Porcupine Ridge x ilukutak

✹☾❂

Eleuthera couldn’t help but smile as the man spilled several mouthy syllabi as his name, an epithet which she knew to be reflective of the cultures that lay north, living almost entirely amongst snow. At least, the willow wolf mused to herself, she wasn’t the only one with a name that proved to be a mouthful — a jumble of consonants and vowels that somehow, over the course of a lifetime, came to represent them as individuals. She was Eleuthera, and he was Kigipigak. There was little they could do about it, if they had wanted to.

The question was turned back unto her, and she bit her lip demurely, waiting a beat before answering. Identifying herself, and her vague allegiances, was not as secure of a thing as it was before. Eleuthera no longer had the strength of her pack behind her... and did not have the confidence of a wolf who did.  “I am Eleuthera, of…” she tasted the words upon her lips before they were uttered. “of the willows, far below.” If he was so deep amongst the mountains here, she saw that it was unlikely he did not know the willows — and the scent of the pack which faded as every sun went to set. “I am well acquainted with the packs of the area,” Eleuthera pondered, toeing a small patch of dirt beneath her toes. “The watch, you say?” The name was new to her, and the tides of packs and power, it seemed, were always ever turning.