Wheeling Gull Isle salt sting

Tagging @Coelacanth @Stockholm and @Reigi for visibility!

The smell of the sea stung his nose as he began to awaken. He was aware of being cold and wet. He was aware of an overall grimy feeling in his fur. He was aware of the emptiness in his belly, the jelly-like weakness in his limbs, the effort it took to draw breath. The salt sting caught in the back of his throat and he coughed, hacked, body jolting with each forceful expulsion of air. He finally caught his breath and sucked in lungfuls of cold, sharp air. Finally, when he felt ready, he opened his eyes. He was lying on his side, and immediately, the flash of the sun was too much to bare. He quickly squeezed his eyes shut again, but he was not comfortable continuing to lie here. The grittiness, he realized, was from the sand so embedded into his fur that it was irritating his skin. His throat was also raw, as if he had choked on and swallowed many mouthfuls of saltwater. He pushed himself up to his paws, which took far more effort that he would have liked, and kept his eyes trained on the ground to avoid the blinding sun. Where am I? How did I get here? He realized, with a thrill of terror, that he remembered nothing.

cameo unless noticed

She'd regained her strength enough to be able to travel around the island, though she felt eyes on her most of the time. Maegi knew she was a stranger here, and though they had made her feel welcome, she was aware of being the other. These wolves were bound to the sea, and the speechless mother was their friend.

But Maegi? Maegi was bound to no place, save the dark woods. And the closest she felt to home was in her dreams, when she padded through the trees. Then she woke, and they were ages away once more.

Today, she padded along the beach, looking for something to do. She'd nosed at various shells of creatures strewn upon the sand and found them mildly interesting for a few moments, then had moved on, dissatisfied. This was nothing like Blackfeather. She missed the Temple, the Web. Hell, she even missed Namira's Mire, for all its foulness.

There was just too much sun here for her liking.

The explosive sound of coughing sounded nearby, and she started, fur bristling as she looked wildly around for the source of the noise. Her gaze fell upon a wolf, pelt soaked with water, looking utterly wretched. Alarmed--as if she was in the wrong place at the wrong time--Maegi skirted toward the trees that lined the edge of the beach, her mismatched eyes glowing from the shadows as she waited to see who would find this newcomer first.

She had been intrigued by the sea but too frightened to come close until she had been on the Island for a while.  She was settling in the best she could, and so far it seemed as if nobody hated her.  Not yet, anyway.  In her heart she figured that it would come, inevitably, but for now she was safe.

As she traipsed along the windswept borders, the ocean spat out a ragged-looking wolf and she set upon the water immediately, allowing the stranger space (mostly because she was frightened,) as she chased the tide back to the ocean.  The water receded as it always did after coming ashore, but Reigi, of course, thought this was her own doing.  Yeah, and stay off my island!

Triumphant in chasing the water from its unsuspecting victim, she turned back to land with her tail sickled over her hindquarters and ears pushed forward — alert but not dominant — as she started to investigate the stranger.  She meandered close and if she was not met with a flurry of snapping teeth, she would stick her nose in the wet thickness of the stranger's pelt before unleashing a howl for her pack to come take a look.

He still had his paws beneath him, but was swaying gently as he sat. The swaying made him nauseous but there was nothing in his system to throw up, no way to alleviate the roiling in the pit of his stomach. He was so weak he hardly noticed when a creature approached him and gently nuzzled into his fur. The feeling of it shocked him and he shivered, suddenly feeling sick, but in a different way from before. Now he felt uncontrollable shivers coming over him. He felt his body swaying dangerously, too hard, but could not stop himself from falling over into the sand again. His mind, foggy with exhaustion and starvation, drifted in and out of consciousness.

Oh.  Dude like, fell over.  Uhhh.

She continued rooting her nose around in his fur, searching for signs of illness but she found none other than the saltwater vomit.  She positioned herself above him, crouching as if to protect him from that Very Mean Big 'Ole Water and howled urgently for @Coelacanth and / or anyone who could hear to come make him better because she didn't know what to do.

Coelacanth wasn’t feeling well today; she was assailed with bouts of nausea that kept her jaws tightly clenched as bubbles of sticky froth collected upon her lips. It was not a good look for her, and she kept largely to herself because of it. Rolling in mint did nothing for her, but she found that nibbling at the flesh of the coconuts that occasionally washed ashore from the grove on the Teekon mainland helped settle her stomach — and the scent of vanilla blossom was equally soothing. It came to pass that she mostly smelled of vanilla, coconut, and berries — with the whole island under her claim, she shamelessly indulged her sweet tooth! — with the ever-present undernote of salt.

An alerting howl drew her interest, and she began moving toward the shoreline — but when the winter raven howled not once but twice, Seelie quickened her pace. She washed her face to present a less rabid countenance and filled her mouth with berries, not for her own delight, but for the stranger who had so piqued her tauhou’s anxiety. Upon meeting Maegi for the first time, Coelacanth had ardently wished for sugar to jumpstart the girl’s energy and help her inland, and she didn’t want to be caught unprepared this time around. Despite the pain that shot through the play of muscles across her withers and along the nape of her neck, she kicked into a sprint.

She arrived on the scene with a reassuring nuzzle against the sandstone female’s cheek. “Good, good girl,” she breathed, approaching the male without hesitation and making to curl her tiny body around him. Gently she dropped the berries at the strange wolf’s paws and began to bathe his face, heedless of her own safety. It wrenched her heart — she wanted him to be Aditya, wanted them to be able to start everything over! — but she drew a deep, even breath that cooled the hot stinging of her eyes before it could become tears. “Cold,” she whispered to the island’s guardian. If he didn’t warm up, he wouldn’t be able to digest anything, let alone move further inland.

At long last, “Komodo,” she whispered, her cerulean eyes conflicted, yet pleading. “Find.”

He jerked awake with somewhere between a gasp and a yell, jerking his head away from what — in his sickened state — he had assumed to be sand somehow slowly suffocating him, landing on his face to kill him. It was actually a tongue, but still, even now, staring at the black wolf-like creature in front of him, he had a vague sense of impending doom from anthropomorphic sand. He could smell some kind of sweet, tangy scent at his paws, but the act of moving his head to look down between them caused immediate pounding and his vision swam. He groaned in pain and general feelings of hopelessness and the fear of death. Then his vision cleared some and he dipped his head down and ate the berries without thinking about it. He didn’t taste them much, for the salt was still too strong on his tongue but they had a sort of quenching quality about them that revived him enough to start looking around for more. He realized shortly and with disappointment that there were no more. He lifted his head then and stared accusingly at the black female who was so close to him. Why didn’t you bring more?

Her heart beat a one-two drum against her chest, each moment that passed felt like an eternity.  She moved off of the boy to let Coelacanth take her place instead, and paced back and forth until she was commanded.

The raven was quick to bend to the Aralez' will, and swiftly she set off to find @Komodo and bring him forth.

The angakkuq was found easily, as he was making headway marking the shores of the isle. The lesson that Axolotl — to mark the treeline, rather than the sands — had not been lost on him, so that’s what exactly what he was doing. It was very like Komodo to glean learnings and customs from the wolves he met, and sometimes re-met, and incorporate them into his own life. He was an amalgam of every wolf he had ever met. It strangely also gave him a sense of unique-ness, though none of it was truly his own. 

The voiceless one needn’t have a voice to communicate her distress. He followed, his moments strong and purposeful, without many questions or much prompting. The roan brute was led to two forms upon the sands; one was distinctly Seelie, and one was distinctly disheveled by the ocean’s heavy hand. The sea could be a cruel mistress. Well, the boy didn’t appear to be in dire danger, but Coelacanth shielded him as if he was. Komodo wished to walk right up to them and assess the situation, but knew he couldn’t. Things between him and his Aralez were much too fragile. Instead the medicine man inquired steadily “An’ who’s this?” and lowered his head to give the flotsam a cursory once-over from afar.   

She will be back next round!

The tiny Groenendael flinched back reflexively when her patient jolted awake, a strangled cry wrung from his lips when he wrenched away from her. She borrowed a modicum of his pain and drew it unto herself, her empath’s soul choosing this unfortunate moment to surge to the fore — but took heart at his apparent appetite, even when he stared at her coldly, seeking further sustenance to settle his sea-tossed stomach. “Peace be,” she whispered to him, a warning as much as a greeting, spindly limbs moving fluidly to elevate her. She stood before him, her Neptune eyes fixed with pained concern upon his gold-limned visage, and wished he did not look so much like Aditya.

Daring his tolerance, she made to lave the salt from his crown with her tongue — to taste his scent and comfort him — and if he allowed, her tender ministrations would wander down the slope of his neck to his withers. She learned from his scent that he was of generally good health aside from the typical maladies of a loner compiled with the wrath of the sea; he was younger than her, which she found comforting — mainly because that way, he could remind her vaguely of Driftwood instead of constantly tormenting her with images of her singing, dancing dost. Mera dost.

It was in this way that the winter raven and the Earthstalker would find her, hovering over the pack’s newest tauhou with a worried expression. Without looking at Komodo — an easy feat, given her fussing over the poor wolf, “Flotsam,” she offered succinctly, her vague reply suggesting that she had not questioned him overtly. Given his fervor for the berries, she decided that she would go fetch some more food for him to help him gather enough strength to trek inland. “I — g-get food,” she informed them both, disappearing like a ghost in the island mists to raid one of the caches.

Sorry I didn't realize it was my turn!

Peace be, the woman said, and he stared at her in both surprise and confusion. Then she got up, and he continued staring at her, wondering if she was getting him more food. He decided to just sit tight, half because he wasn’t sure he could stand yet and half because clearly this island was inhabited by a pack and he didn’t want to piss anyone off. He laid his head on his paws like a good subordinate and didn’t make eye contact with anyone, wondering what would happen next. His stomach rumbled and he shifted a bit uncomfortably, but tried not to draw attention to himself.

Curiously she moved next to the flotsam as she had when he had first arrived, slaking next to him defensively.  There was a tension in the air that made her uncomfortable both between the two packmates she loved fiercely and because of the situation.  She shrank on herself and attempted to remain silent, though she shivered and whined.

As a wave rolled back ashore, she shot after it with chattering teeth and aggressive barks and successfully "scared" the wave back to the ocean and then resumed her protective positioning.

I know a couple of you are trying to wrap up threads, and I received permission from Fira to tack on this conclusion. Let me know if you’d like me to change anything.

Names were duly exchanged when the burnished male found his voice at last, his constitution fortified and his throat moistened by the fresh new bouquet of berries Coelacanth brought, toted on the husk of a coconut. The Aralez enlisted `Io and Komodo’s help in helping Sunflash limp further inland, taking him to a freshwater source to slake his thirst and whetting his appetite with gifts of fish and meat from the caches. The pack’s newest tauhou seemed doomed to remain so, however, for once he regained his strength he offered his thanks and struck out for new adventures.