Moonspear the heavens swung their blinding gates

Persistent, ever persistent, snowfall continued to smother them. Smother was the word that Dirge decided to plucl from thin air on yet another overcast day rife with more snow than he cared for. If spring was drawing ever near—of that hr was certain—then winter would only tighten its hold until it could grip no more. Long covered were the juts of dark shale and granite and now only the juts of rocks just as long loosened from the crag stood out in the depths of quiet wood. He passed by them quietly, an earthen shade in a world that remained droll in its palette.

It irritated him in varying degrees; the rolling ebb and flow tide of wolves in their season, the not long lapses of sunny weather did not aid him much either. He longed to stretch his limbs and head for open plain but doing so was a fool's errand, and getting caught in vastness was a longer plummet to a swift end than going haphazard over a cliff edge into the void. He kept his frustrations to himself, though a tense sort of terseness had unfurled across his features and set into the absence of his swaggered gait.

The borders loomed ahead and along him as he shifted to follow, seeming more like tempting sirens singing lost across snow-swept grounds. He bickered over options internally; sure, the snow was light now but it had not abated and surely seemed it would not today. Then there was the matter of foxes and cougars and all manner of other beasts bound to be lurking as well. He didn't know the details in depth but had gleaned enough, which all and all made the borders the most exciting locale in reach that would have a lesser chance of getting him into trouble. Maybe. Dirge was no mathematician. With a huff and a shake of his coat to set his fate, he decided to patrol.