Dragoncrest Cliffs marinette

sobeille had disappeared. others were looking for her; for his part, lafayette followed her trail to the edge of the territory and then down into the neighboring sound. he knew she spent some time here, but after that. . .

well, he had yet to hone his tracking skills, and so the scent was lost.

today, the ruddy boy stood at the western edge of the great sequoia forest, at the tree-line, looking down upon the rocks and churning waves. he had been troubled by dreams, lately. not for their contents—but for their lack altogether. his slumber had been accompanied by no one, nothing.

what did it mean?

he sat back with a sigh, jaw tight with clenched teeth. he wasn't very close to sobeille—truthfully, she scared him—but it was undeniable that her absence was a big loss for their family. was it a harbinger of something worse to come?

The young girl was gone. Despite his decline overall, his tracking skills were still sharp. She wasn’t prey, but wolves were animals just like anything else. Had smells, left prints. Trackable. 

He wasn’t surprised to find Lafayette following the same trail. 

He didn’t know the wolf well, but learned to feel partly responsible his well-being, just the same as any other younger Sapphique member. 

He did feel guilty, too, for trading drugs in front of him. Not that it was at all Pepper’s fault. But a pup had no business being exposed to that sort of thing. 

He’d address it if it was brought up, but had a feeling he was none the wiser to what had actually happened then. 

He only assumed he was close to Sobielle. His knowledge on the politics of the young’ns in the pack was..not good. But surely they all played like..hide and seek together. And they were siblings, which had to count for something. 

”Any luck thisaway?” he asked, placing his muzzle to the ground to locate the scent again. Definitely had been here. But he couldn’t tell just when.

he turned as the man approached and shook his head in reply, then looked toward the sea with a sad expression.

non, lafayette said softly. i haven't gone far, but the trail jus' seems to. . .disappear.

the boy sighed again, turning his back on the shore and facing the other wolf instead. your name be pepper, right? he asked. i'm lafayette—mireille's son.

he remembered the time when he'd stumbled upon the mysterious exchange between the pale stranger and the aging man. 

what was dat t'ing de woman brought you, on de border? he asked, curious. she said it be a gift.

No pawprints, no scent to pursue. Maybe the fresh snow was the cause. Wolves didn't just vanish. Pepper had encountered the same thing on the trail he followed, though he just assumed she'd turned back and retraced her steps. Maybe that was the case here, too. 

He knew the boy's name, but a proper introduction would be polite. 

"That's right." he said, offering a gentle smile to the boy, though his eyes remained concerned. "I would've introduced myself sooner, but trying to catch up with you young wolves is hard for these old bones," he stated, tail giving a quick wag.

His eyes widened briefly at the mention of Leto's gift. But he wouldn't lie. 

"Oh, Leto? She's an old friend. They were herbs. For old wolves who aren't as spry as they used to be. I had Phobos check 'em out though, and we decided not to use 'em. Could have some real bad side effects that might cause the user to hurt someone else." 

He should've dropped them into the sea, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. They were from Leto.. and in the back of his mind, he held them as a last resort.

@Leto (tagging bc mention!)

the remark about old bones made him smile, and his demeanor visibly eased as he listened with curiosity to pepper's explanation of the herbs. 

ah, i see, lafayette replied, but he was clearly intrigued. i helped phobos wi' some plants de ot'er day. he said de same—dat some could be bad for us.

his tail shifted gently behind him in amiable companionship. i hope you can find sometin' to help you, he went on. alas, he didn't know enough about herbs and medicine to be of service. that, along with sobeille's disappearance, brought a feeling of helplessness up within him.

you werena born here, right? he asked. you don't be talkin' like my family do.

He let a small smile tug on his lips. It was seeming less and less like there was much that could help him. Herbs hadn’t. The water had, but it was too cold now. 

”No, not from here. That obvious, huh?” he asked in response, but a quick wink made it clear he was joking. 

He wondered if being around them would ever lend to him picking up on their accent. But it hadn’t happened yet, and he figured by this point it probably wouldn’t. Val didn’t have it, and he’d been around longer than Pepper had.

he chuckled softly, catching the humor. you here now, lafayette replied, voice gentle. all dat matters. but where you come from, before?

he mused upon the variety of landscapes cousin etienne had told him about—mountains, hills, open plains, and so on. one of those, perhaps. . .or something even quite different! he was always keen to learn new things about the world.

He was here now. And he had a black pearl to prove it. 

He’d rather not have the child know about what his past was like. Not now, anyway. Maybe when he was older. But he could at least share a bit about where he came from. 

”Used to live in a larger pack east of here. Me, my brother, and my father, and a lot of other wolves. Weren’t nearly as peaceful as it is here. Lot less sand too.”

it didn't escape lafayette that pepper spoke mainly of men when describing his home pack. sapphique was based around women. 

and the boy wondered whether it felt odd that the man had shifted cultures so abruptly.

what did it look like? he inquired, cocking his head. do you miss it?

”It was real pretty. Grassy, few rivers. Lush forested hillsides.” 

Still some of the most stunning landscape the old wolf had seen. Shame it was populated by such terrible residents. 

Or he thought it was. It was years ago, pack could’ve died out by now. 

”But no. More ‘n more thankful each day I don’t call it home no more.”