Stavanger Bay everyone, step aside; this is the last warning

Had Szymon been privy to Doe’s present thoughts, he would have stopped short and simply stared at her pretty, sharp-featured face in disbelief; he was, after all, venturing into the confusing maelstrom of love and affection for the first time in his life. The lowest ranking member in his home pack and a youth besides, he had kept as far away from all of his siblings as possible, with the exception of Skellige — and although at least one of his older sisters must have been receptive at some point, he would have been so overwrought that he never would have noticed the warring males’ — or Jaglon’s, if it came to Ksenia — renewed and fervent interest in them.

Growling pleasurably, the sound dropping to a low hum as Doe repeated his odd embrace, Szymon turned his head obligingly and chuckled at her sloppy overtures of affection — a deep and rolling sound accompanied by the joyous thwp-thwp-thwp-thwp of his wagging tail. The perfume of her breath carried for him an intoxicating, ambrosial allure — he liked fish, anyway — and he nibbled and licked at the crest of her slate-furred neck as she burrowed her face against his chest. “M-My l-l-lovely girl,” he crooned to her at her question, “no.” He hadn’t been around the densite all that much over the past few weeks. Border marking kept him busy, for they required constant refreshing until the perimeters were worn with his paws; he left visual markings as well as scent markings — dragging fallen logs and driftwood when he could, adoring them with the tufts of his fur and blood of his kills and abuse of his talons when applicable.

It was at this point he remembered he had brought gifts with him, but if she was going to show him the den anyway, perhaps they could do a mutual sharing of All the Things. “H-Have something to sh-show me?” he questioned haltingly, but with more fluency than he could boast at other times or in other places in his life. At her reply, “H-Have some — th-thing — to show you, too,” he added teasingly, his teeth preening her shoulder. His tongue swept the fur there, and he watched with rapt fascination as the slate gray fur, once pushed aside, revealed a paler, more vulnerable undercoat.