Phoenix Maplewood small talk is very small indeed

For anyone who wishes to patrol the borders!

Attacking bears. A soiled garden. A slew of new faces. The inner-sanctum of this pack was feeling a bit stuffy for her tastes. With Nochtli's departure, that small presence of comfort was something of a void and she found herself drawn to the outer reaches of the trees. A bit of open sky helped her feel a touch less crowded. She understood now Arion's concerns in a constant canopy. She felt the claustrophobia sinking in and so she sought to escape, but only so far.

The borders were significantly less crowded and also provided her with something of a task. Idleness was next to laziness and while she was a large, bulky sort of individual, her natural inclinations were something of a taskmaster. She desired business in all forms and a goal at all times. Today, she could escape from the shadows of the trees and tend to thickening weak spots in their scent lines.

She tinkled and sprinkled where boundaries had thinned. Her thoughts wandered, moving more quickly than her feet as she strolled within the warmth of the autumn sun. The weather was average, but favorable. Out here, she found herself without complain and that was something near to a miracle as she was generally pretentious and very difficult to please.

setting this by the stream, if that's okay!

The combination of the warm autumn sun and the chill of the water felt refreshing on the wolf's paw, which bounced languidly in and out of the stream. Twenty or so tiny fish were circling the, to them, massive body part, nipping at the toes whenever it was still and scurrying whenever it moved, only to come habitually back at the next break in movement. The paw's owner did not notice this however, as his bi-colored eyes were instead focused on the red maple leaves that were dancing through the wind; this did not last long, as soon the wind stopped and the leaves fell and the eyes rolled.

Jax Saturnin was bored, and those words were not ever meant to stand beside each other.

The tapping of his foot against the water became less lazy and more aggressive, until he gave the surface a final slap and stood up. How long had he been waiting here? Not wanting to think of the answer, he shrugged to himself. The lone wolf had caught the invigorating smell of wolves and followed his nose to where the smell because insufferably strong, and here he waited. Truthfully, it had not been longer than 30 minutes, but Jax was not a patient creature, and he had taken to doing a variety of activities while waiting, which the area surrounding him reflected. There were multiple holes in the ground, one of them containing a half-eaten squirrel, the trees were gouged, and the bushes had been uprooted. 

Fortunately for the foliage around him, that boredom would soon come to an end. Nose twitching, he whipped his head around and stared. Soon enough, a figure came into view. Taking no time, Jax fell on his side, eyes closed, muscles twitching and tongue hanging out. 

Oh, it had been too long.

All good!

Her patrol took her round the northern tip of the forest towards where the stream crawled between their trees. In walking, she noted the peculiar scent of upturned earth and the sharpness of plants whose sleek insides had been crushed and exposed. Was there something of a wolverine in these parts? Another badger? Curious, she pressed onward and found this area in something of a state of disarray. This wasn't the least bit normal. What creature would dare tear up the earth in such a fashion?

Her eyes eventually settled upon a gray scale male who lay upon his side and twitched. Was he seizing? Rabid? She could not tell from here and lest he be infected with some sort of fast spreading disease, she kept her distance... but how to distract him? Thinking on her toes, she snagged a long branch from a dying tree and carried it between her mouth. Maintaining a healthy space between him, she poked the wolf with the pointy end of the branch.

"Are you dead yet?" she asked, after prodding him a few times and dropping the limb so she did not have to speak with wood in her mouth. Citali picked it up once more between her jaws and poked at different parts of his twitching body.

The painful poking of the stick made him want to take his paw and shove that stick down her throat, but kept still; good things to those who wait, and all that jazz. It wasn't until after she spoke that his bright eyes popped open and he jumped up, scrambling backwards so fast that a flurry of leaves and dirt were kicked up. He stared at her, trembling, for a couple seconds before finally speaking.

"I was dead."

The words came out as a whisper. Jax took a tentative step towards the great brown she-wolf. "I was dead, and you saved me." His eyes fell to the stick, and he let out a weary laugh. "The great Staff of Rejuvenation...it's here. It saved me. It's yours." With a cry, he fell to his stomach and crawled toward her, desperately trying to kiss her paws. "I am yours forever, my liege. Tell me what you will have of me, and it will be done."

300th post!

She didn't have time to poke him again. No sooner had she put the branch back in her mouth than he quit playing opossum and was up on his feet again. She dropped the tree limb and stared blankly at him as Lazarus began to speak. She stared blankly at him. "You were not dead." Couldn't have been. He was twitching, which suggested active, continuous muscle response, and she knew it was medically impossible to come back to life. Dead was dead.

He went on with some preposterous notion of magic. Her eyes widened. Was this wolf mad? He stepped towards her and Citali stepped back, remembered who and what she was doing here, and then proceeded to take two steps forward. If he was going to be ridiculous? Well, two could play at that game. "I would have you not kiss my feet," she started, making to bop him on the nose. "Then I will have you off of these lands, sir. You are not welcome here."

awesome :D

Her paw hit his nose, which caused him to sneeze. He stared up at her stupidly. "But I was dead. I was. And you and your staff saved me. How can I leave when I am required by law to serve you for all of eternity?" He rolled over on his back and looked up at her, tail softly wagging between his legs. "Master has told me not to kiss her feet, so I will not. But I came here for a reason, I did. I came here because I wanted to join, but I waited so long at the borders that I died. And now that you have revived me and I see that this is the home of the Staff of Rejuvenation, how can I leave? I would like to stay here, serving you, forever."

His eyes rolled around in thought, and he wagged his butt excitedly as an idea came to him. "If you don't want to see me, I could be a scout! Oh, I am a most excellent scout, just wonderful. Or a spy; do you have enemies? Let me spy on your enemies so you may lead your pack into battle with the upperhand, I would do that for you, yes I would, yes I would. I would do anything for Her Most Bringer Back to Lifer and her merry band of sprites." 

Citali looked to him and sighed. For a crazy wolf living is his own personal la-la land, he made a very valid point. Fine, then. If he wished to be forever in debt to her she could find a way to make him eat those very same words. At least he was acting submissive, something which appeased her greatly. Glancing at him, the only thing she'd change was that happy wag in his tail. Servants weren't allowed feelings. Only the actions requested of them.

"Very well then," she remarked, moving herself to sit. "You shall act a proper wolf and behave accordingly. You have reached the borders, wish to join, and since you were improper about it I shall teach you the proper way." It was simple really. "Howl, sir fool. No one knows to meet you unless you make your presence known."

They might have been alright had he not rambled further. She felt suddenly exasperated and did her best to keep her expression neutral. She had no need of his offered services, but at least he was... Oh forget it. He'd already proved he was imaginative. His enthusiasm for fantasy was beyond her comprehension. "Let's start with that howl then, shall we?" The basics first. Then they could go from there. "I'll demonstrate."

She lifted her head back and released a howl of her own as she requested the presence of @Saena or @Reek. "Now your turn."

So close! Saena was almost at the very top of a slanted, half-rotted log in the forest's western quadrant when Citali rose her voice in summons. Her ruddy ears pinned back and she reached a paw forward, half-tempted to ignore the Gamma until she made it to the very top... but that wasn't good behaviour for an alpha. Certainly not one who had need of mature adult wolves in the ranks to make up for her husband's stupid pets and Scarlett's cubs. So she shot a last lingering glance at the tip of the log, where a bright little mushroom sat bobbing in the wind, before she turned and clumsily descended to the forest floor.

She was pleased to note as she trotted that she was finally feeling a bit spry again. Her leg was still stiff and sore if she was still for too long. Her severed tail still hurt like a bitch to sit on. But she was almost able to run again and that was something. She made it to the borders faster than she had in over half a month, though as she drew close, signs and smells of destruction became evident. The shrubs were shredded, the earth was uplifted, and suddenly Citali's howl didn't seem like a promising one.

The alpha female burst out of a thick patch of undergrowth and whipped her head around, half-expecting to see the bloody bear from late September back again. Her heart hammered even when she realized there was no bear. She looked questioningly to the healer, and only then did she spot the greyscale figure of Jax. "Hullo," she said slowly, doing her best to mask the concern and worry that threatened to creep into her voice and that remained still writ on her knitted brows.

Hearing her command for him to howl, Jax pulled his lips back in an apologetic smile. "Ah, well, you see, not only am I 'Sir Fool,' I am also 'Sir Cannot-Howl-At-The-Moment-Because-He-Has-A-Ruptured-Vocal-Cord.' My Howl Cord has snapped right in half, doozy of a break, gonna take a while for that one to heal," he said sheepishly after she had let loose her own howl. "Oh, but your voice is lovely, most befitting for a mage. First you save my body, now by giving me this opportunity, you are saving my soul; how will I ever repay you, how?" Still on his back, he twisted his head around and stuck his tongue out and made to kiss her feet again, but remembering the nose bop, quickly pulled back. 

Soon enough, a new figure came bursting through the undergrowth, and Jax turned his head to face her. Face emotionless, he lifted a front leg and raised it up towards Citali. "She saved me." He remained still for a few seconds, then scrambled up only to dive down on his back again, this time sliding himself as close underneath Saena as she would allow it. "You must be the head honcho of this lovely forest, and Master's boss to boot. I told her I would be a spy for you, yes happily, happily, I will give you all the information needed to crush thine enemies, as they say. You do have enemies, correct? Oh of course you do, any pack with the power to bring a wolf back from the dead has to have enemies, has to have secrets, and has to have enemies who want those secrets. Well, fear no more, Jax is here! Or Sir Fool, as your fine mage has taken to calling me, and I will be called what she wishes to call me, make no mistake about that, but you may call me Jax Saturnin if you wish, or Sir Fool, whichever you prefer."

After taking a second to catch his breath, he smiled up Saena. "In fewer words, I would like to join your pack." 

For one who made more than anyone's fair share of noise she found it terribly difficult to believe he'd ruptured a vocal chord as he'd suggested. "Really, now?" she replied with lifted brow. "If your vocals were snapped clear in half you'd not be talking at all." She knew this. She was healer enough and familiar with the anatomy of things enough to know this all a-matter-of-factly. "Let's start by telling only truths," she said, and realized she might have been setting herself up for another round of mishaps. Oh well. "Your vocals are fine. Now howl."

He was saved from having to do so when Saena emerged from the wilderness. In this moment, she was looking at her own savior and felt something in debt to her alpha considering her present company was someone she very much needed saving from. The male pointed his paw towards her. "She saved me." Citali's ears fell flat as she droned back, "I found him," before he launched into another round of nonsense which proved his vocals were working not only fine, but on overtime.

When he'd finished, introduced himself finally, and followed with his intentions here, Citali loosed and exasperated sigh. "He's also convinced he's ruptured a vocal chord," she followed with tired enthusiasm. He'd covered the gist of it and, as he'd already stolen everyone's word quota for the day, she felt no need to badger the topic further by repeating them. Alas, she was glad this wolf was no longer fully her problem. He was a burden that was meant to be shared.

I'll powerplay Citali minorly to finish this thread up, since her player has pulled her out of the game.

What followed was like something out of a comedy. The grey male with his unusually bright dual-toned eyes immediately launched into a very long-winded account of how Citali had saved him, referencing such strange and unfamiliar terms as "mage" to turn Saena's brain on its head. She understood what he was getting at, though it took some deciphering and some interjecting by Citali for her to truly get the act. Ah.

"You're awfully skilled at speaking with a ruptured vocal chord," Saena noted. She thought she heart a quiet snort in Citali's direction, but she didn't lift her head to check whether the healer was amused with it or not. "What sort of name is Sir Fool anyway?" she wondered aloud, "wouldn't you want others to take you seriously as a spy?" She would've wanted that if she was a spy. Alas, Saena had almost no stealth to speak of, and gathering information from others was hardly an interest of hers. The affairs of others were barely even a concern, yet she supposed a spy could have its merits.

"Jax," she affirmed, preferring that over "Sir Fool" if only because it felt rude to call him that, "how do I know you're not just here to spy on us for someone else?" She sort of doubted he would extravagantly mention how Citali saved him if that was the case, yet she always had to be careful with this sort. Anyone who was capable of spying for her was capable of spying against her; she didn't want to fall prey to someone else's trick, let alone a man who referred to himself as a fool.

Presumably as a result of her question, the man changed his mind and was on his way. The alpha remained vigilantly on the border between her home and his retreating backside until he faded away into the plains.