Wheeling Gull Isle And We'll Go A-Waltzing Matilda No More

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The strange bitch jumped and spun toward him, and Driftwood jumped in turn. He folded his ears back and his legs down on themselves a little; he was seriously beginning to doubt the wisdom of his decision to visit his old home. Obviously no one he knew was here anyway... He did wonder with a pang though whether Moorhen's old woodpile was still intact. Or the den he had helped to dig, or any of the caches he had stored... how much had these intruders already desecrated anyway? He looked at the girl with confused and concerned golden eyes, his paws continuing to restlessly shift beneath him. Uh, I, uh—sorry, I just—

Then it was quite suddenly his turn to be snuck up on. At a low barking noise from behind him Driftwood leapt up in the air and pirouetted, coming down in a wild-eyed crouch with the fur along his spine standing on end in alarm—he resembled nothing so much as a scalded cat, one who seemed afraid that this second wolf might have brought him a freshly boiling tea kettle. I, uh, that's, I... I-I'm Driftwood, he finally managed to get out. I live here—er, I used to live here, I mean, and I just... wondered if perhaps you ladies might need any help, he finally petered out lamely with some fresh foot-scuffling to accompany the words.

Perhaps he really ought not feel so embarrassed and wrong-footed; after all, not having taken note of the fresh markings Padma had tried to leave obviously within the path of any passers-by, so far as Driftwood knew he had as much right to be here as either of these strangers. More, arguably, if you asked him; but it was a good thing that despite whatever begrudging resentments might be smoldering deep within he hadn't really intended to come marching in and boldly reclaim these lands from the others who may have washed up here since him, because he was making a piss-poor show of it if so. Undersea had always tried to be accommodating to those who found their way to the island, though, and Driftwood reasoned to himself (though he was unable to quite feel it in his bones entirely true) that it oughtn't make any newcomers to Wheeling Gull any less welcome if drifters continued to find themselves cast up on the island's shores now that the pack that had lived there had gone their separate ways. H-h-how long have you been here? he asked of the unfamiliar girls as he crouched there uncertainly, his worried eyes darting from one figure to another and his tail held in a rigid slight curve down between his hocks. Not the most intimidating of interrogations, obviously, but it was a start at least. He was rather desperate to know what had happened to his old haunts, and wished to at least catch a glimpse or hear some reassuring more-recent description, but found himself very uncertain he would even get that far.