Moonspear i miss those days

@Wraen! So sorry this took forever!

 

For once, Rannoch did not wake up to gloomy clouds overhead. The day had begun unlike its recent predecessors; a gentle wash of peach greeted Rannoch as he opened his eyes, and instantly he was drawn from the comforts of his den. 

Although the chill slapped Rannoch in the face as he emerged from his warm sleeping quarters, he paid no mind to it. He was thoroughly entranced by the spectacle overhead. He forewent his usually stretching routine, and instead meandered as his eyes lingered on the sky overhead. 

Wintertime was usually a time in which Rannoch recalled the hardships in his life; the unpleasant weather made for abhorrent thoughts to occupy him when he was by himself. But, for once, his mind was absent of the constant worries and reminders of his past; he was at peace. 

Sighing happily, he sat with a smile on his face; he could understand why Liffey found joy in looking at the sky.

Wraen had returned to the place, where they had left the cougar's corpse few days earlier, and was relieved to see that the night-crawlers and scavengers had done a good job at cleaning almost all of it away. She had been a little at loss, what to do with the mangled body, because, while eating carnivores like fox or occasional coyote at times of a desperate need, was acceptable, she could not bring herself to touch the cat's flesh. Either because of the bad memories or the rancid stench. She just could not eat it or store it away without having that horrible taste in her mouth. 

There were tufts of fur and some bones scattered around, but everything else was gone. On her way back to her comfy den, she decided to make a detour and see, how Liffey was doing. Unlike Wraen, who had suffered minor injuries, she had got some really nasty ones, which she had laughed off at the time, but things could change for the worse once the adrenaline rush died down. 

Liffey she did not find, but Rannoch was there - sitting proud and tall in the morning sunshine. "Hey!" Wraen announced her arrival from afar and closed the distance between them quickly. "Good morning!"

Rannoch turned to face Wraen, his expression as bright as the sky overhead. "Wraen!" he rejoined with evident relief in his voice. Although he knew that Wraen had survived the cougar attack, it was a relief to him to see her out and about. "Good morning!" he called as he stood. 

Once Wraen was in front of him, Rannoch affectionately bumped his muzzle to the underside of hers. "How's everything been?" Rannoch asked as he pulled away from their embrace.

"Oh, I am fine, can't complain about anything," Wraen replied and sat down. "You seem like doing ok, as well," she commented after looking the tall guardian up and down and making sure that he - unlike Terance - wasn't sporting any new injuries and soon-to-be battle scars. It was funny, how two people could do exactly the same job, but the outcomes could be wildly different. 

"Is Liffey here?" she asked, craning her neck to look behind Rannoch, in case his mate was hiding somewhere near, then turned her gaze back to her friend. "She got beaten pretty badly, though Terance got the worst of us all."

Rannoch was happy to hear that Wraen was doing well; she deserved a little peace after the ordeal with the cougar. "I am," he affirmed with a wag of his tail; Rannoch felt the best that he had in months, despite everything that he had been worrying about. 

When she asked about Liffey, Rannoch shook his head. "I think she got an early start to her scouting today," Rannoch said as he turned to face the den behind them briefly. "I'm not where she headed off to today," he elaborated with a frown.

"Glad to hear that," Wraen was relieved - if Liffey was up and running, then she must feel a lot better. They both had been hysterical messes few days ago and it had taken time for her to recover fully. 

"Well, then - let's make best of our run-in," the gears in her head were turning, coming up with a plan for an activity they could do together. "Hungry?" she asked, because, if he was, then she had the best sea-food restaurant in mind.

Rannoch smiled at Wraen's sentiment. "I'm glad to see you out and about, too." Although his worrying over Liffey had been prominent, the Epsilon had worried for Wraen and Terance as well. 

The inquiry of Rannoch's appetite caused a rumble to sound from the pit of his stomach; he had neglected breakfast to marvel at the sky. "Yeah, pretty hungry," Rannoch replied with a laugh as he hoisted himself onto his paws. "You have anything in mind?" Although he had his preferences, Rannoch was not a picky eater.

"Let's just say that I have my secret sources," Wraen replied with a mischievous smile and beckoned Rannoch to follow her. They would have to travel a little outside Moonspear to a round lake not far from Bramblepoint. She had checked it few days earlier and though it had been covered in ice then, crows had been flocking around one end, where there was a break in the ice and they had been fighting over dead fish. 

"We will have to walk some distance to reach the spot, but on the plus side - a conversation with no invisible ears listening, no invisible eyes watching," she added with a laugh. "How is Terance doing?"

"Secret sources?" echoed Rannoch with a smirk. "I'm intrigued," he revealed with a wag of his tail as he followed after Wraen. Rannoch nodded to the information that followed; he was relieved to hear that they would be just beyond Big Brother's reach. 

"He's doing... okay," Although Terance had been more present in their patrols, Rannoch still worried about his injury from the cougar attack. "Much better than before, though. He told me about his injury— said it wouldn't heal right. I feel bad about it. I should have been there to help." He frowned, unable to mask his guilt. "Your injuries are healing well, aren't they?" Rannoch asked while he briefly examined Wraen's gait; she seemed fine to him.

"Well, unlike Terance, who has a knack of removing flesh from his body," Wraen began, giving Rannoch a look that said she knew other, less violent ways of, how to lose weight, if that was an issue, "I got slapped accross the face and aside from a sore cheek and swollen eye for a few days, nothing worse happened to me."

"But, what about his... lack of lust in living?" she asked, having no better description for the term "deppression", which she did not know. "When we last talked heart-to-heart," she winced at this memory, "he told that this comes and goes for him."

Rannoch exhaled, his relief evident. "I'm glad nothing more happened to you." Physically, of course. Rannoch couldn't even begin the mental trauma that this incident may have caused any of the wolves involved. 

"Yeah, it does," Rannoch confirmed, "Lately, it seems as though he's had more good days than bad." There had only been one instance where they had forewent their patrol because of Terance's depression. "I think he might be getting better now that he knows whats going on," he reported; Rannoch had no idea of how depression worked.

"Yeah, but it is always there, isn't it?" Wraen did not like the idea that her brother might have a "disease" and that there was no cure for it. A magical herb that would fix, whatever was wrong with Terance. Because this reminded all too much of Osprey, except besides of just having bad days, she had seemed physically ill as well.

"It's good that you are keep an eye on him," she was grateful that Rannoch was such a good and trusted friend, because she knew that despite their heated argument about being truthful and honest with each other weeks ago, Terance would still not tell her, when he was going for worse. "I mean, in his chivalrous attempt to keep me out of harm's way and hiding his weakness, I am afraid to miss the last moment and that at one point he would be beyond help."

"It appears that way," Rannoch replied. There was still so much about Terance's condition that Rannoch could not grasp. "There's so much about it that I'm still figuring out," he admitted, "But I'm going to do whatever I can to help him." 

Rannoch turned to face Wraen, and he offered her a smile. "I can understand that worry— I'd feel the same way if I were in your paw steps. But, between us looking out for him, I think that we'll catch anything bad before it becomes too drastic." 

"Yeah... he is not gonna leave us without our permission," Wraen joked, but truly hoped that there would not come a day, when Terance simply slipped through their fingers. Losing him to such a disease was worse than having him dead.

"What about the love interest of his? Any progress?" she asked next, because Terance had mentioned that besides friends and a new family he had found love here as well. But since she had never caught him and the lucky lady "red-handed", she wanted to know, if the matter was so secret that only his best friend knew about it.

"Yeah, he's stuck with us forever," Rannoch quipped. Whether Terance liked it or not, they would always have his back. 

The mention of Terance's infatuation brought a frown to Rannoch's lips. "If there's anything going on between them, he hasn't told me about it," he admitted, "Which is odd to me. Terance tells me everything. " 

"Oh, in that case everything is clear - he has a boyfriend already," Wraen joked and bumped her hip against Rannoch's. Had it been true, she would not have minded, as long as her brother was treated with respect and love he deserved. Reasonably so - as a sister - she thought that her sibling deserved nothing less than the very best. 

"What about you and Liffey - it's none of my business, but do you have any plans for the future?" having heard this and that about the circumstances they had joined Moonspear, she had had a feeling that this would never really be a permanent setting for them.

"He wishes," Rannoch returned in jest; he was oblivious to the feelings that Terance harbored for him deep-down. 

When asked about Liffey, Rannoch's expression softened— they very mention of her tended to give him the warm and fuzzies. "We're good. We're thinking about starting a family this year," he licked his chops, unable to hide his excitement.

"He can wish all he want, I want to see, how he gets through Liffey first," Wraen grinned - because if that woman had the courage to take down a cougar, imagine what she would do to anyone, who set their eyes on Rannoch.

"Wow - that's great news," she was a little surprised to hear that, because they were the same age and she still felt like she had just had started to live on her own to think about children so soon. "How... will that sit well with Charon and the rest of the clan?" she might be wrong, but they did not seem like people, who were open to new blood aside from their own.

Post 600!

Congratulations on 600 posts!

 

Rannoch chuckled. "Liffey would win for sure." Although Terance was tough, Liffey was tenacious, and in the fabricated situation, Rannoch could see her winning for that reason alone.

"I... don't know," Rannoch admitted with a frown; the notion of seeking permission from Charon and Amekaze was sobering. Like Wraen, Rannoch suspected that the Ostregas would not be keen about another family reproducing. "I can only hope that they hear us out and consider it," he said through a coerced smile.

"For your sake I hope so too," though Wraen harbored hardly any optimism of those two getting a permission. She could not speak for Amekaze, with whom she had never exchanged a single word and only seen in passing, but Charon - as self-centered and biased as he was - would not be interested in considering it. 

"What do you know about our alphess? I haven't really had any personal encounter with her. She is to me like to the most - I think - a ghost that everyone knows and talks about, but has never seen," she was curious about the dark lady of the mountain.

Rannoch appreciated Wraen's sentiment. Although the outlook on the situation seemed bleak, her words gave him hope. 

When asked about Amekaze, Rannoch shrugged almost immediately. "I'm not sure," he admitted with a frown. "But, your description of her seems about right. I've never had one-on-one time with her." 

"You know, this could be a good material for a story," Wraen noted, recalling all the ghost and monster stories Osprey had told her as a kid. Despite the fact that she had been terrified of the dark for a very long time, the desire to hear some more overcame that fear. Even now, if she happened to wander around during dark hours, those old tales would come to her mind and feel very, very real.

"You know... a... Night Queen and her three daughters the witches, because... midnight is the witching hour," it was amazing, how you could draft characters for a new story basing them of real life prototypes. "I won't be very original about the names - Dusk, Dawn and... help me here maybe?" she looked at Rannoch, who had proved to be smart on various subjects. "Something along the lines of twilight, eve... Oh! Eventide would be a fabulous name, but can't have three names meaning the same thing."

Rannoch was intrigued by Wraen's idea, and the cogs within his mind began to turn. "...Dark?" he tried, and immediately found that is suggestion was inadequate compared to Wraen's. "I like Eventide," Rannoch supported with a wave of his tail.

"Dusk, Dawn, and Eventide," he repeated thoughtfully, "I think Eventide would be the leader, like Hydra." 

"Eventide it will be then," Wraen agreed, liking this option all the more better now that Rannoch had deemed it valuable as well. And, when he mentioned Hydra being the leader of the group - the girl smiled. Her packmate was perfect for that role. Funny, how she had never realized that beta was a walking heroine of a story already.

"And we should not forget about Father Moon," she added and Charon fit the description so perfectly that she almost laughed at, how easily everything was unfolding. "Now the setting. Where do you think they live and what do they do? What is their magic?" she posed the questions and fell silent, thinking about them and hoping that Rannoch was doing the same.

Rannoch's inspiration was obvious. "Given their names, I think they would live close to the sky," he said and briefly looked at the sky overhead. "Maybe in the clouds?" 

Rannochdrew a blank in regards to the magical aspect of their story. "As for the magic..." he trailed, "Maybe... they have the power to control the weather?" It made sense to him, as they were sky-dwellers.