King Elk Forest that is so not my motto.

Well I looked again and realized you hadn't actually said Mariposa's stomach growled aloud, whoops... if you want me to go back and change this to delete that out, lmk.  ;) 

To a point Owen had been reluctant to go very far from home. His lengthening young legs were starting to grow itchy and restless, however, and tired of seeing all the same snow-covered sights whose scent was likewise dampened by the presence of the cold white stuff. (Stuff that frankly Owen was still not quite convinced might not secretly be at least part stardust, in all honesty, but that was a different story for another day.) What he didn't want to do was repeat his sister's escapades of recent days, so he kept making longer detours around the edges of the various patches of water to the south, regardless of how thickly the ice seemed to be covering them. Owen stopped for a little while to rest at the edge of Verdant Basin, then, regarding the lake with a shiver, swung wider yet around the treacherous water's edges and passed under the trees where he felt safer.

The snow was less thick upon the ground here, save for where the occasional tree had managed to dump its branches' burden and make the piles even deeper. But some of the ground was almost clear, if a pup was careful where he walked. Owen wended his way unevenly through the trees, casting a cautious look upward where a partial umbrella of tree-clutched snow still obscured large patches of sky, only to stop short and prick his ears at what sounded like... a small, strange growl nearby? Owen's hackles rose, and he hunched his head down, sniffing with wide eyes as he toyed with the notion of turning back for home, or at least backing off far enough to see if there was a braver sister or parent nearby that he could yell for. But he'd come all this way to encounter new and interesting things, hadn't he? So after a minute's hesitation Owen stalked carefully forward to get a better sniff and perhaps catch a glimpse of whatever it was that had made the small sound. It might have been a growl, true, but it had sounded pretty small, at least... so if it was something looking to challenge Owen's trespassing on its turf he figured he could probably outrun it in a pinch. Hopefully. His ears perked higher and his eyes grew saucer-like, as his nose inhaled more deeply and caught wind of the scent of a youngish and unfamiliar girl. He heard her take a few deep breaths, and homed gradually in on the noise's location.

Hey! he called softly after another few hesitant steps and another moment of deliberation. He padded a few more venturesome steps forward to climb partway up one of the bigger snowpiles, from which he could survey the area and get a look at the stranger. Who're you, and how come you're all the way out here? Owen frowned a little, his brow creasing slightly as he considered the female before him. Something about her reminded him of his sisters, some. Not the coloring, certainly; maybe it was something in the way she carried herself. Or the adventurous distance she probably had just traveled, though that was a bit of an assumption since she certainly hadn't come from the Plateau itself. Y'got snow on your back, by the way, he pointed out, green eyes flickering over the dusting of white on her ruff. ...And...was that me you were trying to growl at a little bit ago? A hint of hurt crept into his eyes and voice at the notion, along with a slight whining undertone of his own, to sort-of match the other's plaints. It really wasn't fair if she was growling at him...he hadn't even done anything, geeze! But if she wasn't...well, that was more worrying, in its way, because then it must be something—or someone—else that had inspired the attitude. And while Owen didn't see anything about worth growling at at first glance, that didn't mean there wasn't something nearby. Hiding. Maybe while it colluded with the cold scent-dampening starstuff, here.