Firestone Hot Springs Expanding the horizons

For Raissa

FitzDutiful was expanding his boundaries today. It was the first day, since joining Blacktail Deer Plateau, that he was making his way outside of the pack lands and into the wild. He had no idea what the other wolves in this area were like for all he had encountered was his pack mates.

Today, his destination was south of his pack lands, towards the thing he'd heard called Hot Springs. Apparently they were rumoured to be quite good and so that was the destination he'd headed in the morning. Now, approaching midday after a rather casual stroll, he arrived.

As soon as he got closer the heat hit him and caused him to flinch before accepting the new humid environment and moving onwards, deeper into the lands. Coming across one of the pools of water he cautiously dipped a toe in. While being too hot to drink it was quite pleasant against his fur. Too cautious to enter wholly, FitzDutiful was content to rotate his front paws in their dips into the water, while keeping a eye out for any other wolves that may be approaching.

OOC: Raissa is mean, be wear, lol

Raissa watched the grey wolf approach the hot springs carefully, dipping a toe in at a time. She had just come to this area and she was already bored with the area. Hopefully this wolf would be fun to mess with.

She smirked as she thought of her plan. Walking over to a bramble bush she executed it with perfect silence.

Wrapping a thorny vine around her leg with her teeth she played out the image in her head. She pulled her leg so the vine was pulled tight but not cutting her skin. The other wolf wouldn't be able to tell the difference. She cut the vine off with her teeth and walked away, the vine still wrapped firmly in her fur.

When she was far enough away, she let out a very realistic yelp of pain an ran through the woods towards the hot springs. Raissa pretended not to notice the other wolf and plunged her "injured" leg into the steaming pool.

With fake tears in her eyes she pulled her leg out and pretended to try and get the thorns out of her, the whole time letting small whimpers of pain escape her mouth.

So sorry for the wait! I've been prioritising RHC threads to help get the pack up and forgot how long it had been!

Duty was startled when a female wolf let out a yelp of pain and he jumped up, looking around to see the injured being. Very soon the said injured wolf was seen bursting from the woods heading straight for him, FitzDutiful back-pedalled slightly as she plunged her injured leg in to the water.

Feeling a bit confused, he just watched her as she attempted to remove thorns from her paw obviously in pain. Duty had never been in this situation before and he had no idea of the etiquette in removing thorns from another wolfs foot. Indeed, he had never had thorns in his foot to know how to remove them. Keeping calm and placing a counsellors perspective on the matter, Duty asked the only question he could think of.

"Do you want me to go fetch my pack's medic?" he was sure the Plateau had a medic though he had no idea who.

Its totally fine! :)

Raissa was startled by his sincerity, not usually were wolves this kind to her. She felt an odd feeling well up inside her. Guilt. She actually, genuinely felt bad for planning to play this wolf.

She shook her head at him. "No, I think it will be fine, just a little sore. It will better as soon as I get these nasty thorns out." she smiled a little. Now all she had to do was make sure he didn't find out what had really happened.

Raissa pulled her foot out of the hot spring and started to pull the vine out, doing it roughly so it actually did cut her paw. She couldn't believe she was hurting herself just for the sake of this wolf she didn't even know.

The female refused the help of a medic and started to pull the thorns out of her paws. FitzDutiful physically winced as she began to rip at them and, as he watched, he saw the blood well up from the cuts. "That looks pretty bad." he said, full of concern, "I've never had thorns in my paw before so I can't say for sure, but any blood can't be good!" He didn't really know what else to do, he couldn't help her any more than he was doing - especially if she didn't want to see the medic.

Thinking of how to help he figured getting her mind of the pain might be good. "My name's FitzDutiful," he told her to change the subject. "I'm with Blacktail Deer Plateau just over the way." He didn't know, at this time, that it wouldn't be too much longer until he left to found Redhawk Caldera with Perry and Fox. "What about yourself?" he asked, her scent giving away that she wasn't part of a nearby pack, if in one at all, "What brings you to this area?"