Moonspear workin' on the night moves

No posting order! Next round will begin 11/14 or when everyone has posted. Whichever comes first!

When they'd all gathered, there was only one face that Katmai did not recognize — but he already knew her name, and he offered her a welcoming smile as he did all the rest. He only deviated when Kinusi arrived, at which point his smile was less one of welcome and more one of joy.

With her beside him, how could he feel anything but confidence and ease?

"I wanted us all to stand together today, so that our faces are known to each other," he said to them, after having counted each head in his growing flock. Seeing them like this filled him with something looming and unknown. Like when he looked at Kinusi and felt called to action — only he wasn't quite sure what action he ought to perform. But it was a nice feeling, full of warmth and gratitude, and he was pleased enough to let it curl up in his chest like a dragon in its cave.

"The strength of a village is in the wolves that make their home there," he said, the words coming to him easily.  "Not in our numbers, but in the strength of the bonds we have with one another. But we are many, and we do not all know each other very well yet. It is my hope that I will find these bonds in all of you, so that my strength will be your strength, and your strength will be mine. So that even in sickness or injury, none of us will truly be weak."

He stole a glance at Alaric, just to check the older man's expression. It felt strange to speak before him like this, even if they didn't know one another well. Alaric was still a kind of role model, and he wanted to make the man proud. As proud as his own father might have been.

"And I wanted to ask," he said, moving past the more serious address to speak more candidly with the others, "If any of you have any traditions from your homelands that you wish to bring to this place. We are called Dawnspear to honor our Morningside and Moonspear lineage — but not all of us are Morningside or Moonspear. And I would like to have ways to honor all our pasts, and the long stories that have led us here."