tail wagged softly behind him briefly, shuffling the leaves under the tree. 

He would know two words, words he didn't know the meaning of, but what he had heard from a blurred face and faded memory, long ago. 

But he couldn't repeat them.

Wordlessly he moves to accept the rabbit head and Seth looks on, still running his tongue along teeth-tinged marrow and smiling at his enthusiasm. When the boy is finished, he tears off a hind leg and places it between his paws. Dessert.

“No matter, wordless ward. We shall call you Rabbit. You seem quite partial,” he snickers and rises to scratch his spine across the spruce’s dried bark.

“What do you dream of, Rabbit?” He wonders idly aloud. “Hopping bunnies?”

“Kings and Gods?” His grin turns devious. “Do you want to know the difference between them, dear Rabbit?”

Fallen Sun, or perhaps Rabbit was a better name for him, chuffed. It... almost sounded like the word 'rabbit', but his tongue could not manage anything more than noise. 

The boy tilted his head at the new sounds, eyes insanely curious. His ears were pointed towards the wolf, his paws fidgeting to get a better seat. He could barely contain himself. 

Perhaps he'd call this one... Soot Teller.

Oh a good lad, a delightful eager one! He moves to gather enticingly closer, a folding of silken limbs across a narrow body, allowing those marrow-suffused lips to braze the tip of a waiting flaxen ear. Will he stir for purpose? Will he wish for something greater? Every wolf needs cause, whether or not they are able to name it.

“Kings talk. Gods listen.”

“You are wise to listen, Rabbit. You will know the gospel which they do not. You will find that men speak without ever once uttering a word.”

Fallen Sun had never much wanted for much in his short life, but he perhaps felt a calling that drove his wayward paws. However, his true wanting would perhaps be odder than himself. 

The more the boy heard the odd noises of the wolves he found himself around, the more he wanted to learn to communicate with them as they did. It was frustrating not to understand, to see their lips and mouths make noises but never be able to hear their meaning. 

I don't... understand... but you seem rather happy to talk. So I'll listen. 

His head tilted, a tiny rrr? escaping him.

There’s the sweet flutter of confusion, the shimmer of unsure emotions on the boy who longs to heed each word, but who perhaps cannot. The shadowy man spares him a woeful little croon, hovering over him. Such a pretty golden child.

“I hope you’ve enjoyed your rabbit's leg, Rabbit. But you see, I too desire a Rabbit's leg,” he turns his sun-eyes on one golden hock and swoops to catch it between his fangs.

Fallen Sun's confusion turns just a smidge too late to dodge out of the way—fear-scent radiating from his pelt. 

What was this? Why? He wasn't sure what this was- 

A growl escaped him, one only vocalizing his state of mind rather than one of a warning. 

What are you doing?

An experiment.

The boy’s face is mere chaos, a growl meant in fear but not warning. A body stiffening. His clutch tightens over the ankle and he gives a few tugs, his eyes glittering and mad, as if to say: I shared with you now you share with me.

Is there self-preservation? Is there fight, and flight? Or is there obedience, submission, trust for one black serpent with a food supply?

The boy's maw rose in defense, displaying a set of youthful white fangs. He was inexperienced and had never fought another wolf. It showed. In his eyes lay a wildfire of confused anger, not understanding this behavior and not taking it well inside. From his throat, a message communicated so clearly without words that a deaf squirrel could understand. 

But Soot-Teller did not give off such feelings, which confused the sun-pelted wolf. His eyes darted from the wolf to his leg. If he had wanted to break his leg or even his ankle, chances are he would've done it already and have disappeared into the horizon. 

Which calmed down the panicked wolf somewhat. His eyes looked down, and his body followed, a confused, growl-edged whine emanating from the silent one.

A snarl yields to whimper. Stiffening to compliance. His torso deflates, like a discarded glove.

Seth might have released him, then. Inquiry successfully tested. Results clear.

Except…he grips stronger, he tugs harder. He creeps back, up into the underwood, dragging the boy along with him by the hock.

His vision sparked, all-consumed by those forest-eyes. Come with me, boy? Are you willing to part with a foot? Where we are going, you will not need it. I shall give to you another.

A yelp gives into a stiff growl, trying to free his leg amidst Soot Teller's grip as he was dragged away.

Was he backing out? 

No, the whining was back, the submission.

The golden-pelted wolf was so confused, he didn't know what to think, on the rare occasion he thought at all.

What did he even want with him?

There’s that delicious confusion, a dwindling resolve followed quickly by acceptance. The older man hauls the flaxen boy up into a twisted thicket, beneath the throng of thorns reaching for tufts of undercoat, and eyes, if they were not careful. Once into the maze he drops the boy’s leg, no explanation offered, then weaves his way out, sipping through the parched entanglement.

He returns to the shade of the tree. Sits. Watches the boy.

“Come, Rabbit.”

Or flee. Return to your warren.

Fallen Sun shook his head after Soot Teller disappeared into the thorns. But, despite the wolf not speaking, he was rather true to his word. His body twisted and twined through the labyrinth of spikes and pain. The boy failed to keep a fair number of them from his pelt as he exited and padded towards the older man. 

He sat down, wincing as he discovered that a thorn had struck its mark on his thigh. 

The silent rabbit stared at the black-pelt's chin, huffing with a what was that for? look on his face. 

I have given you my submission, do not make me regret it. 

Rabbit colored he may be, but that was where the similarities ended.

The boy returns. He could have run, he chose not to.

“What is it you want, Rabbit?” To the young wolf he asks with a tilt of head and a delivery silken.

“Food? Another hare?” He will hunt one now. He will give its entirety to the hungry boy.
Unless, that is not what he wants at all. Unless it is for a greater cause he wishes for enlightenment.

“Or purpose? Choose, Rabbit.”

He rises and walks, out from the shadow of the mountain and the patch of treed land, out into the stretch of valley.

He’s grown tired of waiting.

If he’s trailed by a rabbit, or only his own shadow, alone that is for the young wolf to choose.

He knew little of the words, but perhaps one came to him, that he tried his darndest to speak. In fact, it almost, through utter coincidence, came out as an actual piece of word.

nnnak

He wanted to talk. To understand what it was Soot Teller and the wolves of this wild were saying, and to say words back. Fallen Sun wanted to talk.

Perhaps then, he'd better understand what the black wolf wanted.

“Follow then, boy,” splits the air, the gibberish going otherwise unacknowledged. There would be time for training, time to put words upon a tongue, only as needed. “But know you enter the realm of Kings and Gods. Know your life will be in service to them– and to me.”

Paws sink into the glade, he turns a hungry look to the flaxen wolfling. “Do as commanded and you will have all the rabbits you can desire. All the purpose, too, if such a thing is what you seek.” He aligns himself with the horizon, pace steady and pooling.

“They will think you simple, Rabbit. It is good to be. It’s the ones no one imagines anything of that holds power. You will make moves no one expects– for who expects anything from a Rabbit?”

His head tilted in eager confusion at Soot Teller's words, but the younger wolf followed his elder as if he were a duckling lining up behind its mother. After all, it wasn't as if he had anything better to do, and the man seemed to promise food.

Fallen Sun trotted behind him, not quite understanding what was happening but curious and happy for it at either way. Somehow or another, he had proven himself to this wolf, and perhaps this wolf would even help in his quest for an arsenal of words. 

Maybe then easier communication could be found.