The Heartwood [PHE] cloud girl

no posting order, single replies welcome! <3 backdated to oct 12

pleased enough to leave moontide behind, sun eater kept his word to @Anselm and tracked through the foliage inland, until the scent of many gathered wolves became thick. here he planted broad paws and went no further.

"these are the sun wolves. i stay away, with ghelan. we wait here," sun eater decided, gesturing to the overhang of shadowed trees. "two days," he grunted to grey man, looking to @Ksura, glancing at @Brave One. "i wait two days. then we take him home to river."

these warriors had silently raided moontide and taken the boy. sun eater saw no reason to doubt that grey man and sheep killer would return to saatsine's camp when they had finished here. did sheep killer have such business? he was free then to do as he wished, and sun eater would not leave him behind if he wished to depart before grey man was ready.

to his son he jerked his chin now, moving away from the glen and deeper into the woodland.

His instincts told him to get as far from Moontide as possible- and he dreaded the trip inland toward the woodlands where Grey Face had some unfinished business. They could be hunted down, chased- villainized if they were caught. He found himself dizzy from walking down the thin railway edge; the wrong side of the tracks kept pulling him to teeter over.

Sun Eater and his son would wait nearby, for two days. Presumably to avoid conflict- the wolves whose pack they had raided might be here, and the man and his son would likely be recognizable. 

Ksura knew that if he found Wren or Silvertongue amid the gathering that no good could come of it. He’d already held onto the matchstick for too long- the burn of the flame against his thumb was something he now had to embrace. 

I have no business here. He said to the man, once Sun Eater and his son left. I didn’t sign up for any trouble so…You’re on your own. 

He had a wife to return to, a new life to embrace. It had already begun with grief, trespassing, kidnapping…And that was enough of a sacrifice.

his father spoke to the men in tongue just vaguely familiar to ghelan. the boy exchanged no words to either, unsure how to approach the men. they seemed antsy even after they'd long since left moontide. 
the only comfort he could give them was that it would take long for anyone to notice he had gone missing.

his father's gesture interrupts his thoughts. quickly the boy slinks after him, leaving the men on their lonesome.

the trees hung over them like many hands reaching for the skies. this wasn't the open brisk of the shoreside, or the open fields of the plateau, where the sky stretched miles and miles outwards. in the shadows of these woodlands, the little glimpses of the sky he could catch gave ghelan the impression of being trapped. his father, whose body stood out from the brightness of the sun and open breeze, blended in perfectly here.