Stavanger Bay give in to me

As I wrote this, I couldn’t help but think of Szymon going, “LOOK AT THIS BEAUTIFUL MACARONI ART I MADE FOR YOU.” XD

A low chuckle billowed up through Szymon’s throat as Doe danced away, a bird among wolves, and he followed her with a pleasantly drunken gait — but as they neared the beach, his steps gained purpose and he picked up his paws with renewed vigor. Nipping playfully at her shoulder, his fangs clipping on air alone lest he accidentally spill her blood with what was intended to be a loving overture, he moved past her to take the lead, his paws unerringly tracing their way back to the little tide pool. Turning his head with lifted brow, his unwittingly roguish expression eager and unabashed, “Ready?” he thought at her, his twitching tail alive in a series of lashing sweeps that fanned his hips.

Then, with an intense stare, he turned his focus to the pool, ensuring that all of his prizes remained where he’d left them. He brought the snapper and sculpin to her, laying them before her paws; whichever one she didn’t want, he would gladly eat. And nosing delicately in the sand, the granules generously coating the scabbed over bridge of his nose, he scooped the eggs and laid them one at a time before her. His chest swelled with pride, looking at them — he was not such a failure; he was not such a monster if he could safely secure things as fragile as these. Oddly, knowing that he had not broken any of the three gyrfalcon eggs enforced his conviction that he was meant to take care of Doe and offer her the gentleness that lived close and clandestine to the marrow of his bones.

And then it was time for the Big Reveal — the mud shark looked odd without its dorsal fins, but he couldn’t risk any of the bay wolves getting snagged on their venomous spines. He lifted the two and a half foot prize from the tide pool where it lay, the leathery skin cool and strange upon his lips, and he shook it menacingly — just in case she doubted his prowess, or perhaps simply because he was inordinately bigheaded in the face of his recent trophies — before laying it at her feet. He rested his paw on it, though, indicating with an apologetic dip of his narrow skull and a brisk flicker of his twitching tail that this one was not for her. She would understand, he thought — he jutted his muzzle in the direction of the Leviathan’s lair. “S-S-S — ” He faltered, but the sun was still warm — Doe was still with him — and even if he was not touching her, which somehow made speaking more difficult, he reached for her gaze with his own and drew breath, steadying himself. “Sk-Skellig-ge,” he said haltingly, but with more fluency than was his usual wont.