Aine dropped her roughly-made sack of furs. Her nose twitched for a scent... And there it was. Weathered, beaten, and abandoned, the scents of the Horizon Ridge pack had all but disappeared almost completely.
Picking up her fur-bag, which had dried meat in the center, surrounded by salt crystals she had collected over her hunting expedition. She had returned to find not a trace of recent pack activity. Quickly, she tried to find a scent that she recognized. She found a very, very faint trail. Thistle Cloud.
She followed the trail, losing it several times due to other cross-over scents, let alone the fact that it was several weeks cold. But mainly, she was able to keep on the main track.
She was so centered on it, she yelped in surprise when she inhaled the pungent odor of a pack border. Quickly backing off, she looked around to see if anyone had noticed. Slowly she began to turn around, to fall back and think...
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| Ragnar had heard the yelp, off to the distance, his ears twitching to greet the sound before he scented the creature, faint though it was carried on the breeze that was softer here, buffered by the ancient forest that stood between the southern (or is it northern?) borders and the shore. The tall, thick and in some cases gnarled trees that were as old as the All-Father himself if Ragnar had to guess, had many uses and buffering the winds into softer breezes coming from the ocean was definitely one of his favorites thus far. The Jarl wasted no time investigating the sound, preparing himself mentally for another trespasser. The next time, he would not be as lenient as he had been with the girl and her elder companion. A two week servitude to the wolves of Stavanger Bay was kitten’s play compared to what Ragnar could and was entirely willing to do to those who ignored their scent markers and paraded around their home. He was not often in a generous mood when it came to trespassers because he was territorial to his callous and savage core; he’d never had much patience with wolves who exclaimed that they hadn’t known when the scent markers couldn’t be any more of a neon sign that screamed to your face and nose ‘Do Not Trespass’. Or more like it was ‘Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here’.
Having not been very far from the woman who soon came into the view of his gaze of Caribbean ice he studied her carefully as she seemed to back away from the borders. Smart move, the Viking couldn’t help but sneer in his thoughts, as he approached. He did not recognize her as a one time member of Horizon Ridge likely because they had never met and he had been aware of wolves coming and going just as fast. If they did not intend to stay then he did not need to waste his time getting to know them. Abandoning a pack was one of the worst kinds of treason to the platinum, scarred Northman and not one that he took very lightly. It was as just as bad as treason and Ragnar’s culture didn’t punish treason lightly, either. "Did you come close to my borders just to leave?" The Viking asked her, rising his naturally soft and heavily accented voice so it might carry to her as he neared, hoping to catch her and figure out why she had came this far only to turn around. |
She slowly turned, her tail already drooped slightly as a sign of submission. "Er, aye an' nay. I was lookin' fer the Horizon Ridge pack, hmm? It, uh, appears they no longer exist... Ye, uh, wouldn't happen te know a Thistle Cloud, would ye?"
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| She stopped when his voice called out to her, unknowing of her name or that, even, they had once been packmates. It was probably a fluke on his part, as Head Warden, regardless of she had came and went before his promotion to Beta he should have made it his business to at least get acquainted with every wolf in the pack. For a moment as he stopped and stared at her, Ragnar half expected her to ignore him and keep going. He assumed a dominate posture, expressing his rank as Jarl so that there was no question of who he was to this pack. The display was probably excessive but considering he had just dealt with trespassers a few days earlier, of which he had not forgotten, he was bound to be a little harsher at the borders than he normally would have been. The woman, despite Ragnar’s expectation, turned to face him, her tail held low in submission he saw and in accordance relaxed his assertive stance slightly.
He struggled with her own accent, thick as it was, just as he had with Ollie, brow furrowing as he attempted to piece together the accented English (and had a brief moment where he wondered if it was hard for others to understand him like that). Common tongue as his secondary and learned afterwards language had it’s own lines of cons. The important part of what she said, however, he understood (with a little difficulty) and was about to determine that she was looking for Horizon Ridge but they were no more. It wasn’t, necessarily true. Stavanger Bay was the survivors of the Ridge because Ragnar couldn’t entirely claim that Stavanger Bay was Horizon Ridge because they weren’t. Not really. He had began to implement more of his culture’s ways into how he ran the pack though he kept his religion to a minimum and non-mandatory with his subordinates in mind. Just because he was the Jarl didn’t mean he was going to forsake his beliefs. He hadn’t forsaken his Gods or beliefs when he had been nothing but another subordinate in the Ridge and he wasn’t about to do it now. His subordinates were welcome to attend things that revolved around his religion, or enjoy the festivities without believing, he didn’t mind and neither did his Gods. In truth, the religious aspects were for his and his children’s benefit who he was raising to his beliefs.
"The wolves of this pack are survivors of the Ridge, we started over with a clean slate here, pushed into taking action by the intrusion of a pack called Wheeling Gull Isle on our doorstep and the murder of Pump," Ragnar informed her, falling silent as she inquired if he knew a Thistle Cloud. Thistle was his Dröttning, his Queen though she held no official title of it in the pack hierarchy. She was everything to him that Frigg, Queen of the Valkyries was to Odinn. It was a silly question to him but he understood that if she didn’t know he was her husband than it was understandable. "Thistle Cloud is my wife," Ragnar told her stoically, surveying her again. "Why are you looking for her?" He was curious, if nothing else. |
"May she rest in peace..." she said, before opening her eyes again, "Thistle is yer wife? Then ye must be Ragnar." She stopped herself. "My apologies, I had my suspicions that ye were Ragnar, but I just had te make sure..."
She thought before continuing. "I came in search of Thistle for an explanation... I seem te have found it." She thought about asking to join the pack, wondering if Ragnar would say yes.
But if I tried to leave without punishment for being so near his borders... Her mind turned. Her parents had told her of what northmen had did to those they raided... Some were kept for slavery, others killed, and still others... Nope, not even going to think about that one...
She looked up at Ragnar as if she was stepping on eggshells(which she probably was), waiting for him to reply.
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| Pump’s death had not been a peaceful affair and Ragnar didn’t even want to imagine how much she had suffered before she had allowed Odinn to take her. It was ironic and perhaps even hypocritical he realized how it bothered him to think that she had suffered horrendously as the bear attacked her and then dragged her down the shore and yet in the same breath had performed a blood eagle on a traitor of the Cove in the past and had felt no remorse to his suffering. It hadn’t bothered the Viking in the least. Attachment provided prospective, for the moment at least. It was not likely Ragnar would ever forget it but eventually the horror of seeing a friend in that state would fade as time wound on. "I am Ragnar, yes," He responded contemplating the ways in which this woman would know Thistle.
Ragnar waited for her to speak more, and had gotten the wish fulfilled even if it wasn’t quite what he’d been expecting. So…that was it? She had tracked Thistle here to ask a question and then go on her way? That was a waste of trip as far as the scarred Northman was concerned. "Were you apart of Horizon Ridge?" He inquired after letting the silence stretch on for a bit, wanting to solve the mini puzzle of how she knew his wife. Thistle during her pregnancy hadn’t ventured out of Horizon Ridge unless she’d been with him and together they had not came across any other wolves. The only logical conclusions he could assume were that she had known Thistle previous to her pregnancy or that, as he inquired, she had been apart of the Ridge at some point. |
She didn't mean to sound nosy, but she always had an extreme soft spot for pups, and always became soft-clawed around them. Her tailed wagged slightly as she asked the question, hoping to get more than just the answer yes.
Suddenly, though, she remembered her place and lowered her head and her tail. "Oh! My apologies..."
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| The woman answered that she had, indeed, been apart of Horizon Ridge. This made Ragnar wonder why she had left them, though he had had his moments when he had not been necessarily happy at the Ridge, either from a dispute of opinion between Pump and himself or his general dislike of the scarred territory to begin with he had never thought about just up and disappearing. He had, intended, at one point, to break away from Pump but that had been before. "Yes," Came the Viking’s response to her first question, a breath drawn between his answers as he attempted to puzzle out her following words though it was becoming a little easier from hearing her speak consistently. "Three. Two boys and one girl. Ein, Tveir, and Átta." He gave their numbers because it was what they were called (except for he had named the girl in secret). Ragnar shifted his weight then, weighing the options that were present to him, wondering if she had been looking to return to Horizon Ridge. The Ridge was gone but if she sought a home he considered accepting her, if that was what she was after truly. "I am curious," Ragnar began with a trademark coy smirk tugging at the edges of his lips. "Why did you leave?" He did not know if she had told Pump she was leaving or not, mostly because he hadn’t really known her, but still. If she could not offer him loyalty and alliance (and it went without saying dedication) then he had nothing to offer her, in turn. |
She went over to pick up the sack of furs and dried meat. She came over to place it in front of Ragnar. "I have no use for it, however... May it do well for your pack?"
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| The woman, whose name he still was not aware of, despite that she knew of his, corrected him, causing the Viking’s pupils to narrow in their icy and fierce pools when she spoke of a hunting expedition she had went on for the pack. Pump had never mentioned such a thing to him when she had promoted him to Beta and Ragnar had been fairly certain that she had not kept secrets from him. After all, he had been the Head Warden and would have attacked her if she had came waltzing back into pack lands smelling nothing of Horizon Ridge. "Pump never spoke of any expedition she sent anyone on," Besides it had been likely more than a month because his children were over a month old and she had admitted the last time she had seen Thistle the latter had still be heavily pregnant. He eyed the bundle of furs that housed, likely, the meat she spoke of before his gaze rose to her once more. "What is your name?" He wasn’t certain he could trust her, though his trust was hard(er) to come by these days, admittedly. Thistle wasn’t here to vouch for the woman and Ragnar had never heard of her before now. "What will you do now?" If she intended to wander a loner it was pointless to accept what could be food for her; equally as pointless for her to give it away. |
She looked back at him, praying that she wasn't making a mistake and praying that he would say yes. "Ye wouldn' mind if I.. If I asked te join yer pack, Ragnar?" She seemed almost sheepish in saying it, but she asked it with an even tone nonetheless.
| It hadn’t exactly offended Ragnar and really he had no right to claim that she was lying to him, however, if it had been an assignment from Pump he should have known about it and wondered if it had been this woman’s own assignment or if Pump didn’t think it was important enough to inform him of. That thought sent a pang of guilt through the man who had moved her severed body and with the assistance of Surra buried it. She was deceased and he hated to think ill of the deceased and so he shoved those thoughts hastily from his mind. She introduced herself as ‘Aine’ to him and he tucked it away, staying silent as she continued to speak, having to take a longer pause to process her accented words as he attempted to find the full common tongue equivalent. Which despite his fluency in it was harder than he would have expected. Ein had began doing something similar when he had to speak in the common tongue though Ragnar suspected the boy was just trying to mimic Ragnar’s own accent. Either that or it was his way to rebel against the common tongue because it seemed his eldest son favored Norse the most. "What skills can you offer Stavanger Bay?" He asked out of normal ‘meet and greet at the borders’ procedure. She had once been his pack mate as far as she said (he didn’t doubt it because she knew Thistle) but considering he had never met her, never even heard of her he had no idea what she could offer them. "More importantly, do you swear fealty and alliance to me and to my family?" It went without saying that dedication to the pack came hand in hand with those things but if she intended to vanish for months again well…he didn’t know. He wasn’t a temporary home for wandering souls. He created a family not just with Thistle but with the survivors of the Ridge, they were all a family and while family came and went he liked knowing his ranks were solid with those who were loyal to not just him but to one another. |
Aine was obviously a bit prideful on her tracking ability. "Whether it be huntin' down an escapee captive wolf or the weak link in a herd, ye can always count on me to decipher the fallacy from the truth in trackin'."
She looked serious. "I swear full fealty to any pack I join. I would never ask to join yours otherwise."
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| Another hunter to add to their collection and potentially another Outrider. The woman was not particularly modest about her skills as she spoke of them to him though in her defense he had asked her about what she could offer Stavanger Bay. It was not a time for modesty. Inhibition might have held a cost on it if he could not be told with a precision what they could bring with them to strengthen the pack. Even the children, once they became older, would be expected to earn their place and if someone thought they were excused just because they were his would be in for a rude awakening when he kicked them out if they couldn’t prove that they deserved a place within the Bay. Being the Jarl’s children did grant immunity. It hadn’t worked like that in Odinn’s Cove and it wasn’t going to work here in the Bay. Besides having no use for it he had no tolerance for dead weight no matter their connection to him. The Viking’s gaze went down to her offer of fur bundled meats though he made no moves to nose through it and investigate it for himself. He could smell the meat well enough. "I encourage my members to prove to me that they are worthy to hold the trade titles for their skills. You do not have to, the choice is yours but I encourage it." He, himself, held the title of Warden and was working actively on the Outrider skill. "Come, you can distribute your gifts into the caches if you wish along the way but I will give you a tour." With a gesture of his muzzle towards the towering forest behind him and began to lead the way expecting her to keep up with him. |
Aine nodded and picked up the fur bundle. The bag was heavy with salted dry meats and extra pelts. "Thank you, Ragnar." she muffled through her teeth.
She padded over the border to the heart of the territory, the huntress ready to share her gifts with the pack.