Lost Creek Hollow In the morning she said "Listen,"

The morning after her arrival, and Ibis is waking up deep within the forest. She'd tried to find somewhere to sleep that made her feel safe and secure rather than awkward, alienated, and out-of-place; one option was to find her father and make camp somewhere near him merely because he was familiar, but the more she thought about it (and the more she roamed) the less Ibis felt that it was appropriate. Her mind went back to thoughts of Treason, whoever that was, and the fact she now had a step-mother, and would be a big sister — and her mind shut off at that point.

When she did wake up, she was in the middle of a small field of clover.

She let out a yawn and blnked sleep away. For the first few moments Ibis was confused; the trees did not have the same ethereal quality here, the scents inherent to the soil and the forest were heavier, the terroir more intensely peaty. It was an ugly smell that brought her the rest of the way to a state of coherence, and she remembered where she was. The girl got up slowly - stretched her limbs, shook out her coat - and then began to investigate the clovers. It was too early to get up to much else.

terance had gotten up at the buttcrack of dawn because of @Treason's sleeping. or, well, lack thereof. or, well, his lack thereof. truthfully, treason was sleeping fine. but that stomach of hers made her sleep in positions that were more comfortable for her and... less comfortable for him. not that he would complain, because, duh, but a good kick to the chin wasn't good medicine for rest. so when he decided he probably wouldn't get much more sleep, he got up and decided to find ibis. you know, make sure she'd settled in nicely and all that. he patrolled first, just to get some work done, and then set off.

he found her in one of their many clearings, surrounded by clovers looking like a petite little forest nymph. he smiled, knowing that wraen would have a field day with that kind of story. he barked to grab her attention and then began to pad forwards, leaning forward to nose her cheek. "how're you settling in?" he asked her gently.

When she heard the sound of a bark, her head and ears raised to attention and she turned her head so she could look at the origin; Terance came striding along soon enough and the thundering of her heart eased a bit. She was feeling very awake now (thanks dad), and when he softly touched her cheek she felt a sleepy smile creep across her face. The question wiped out that look, though. Poor Ibis, she couldn't exactly hide her emotions that well, even if she did her best to appear one-hundred-percent perfect. The smile that appeared next looked practiced.

I tried to look around before, but it was too dark so.. I guess I fell asleep. That didn't really answer the question but she didn't know what to say exactly. Tell him she got lost? Talk about the cute boy she'd bumbed in to...? Ask about her new step-mom? None of these sounded like a good choice. Just as Ibis was opening her mouth to say something else she was caught by a big yawn, but then she said: Its pretty here. Not the same as... as home, but, its nice. Aw, look at her trying to be kind.

terance inherited from his father the ability to conceal emotion, despite being incredibly judgmental. it would seem that ibis had inherited the same judgement, as well as her mother's complete transparency. at least, terance had always thought she was transparent, up until the day she decided to walk out. he forced away the thought -- he had the option to come with, he made his own decision that day. hers just seemed worse to him.

either way, terance noticed. his smile, though it held it's place, saddened. green eyes rounding as he looked upon her with gentle concern and adoration. he settled beside her into a sitting position, ears cupping forwards. he'd press onwards, he wouldn't make her talk about her feelings... "i hope you'll adjust soon," he did say, though, and the continued, "did you meet any of the wolves here? some of them were in sunspire back when you were a baby." like rannoch, liffey... treason, too. as well as the first batch of liffnoch babies.

He didn't press her beyond her comfort level, which was nice. Most of the time when Ibis spoke to adults they talked down to her (not on purpose mind you, but... It got to be a drawback) or they wouldn't let up, especially in a space like Elysium where feelings flowed like currency. This was a nice change of pace, she decided.

When her father mentioned the Sunspire though, Ibis' face ran blank for a moment. It was difficult to recall the great exodus since she had been so very small at the time, so the name meant little to her aside from what she could drum up from stories told by her mothers; any history she had upon the mountain was nothing but an empty void. Not wanting to disappoint, she went ahead and mentioned, I ran in to a ghost, um, that sounded so silly after-the-fact, she looked at her paws, at the clovers crushed by her petite body, anywhere but at her father out of sheer embarrassment, um, he said his name was.. Ga, Gamut? Gilette? Gan... Gannet? I think.

Besides that, she had spent the night alone.

The girl desperately wanted to move the conversation away from the mysterious stranger who had illuminated so beautifully in the starlight — so she blurted, What's Treason like? But this was another thing she sorely wished she hadn't brought up immediately after. Oh well, she thought - she needed to figure out her feelings on all that eventually.

the boulder chuckled at the comment about a ghost. before she even got his name out terance knew exactly who she was talking about. "gannet," he repeated with encouragement and a few nods of his head, "an old friend of mine, from moonspear." he paused, briefly, wondering if ibis knew what moonspear was... probably... not... he cleared his throat. and he might've clarified, but ibis must not have been listening, because she burst so quickly into a question it caught terance off guard.

at the sudden question, blurted so abruptly, terance's ears pricked upright, his nose twitching as he processed. he didn't even attempt to pair it with gannet, instead, he assumed the question had just been burning a hole through her head since she arrived, and so she needed an answer now. 

he rolled his shoulders, trying to decide how to describe treason to someone as soft as ibis. she was quite literally the exact opposite of ibis, in almost every facet. except, perhaps, that ibis had gotten his judgmental traits, and treason too was quite... opinionated. "well," he finally said, tail flicking, "treason is blunt, sharp, and a bit... forceful. but she's incredibly smart and clear-minded, always knows what she wants." he wondered if treason would approve of that description. a small smile pressed to the corners of his mouth. "don't tell her i said this, but she could also probably kick my ass in a fight." oof -- profanity? did seabreeze use profanity with them? did it matter? she was pretty old by now... whatever. it was a tiny word.

She was glad to have the focus shifted off of Gannet, but as soon as Terance began to talk about his new love Ibis soured; she wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt - no, both of them. The more she heard, the less and less she could focus. Then her dad did something she would have never expected, and he cussed! It wasn't much, but as someone that never heard that kind of language, it stuck out. Ibis looked utterly surprised (and a little bit repulsed) as she peered at him; her eyes wide, ears at first tilted towards him so that she could listen attentively like a good daughter, suddenly slashing back. He didn't seem to react to the words, except for maybe a vague lilt of humor to his tone, which also baffled her.

Ibis swallowed a lump in her throat and went ahead with the conversation, pretending she hadn't heard that little slip-up of his. He hadn't reacted to it, so she took a cue from him (but it was still a bad word, gosh, how dare he!). So she's... Not like mom, she countered as clearly as she could. But you... You like her? Is she um — do you like her because she's smarter, or, or prettier, than mom? Why else would he have abandoned them all? There had to be something about Treason that was better, even if Ibis could never ever see it. Her mother was everything; she was kind, warm-hearted, the love of Ibis' life — so what made Treason better than all that?

terance was a little baffled by all the questions. though he couldn't read ibis' thoughts, he at least inferred a small portion of what she was thinking. granted, he didn't truly know the extent of it... what had seabreeze told them? or, maybe, what had seabreeze failed to tell them? what was simply a lack of perspective, on either side? 

but, ibis' questions... what made treason better than seabreeze? why had he chosen her over her mother?
truth be told, he hadn't. it'd been... almost a year, pretty much, since seabreeze and terance had split. maybe not quite, i don't know the dates, but in wolf time it feels like a long ass time. he tried to tread carefully, but he also didn't want to lie to ibis.

silently, after noting her shift in expression to his comment (probably the bad word, whoops) terance wondered what kind of ship seabreeze led over in elysium. it was probably pretty lax... all seabreeze had done in the last few months at sunspire was sun bathe with olive... and he somehow doubted much had changed. but was she strict? stern? playful? or did she just sit on the stones all day and hum? terance wanted to ask, but ibis was not the wolf to ask -- and now was not the time. either way, his parenting style was apparently a big shift. he wondered if this was the best move for her, or if she'd be overwhelmed just as quickly as she'd made the decision to stay and pack up to head home. 

he hurt thinking about it. 

"i like her a lot," confirmed terance, who had not used the L-word with treason, or vis versa. it didn't feel necessary, or important to her. maybe it was and he was missing a big ole sign? who knows. either way, they'd get there when they got there. he tried to play out his answers to her questions in his head, how she might react. to terance, now, there was no one better than treason. but he didn't compare her (in that way) to seabreeze. "your mother is incredibly smart and very pretty," he reached to nose her and added in a gentle croon, "almost as pretty as you." 

and then he pulled back, giving a gentle sigh. "your mother left me a long time ago... i missed her, and you and your brother, every day. but seasons change, wolves change, and we grow up a little bit. eventually i just... grew closer to someone else," he said in his best attempt to explain -- but terance was historically no good with words. "treason and your mother are entirely independent from one another." 

There was no telling what was going through the girl's mind; it was entirely likely that too much was flooding her brain and without adequate emotional intelligence, it would remain a jumbled mess. Ibis knew she loved her mother - both her mothers - and that it took her time to adjust to Olive, even though the other woman had been a fixture in her life for as long as she could remember. She knew that she loved her father too. It was difficult to say how much, because loving Terance wasn't as easy as loving Seabreeze, but she tried very hard.

For someone with as big a heart as Ibis you'd probably assume it would be easy to love Treason too but... The more Ibis thought about it (roundabout thoughts) the more she compared the idea of the woman (backwards thoughts) to her mother (trying-too-hard thoughts) and making snap judgements before even meeting her. Was there room in Ibis' life for three mothers? That was the big thought; maybe she was at her parental limit.

Her father seemed very happy though, and Ibis couldn't ruin that. She liked how easily he countered her points with commentary, with affection that she leaned in to and reciprocated softly. Ibis had missed this — ever since her mother's accident and subsequent sleep, Ibis had become reclusive of her family. She had found comfort in her brother but would not go near anyone else if she could help it. The physical affection that Terance showed her now, opened her up again. Made her realize - on some base level - how sad she had been, how lonely, without that consistency. 

She was quiet for a long moment after Terance concluded his points, merely sitting with her father and leaning against him, before the whirlwind inside her head slowed down a little bit.

She makes you happy. I'm happy you're happy, daddy. And just like that, Ibis nosed at her father's cheek and gave him an affectionate little kiss, as if all her worries had evaporated.

HI I AM SO SORRY

the silence that poor ibis showed was worrying to terance, but he gave her time to process. truthfully, he'd never had the broken family that he'd forced upon his children, so he didn't understand. despite the news of his parents death, terance had grown up in a rather whole family. even with his and wrean's falling out, with his and sarah's reunion (though he ultimately had ended up avoiding her at many costs), terance's family was considered whole. 

when ibis finally spoke, he found himself relieved. nevermind that she may have been pretending, the words were nice to hear. and at her gently kiss, terance returned it -- with a much more fatherly, slobbery one to her crown. 

"i hope you're happy too, little bird," he murmured to her, tail sweeping. after thinking of his own family, terance found a desire to want to fix... fix something. maybe it was guilt. maybe it was that he didn't entirely believe her. "have i ever told you about my family?" he asked her with a flick of his ear, green gaze trained upon herr delicate little features, "about your grandparents and your aunts?" 

Its all good! I'm gonna fade here, this thread is old!

Ibis couldn't help but giggle when her father's big wet tongue slid across her head, and while she ducked away from the slobbery love he shared, she leaned in close to him and soon fell in stride. When he mentioned his family she thought only of her mother, who would always be linked to Terance in her mind regardless of their actual distance — her ears shifted, and soon her mind was buzzing with thoughts about grandparents -- what was a grandparent? Wasn't Terance one, because he was grand? The concept was so new to her she didn't know what to say and just blurted, please tell me!

They'd walk a while together, with Ibis learning all she could about her relatives.