Otatso Wetlands sandhill

He blended in with the cranes, which paid him no mind as he sifted through the muddy waters with his sensitive whiskers. Long legs kept only the wispiest fur of his belly and chest dry, but as he lifted his head from the water, it beaded brown and brackish down his throat.

Leathery nostrils flared as he took in the scents around him. There were wolves nearby; he was wary of them, but not even a wolf could begrudge him his current place.

His head dipped once more, long neck curving like those of the birds around him as he fished once more through the mud. Something slippery brushed his whiskers, and with a lightning-quick snap, he closed his teeth around a catfish that came out of the water already thrashing.

His neck arced as he tossed the catfish away from him. It landed still flopping madly in the grass.

Gonna say this is set while Tybault is missing from the pack!

It was a sight of a wolf among the birds which finally pulled him from his blind panic. Tybault halted where he stood, only studying the figure from a distance for a time. A wolf, or... not quite a wolf? All he knew for sure was that the stranger was a man, and that he was fishing.

He approached in a wide arc around the pale figure, allowing him and his kill a respectful berth. The last thing he needed was to get into a fight. To draw more blood. At that thought Tybault sucked in a sharp breath and looked away, perhaps trying to pretend he hadn't noticed the other man. Poorly.

The wolfscent grew stronger. Wildflower caught a flash of gold at the tail-end of his throw and nearly faltered. He didn't, but he did stand very still and quiet as he regarded the male in the aftermath. The avoidant turn of his head intrigued him when it seemed to Wildflower that the man must have sought him out.

"You hungry, then?" he asked in low, easy tones. "Go on then and take it. There's plenty more in here."

He'd even fish the man a second one. He looked like he needed — not a fish, maybe, but something. Something Wildflower didn't feel prepared to provide, whatever it may be, but what he did have was a fish.

That... wasn't what he'd expected. Tybault blinked, silent for a moment as he took in the offer. Uh... sure, What was he doing? Thanks.

He wasn't even hungry, he didn't think. Or maybe he was? A few tentative steps took him closer, tension fading from his posture in favor of something more open. Something — friendly.

Maybe he was really losing his mind. He just didn't want to be alone right then.

If he were inclined to think of minds as things that could be lost, he might've thought the same as Tybault. The he was going crazy, offering up his supper like this instead of going for the throat. But he was sick of fighting, and he had never been one to let his mind run away from him. He was possessive even of his thoughts, and each one became part of him in a way that made this new development feel natural.

He gave food to strangers, now. Of course he did.

"Sure," he replied, still low and still easy. He wanted everything to be easy. Everything to be mellow. As long as he kept his voice even, he could keep his teeth behind his lips. As long as he kept his teeth behind his lips, he could avoid the pain and upheaval of violence.

"Y'know, you've got the brightest eyes I ever seen," he commented, because he'd thought it, and now it was part of him. His tone gave no hint as to how he meant for the words to be taken. "You ever seen a gold ring before?"

Mature Content Warning

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The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: Suicidal ideation

Tybault, on the other hand, caught each new thought like floating embers in bare palms; unprepared for himself, for his own intensity and how it could burst to flame there against his skin in a second. His thoughts had always been less a part of him than some feral fire-fanged thing blazing errant and without a care, a force of destruction he'd always stifled.

There was no stifling it now. He felt unmoored, all cinders drifting and ash in the wind and still burning, always burning. Tybault studied the coywolf as if he'd never seen another person before, as if he half-thought he might be dreaming. Maybe he did. He couldn't be sure what he was thinking just then.

A gold ring...? He repeated, not really registering the words for a moment. All his words came slowly, distracted. Uh, no. Can't say I have.

It was weird. Just having a conversation like this when he felt like screaming, he felt like hitting something, he felt like throwing himself off a goddamn cliff. And there he was. Just talking.

It didn't seem that the man would be attacking him anytime soon. Wildflower was still wary, but not so much he felt the need to keep the same distance between them. He waded to the edge of the pool and pulled himself out, revealing the wild, rangy figure he possessed. He gave a hard shake before coming nearer still, long legs carrying him sedately to stand a short distance away.

"Men wear 'em," he elaborated. "On'ner hands. They're yella like wheatstalks, but they shine like the sun."

He looked at the fish, which was still flopping weakly in the grass.

"Aw — go on, bright eyes. Put us outta our misery," he insisted, waving toward the fish. "It's lookin' at me all sorry-like."

Men? Hands? Tybault blinked, still too distracted by the strangeness of it all to really register anything else. Least of all the fish. The fish that was twitching around pathetically while they —

Okay. Yeah. The fish. He stepped forward to end its struggles, still a little dazed. His eyes found the coywolf again.

Wheat, He repeated slowly. Been a long time since I've seen any of that. The man spoke oddly. Tybault had only just noticed that.

It's probably all ash by now, He mused half to himself. Yeah, he was losing it alright. The Gilded Sea. The Ashen Sea, maybe. Tybault might have laughed at that if he wasn't already aware that he was acting very strangely.

Was this how Reverie felt?

Slowly, Wildflower was getting the impression that this man wasn't the quickest draw in the west. There was some break between mind and reality that took an extra moment to bridge. The part of him that was still Coachwhip didn't doubt he could still do some damage — but, conversationally? Even Wildflower could talk circles around him.

Maybe he would.

The coywolf's tail wheeled in encouragement as the man slowly connected up his dots. Privately, he wondered what sort of picture Tybault made of it — but, since Wildflower was not all too sure about what they looked like either, he didn't hold this against the man.

"Are you alright, cher?" he asked, his voice gentle. He could smell blood on the man, which was not unusual for a wolf, but... "Are you hurt?"

There it was: the question he'd been dreading. Are you alright? Are you hurt? He hesitated, caught between the urge to tell the guy to fuck off and the urge to — burst into tears. Definitely not.

He swallowed hard instead, gaze breaking from the coywolf in favor of the fish he still wasn't sure he wanted. No, No, he wasn't alright. No, he wasn't hurt.

I uh... Tybault hesitated — but why not? His family hated him for it already. Surely adding some stranger to the mix couldn't hurt. I hurt someone I love.

Ah — so this was the other kind of hurt. The kind that went hand in hand with violence, Wildflower had decided. He let out a soft breath and let himself down to his haunches. It was gonna be one of those talks, it seemed like.

He wanted to comfort the man. He wasn't sure he deserved it, but what did anyone know about what anyone else deserved? Wildflower knew he wanted to be comforted, and so he assumed the same was true for everyone else. And he wanted to do what people wanted — he wanted people to be happy. He wanted to make people happy.

But he didn't know how to do that.

"Ah," he said, as if that explained everything to him. But he asked, "Did you mean to?"

It occured to him all over again that this might be a dangerous man. All he could think was that they were in good company.

Does it matter? I did it.

His voice was hollow. For a long moment he went silent, still staring at the lifeless fish. It'd suffered so much longer than it'd needed to — all for his indecision. But that wasn't anything new, was it?

But I didn't mean to. Of course I didn't.

Reverie, he thought, was the one person he'd never meant to hurt. In childhood she'd often guarded their siblings from his wrath in her own soft way — but maybe she'd been the one in danger all along. Tybault shook his head slightly as if to ward such thoughts away.

It's fucked, y'know. You spend your life thinking you know what you're doing - thinking you've got it right, and then one day shit comes crashing down, He drew in a breath. And you realize you don't know shit about fuck.

Black whiskers quivered. Wildflower wanted to laugh, but thought better of it.

"It matters to me," he replied, hoping the other man would see the reason in this. Perhaps it didn't matter to his loved one. That was reasonable, too. Perhaps it didn't matter to the stranger, either. Removed as he was, Wildflower thought that nothing ought to matter to him more than intention.

The man was out of control. He ought to leave, then.

But he hadn't meant to do it. Wildflower ought to stay.

He licked his lips; the only sign of his anxiety.

"My name's Wildflower," he said, watching the man's face. "I never knew a thing a day in my damn life, neither." His teeth showed, but his smile was wry and kind. "You get over it. Give it some time. Or give it plenty."

Wildflower. A pretty name; Tybault wasn't sure where the errant thought came from, nor how it slipped past all his defenses to sit at the front of his thoughts. He wanted to be irritable about it. Except he didn't.

His eyes only left the fish once, only briefly, only long enough to catch the flash of teeth and the kindness written into slim coyote features he couldn't seem to let himself look at for too long. Tybault, He offered, finally reaching for the fish, but only to bring it closer and offer it back to Wildflower, slow and deliberate in all of his movements. The man's nervousness hadn't escaped him. Don't think I'm actually hungry.

Just lonely.

Tybault sat then, hoping that particular subtext wasn't as loud as it felt.

He was amused by how careful they were with each other. Perhaps Tybault wasn't afraid of being hurt by him, but he was afraid of him in his own way. How fearful they had to be even in friendly conversation! The world never stopped being cruel.

Wildflower was done playing its games.

He offered Tybault a wry smile.

"You can watch me eat," he offered, his tone suggesting this was a rare treat while his eyes laughed at them both. He was empathetic, though. They said the worst thing a coyote could be was lonesome — and maybe he wasn't a full coyote, but he had the same fear in his heart. He wondered if it wasn't just the same for full-blooded wolves, too, and then decided it didn't really matter. Any amount of lonesome was a sorry state to be.

So he ate, forcing his shoulders to relax while he did. Maybe he'd die this way. Maybe that would be about as much as he deserved.

He managed a brief flash of a wry, tired half-smile, if only to acknowledge the humor in Wildflower's eyes. Joke or not, however, that was exactly what Tybault ended up doing: watching him eat.

It didn't feel as awkward as it sounded. At least, not to him. Instead he found himself distracted by the little details he hadn't noticed before. The rose-gold tinge to his muzzle, the flecks of it here and there among the moon-silver of his fur. The tall ears and the delicate taper of his mouth. The taut shoulders, loosening slowly.

Somewhere in watching him, Tybault had settled again. He looked away abruptly, ears heating as he became aware of the open admiration behind his own gaze. What the fuck was wrong with him?