Heron Lake Plateau as scarlet flowers lust for the dew of morning

I went into ramble land, oops.  Like 2/3 of this is him off being a doofus on his own, so don't mind me.

And with Alill having left (who he worried about only because of what happened with Towhee), Qui had felt like there wasn't any danger with anyone remaining interfering with Raven's heat -- he was pretty sure he'd gotten his point across to Rye, and every other guy was family.  But that made him a little bit more concerned about the borders.  If Towhee was spending more of her time with Phox's pups, then he totally had to make sure to pick up whatever slack where he could so no strangers got any ideas.  It wasn't like he wanted Raven patrolling right now, despite her (finally!) stepping back up to alphaship beside him.  But y'know what, other than the fact he'd maybe be a little sleep deprived by burning the candle at both ends, it was gonna be a good week.  A good season from now on, he hoped.  It definitely put him in a different sort of mood that was definitely unlike the grim man.

In all honesty some of his behavior was probably more befitting a bird than a wolf.  If he had to leave to pretend to be all focused and responsible (he was not entirely focused), he felt like he should bring back a gift for Raven to apologize for his absence.  Food was an obvious choice, and another time he found something for her herb cache.  But uh.  Now what?  Impressive bones and antlers didn't just appear out of nowhere, so that was off the list...  The patrol he'd gone out on hadn't found anything amazing and he'd totally failed trying to catch a fish... And now she was calling and he was a damp penguin without a pebble or another goofy feathered metaphor.

He did have a bit of a secret weapon.  Maybe.  He was only like 50% sure.  Qui had found what was maybe more useful plants growing in a nice little patch just the other side of the river, but he was planning to go compare to what she had stored to see if it did match or if it was just some kind of unique looking plant that stuck out because he was desperately trying to find something.  So he could very well end up looking like a dunce, but he'd play that card if he had to.  And his logic was kind of fleeting at this point too, because yeah.. That's the other side of the river.  You know.  Out of the territory.

After dancing indecisively in place for a moment, he moved to intercept, hurriedly trotting along to find her.  And really, it didn't take long -- they were pretty well magnetized to each other, and as soon as Qui spotted her silhouette he was running over to meet her with a happy whine and a wildly waving tail.  He was buzzing with a sort of anxious energy, nuzzling and licking her face like he hadn't seen her in a day or two.  On a normal day he was quite happy to spend a good chunk of time in her company, but right now she was positively addicting.  Why'd he leave her side earlier, again?  Oh yeah, pretending to be responsible.  So, patrol is over? he said with a lopsided grin.