The Tangle I said somebody's been shot, somebody's been abused

"FUCK."

Dusty Rose paced at the top of the ravine, the perfect picture of towering fury despite his somewhat underwhelming stature. He made as if to jump, toes hanging off the ledge, claws curled inward to grip the crumbling dirt, but he knew instinctively that this wasn't a jump he could make. He'd have to go around.

"FUCKING — FUCK. AGAIN???"

It wasn't that he was ungrateful or anything. He had all four paws underneath him again, which he surely hadn't believed would be the case not too long ago. He should've trusted that Reverie would rescue him.

He should've known she'd run right off again.

And look, he understood. And he was glad for the help of her weird-ass cult and the hunky guard that'd gone with her and all the reverence with which they regarded her. His lady deserved that sort of respect. Deserved armies to rule over. Deserved loyal subject to boss around. Dusty Rose was all for it! For her. But this crusade was dragging him along, too, and he'd had to endure several long weeks of her extended family's hospitality after the much more dubious hospitality her other extended family had shown her. And it was all just a little confused in his head — who were these people? Why couldn't they leave well enough alone?

But he understood. Reverie was a fucken queen is what all this was about, and Dusty Rose would never, under any circumstance, want her to hide that light under a bushel. She was gonna set the fucking world on fire and he was gonna stand behind her and laugh.

As soon as he crossed this ravine.

As soon as he was sure he wasn't being followed.

As soon as he could fucken find her.

"FUCK," he shouted again, just to make himself feel better. His voice echoed strangely in the dense woodland, bouncing back to him from down below and almost seeming to murmur through the trees. Dusty Rose spun to face them, ears flat on either side of his head.

there was a man near their claim. a greyish man, a loud man, one who wore the stamp of wolf and coyote combined.
bearing in mind her talk with sobeille, chani was nevertheless annoyed to find him so close. a genetic frustration, or perhaps the feminine territoriality encouraged by her older relatives — whatever else drove chani out gave her an edge to the oxide eyes she carried, courtesy of grandmaman rosalyn.
behind him she moved, a wraith in the grapevine thornweald that guarded sapphique.
and when he whirled, chani held her breath, seeing a pretty shade of sea-blue in his face.
but it was chacal's expression she wore when she slithered gracefully from the briars, aloof with a gilded coolness.
and it was mireille's dry voice that spoke. "do you often be shoutin' swears into de void outside someone's door?" chani demanded, chin raised in haughty judgement.

Shadess was growing. She was learning and as she did so, rose her confidence and perhaps, arrogance. When she was but a puppy and toddler, she followed her mother's every step. When she could go to and from the den on her own, she began to shadow her elder sister Sobeille. Now, having traveled to lands far beyond their home, Shadess found sureness in herself to come and go from outside the border now, though never seemed to stray too far from the smell of the sea. 

Today, Shadess trailed a cousin, following her and the same loudness which drove her here. What would she do with him? Another lesson to learn. Quietly, she slid to Chani's side, a hard evergreen eye fixed on the coywolf. Yet when she spoke, it was not to him, but her cousin, not caring that he could hear all of it either. A strange man so close to 'ome. Should we eat 'im? From what Shadess had been told, she knew @Sobeille would.

two scents wove out of bluepeace and into the tangle beyond; one belonging to her cousin, and the other to sobeille’s most darling pupil — her sister.

sobeille did not possess the same fondness for the tangle her family harbored. it was thorny and difficult; game elusive and water tinged with brackish iron. but her family had decided to come here today and familial duty compelled her to follow.

all on account of a particularly loud stranger.

it was not his swears that earned the cool bite of his gaze (which he could control); it was his gender (which he could not). sobeille did not trust him.

rather than make it known she watched from the blackened vines, sobeille crouched — eyes trained in wait on the man that darkened their doorsteps by simply existing.

This was just what he needed! Great! Wonderful!

The coywolf tried for a fleeting moment to look on the bright side of things. But the bright side was still shit compared to where he wanted to be, and look: he'd had a bad day and a bad week and a bad month and last month wasn't great, either. His whole life had been really shitty, lately, and so he felt very sure that his current temperament had been earned.

So what if he wanted to throw himself a pity party?

Even so, he was prepared to excuse himself and go scream someplace else. Until a fiery little gremlin popped out of the woodwork and said something that left him extra peeved. Not that it showed on his placid features; he blinked his dark eyes at them — very cutesy, very demure.

He didn't look at the gremlin. He address the wolf that'd spoken to him. (She might still be a gremlin. He was withholding judgement, for now, unlike the guttersnipe.)

"Someone has got to do it," he said blithely, solemnly, dutifully. "I thought I'd do it here just in case no one'd done it yet today. Just for a little while. There's more SHITTY, ANNOYING FUCKING RAVINES to be shouted at elsewhere, y'know."

He kept his volume more polite this time and aimed his voice outward once more, just for the sake of their ears. He wasn't out here to damage anyone's hearing, arlight?

"You should try it," he told her. "It's cathartic."

And here, there was a little bit of bite to his words. Not directed at her, necessarily. He just wished it was a little more cathartic. And he wished he was feeling a little more fleet-footed, in case these wolves decided he did look like a meal. More power to them, he supposed — and he wished them all the joy of his diminished (skinny! the horror!) frame. He hoped they got his fur stuck in their teeth and maybe in their intestines, too.

Not that he thought it would serve them right or anything. A meal was a meal. That was just the kind of mood he was in today, and the level of compassion he currently held for his fellow wolf.

chani, daughter of reactive coastal beauties, took it quite as a slight. the rust-red eyes hardened above a small curve now blooming on her mouth. not a bit of contrition in him; she marvelled at that, nudging shadess.
"eating dis one would make you stupid i fear," the cliff-hunter purred, though there was danger in it.
she felt a great presence in the air, an observant shade. and though chani knew it could be any sapphique wolf or no one at all, she felt —
she meant to handle this meet as sobeille might.
"but if you be wantin' a trophy off him, cousin, take dat voicebox." gentle, wisping laughter that was not amused at all.
chani moved languidly to block a tiny space amid the yawning thorns, stretching one hindleg as she exchanged a long glance with shadess. a man so close and so loud should be — groveling. yes; heart beginning to race.