The Heartwood No one seems to keep

The growl of the larger wolf gave way to words again and Heph considered them. She wondered, briefly, if they would believe the truth, that she had simply been wandering, or if they were already convinced she harbored some deeper secret. But it was something easy enough to answer and while some other day she may have toyed with the cadence of her words to suggest a deception where there was none she answered plainly, somewhat flattened by the tension in the air. Her shoulders shrugged, the movement ruffling her mane a bit but her tone stayed steady rather than bouncing into dips and arcs. "Passing around, I was thinking of heading north." She had also been thinking of heading south and west and east as well, but none of those plans had really solidified into her head until she had spoken them. But she did not fancy her chances traveling into pack lands and she also had no wish to retrace her steps so north it was and she confirmed it to herself at least until the moment when her fancy changed. After all who knew what she would find up north of these lands, she knew that at some point there might be water, but if the game was not good or the terrain untraversable she would change her direction again.

She had settled her gaze somewhere around the larger wolf's shoulder, easily resting ambiguously between the smaller and larger of them. But as the one tucked against the chest of the other spoke again, this time with a sharp bite to her words that promised a threat she felt her attention shift slightly lower, not discounting the other, still aware of his movements, but not focused. Such serious words to hold so little and the alliteration slipped off the silver-eyed one's tongue almost like poetry but even the threat was in the form of a question. If it were said almost mocking or with a tilted head or lilted voice or even huffed through bits of laughter she might have taken it as an invitation as it were she was not sure how to answer such a demand. Her inflection lightened, not curling around a joke, half-hesitant but no tremors made it truly unsure "That is the truth," The end trailed off, not a proper question but not a proper statement either, missing the dip and raise of query or the hard stop of a sentence.