Dawnlark Plains Rain or Shine (III)

The day dawned bright and clear, though dark clouds amassed over the open ocean along the horizon. Throughout the morning, they rolled southeast, making landfall just before noon and bringing with them a deluge of ice cold rain showers. Simultaneously, a cool draft blustered up from the south, pushing against the encroaching weather system. The largely invisible forces met in the middle, pushing against one another and causing the rain clouds to halt a few miles inland. This created a strange effect: while heavy rain fell on the northwestern reaches of Teekon Wilds, the air remained clear and dry elsewhere, drawing a distinct line across the wilderness.

Nowhere was this phenomenon more visually evident than on the patches of open grassland parallel with the coastline: Silverlight Terrace; just south of Firestone Springs; Dawnlark Plains; and Sunset Valley. (Elsewhere, mountains and other land features largely obscured the effect.) From these patches of flat, open ground, there was a distinct fringe created between the dark, wet rainstorm and the clear air further inland. The rainfall billowed like the curtains on a great window, the dark clouds remaining stationary for at least the next hour or two.

Authored by: Kat (Wildfire)

It was unlike anything she'd ever seen.

Had she retained her naturalist trade, Saena would've been positively leaping for joy at this strange event. She didn't officially hold the title anymore and could no sooner explain what was happening than could any other wolf, but she marveled in it all the same. A morning stroll out onto the plain came to an abrupt halt when the air seemed to shimmer in the distance, and the alpha female had approached the anomaly with utmost caution. Her neck was stretched to its full length, her nose quivering, and only when she touched the fringe did she understand.

On that side it was raining, and on this side it was not. Every so often the curtain of rain would billow and sprinkle her head, but the alpha stepped back whenever this happened, so that it appeared from a distance she was engaged in a complex waltz with the wall of rain. Her ears flickered excitably in all directions, but for now she enjoyed this phenomenon alone with no expectation of anyone else arriving to see it.

Nanook knew she shouldn't have run so far, but every time conviction tugged, the polar child refused to turn back. After all, what would the Maplewood do? There were no punishments left to give. Mother had forced father and Xan to leave, and Nanook had undertaken to push Desna away before someone else could. That only left Sesi, but Nanook had never been close to her peculiar little sister. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing in the end. Her stomach still twisted when she thought of Desna's retreating form, her last look of pain engraved like a fevered dream. The weighty shadow still clung to Nanook and made her paws heavy, but her sister would be okay. She always was.

But Nanook was not, and after setting out that morning in secret, she found herself in a forest due west of the Maplewood. In theory she knew she should have told her mother where she would be going, but Nanook wasn't dumb. If she'd done that, mama would have sent someone else along with her, and that was the last thing she wanted right now. Besides, she could handle herself. She wasn't a baby anymore, and her recent growth spurt paired with her stubborn will gave her a false sense of confidence she could do this alone.

She skirted around the cusp of the woodland, her only company the ever-present burn at the pit of her ribs. It was only as the northern sky emerged from behind the pines that the words and worries within faltered, as if fleeing at the very sight of the battle-line of rain and cloud. Yet while her thoughts ran far from her, her ears pushed forth without effort, and soon her whole body followed. The tall grass brushed against her belly, hunkered down in a mix of wonder and apprehension. It was then she noticed another not far from her, but Nanook remained too fixed on figuring out the formation to give her company a second look.

Her expectations seemingly met, the alpha female gave the rain storm one last lingering look before she began to turn, but in so doing, her hunters' eyes spotted Nanook. She didn't immediately notice the grey agouti female, but the rustling of grass. Something predatory rose in her chest, but then she spotted the brilliant copper of the juvenile's eye, and the rest of her body seemed to materialize like magic when Saena focused on that. For a short moment the alpha stood quietly, curiously watching Scarlett's daughter, before she shifted a leg through the grass to announce herself as well.

"Cool, huh?" she asked with a flick of her snout toward the curtain of rain. Assuming Nanook didn't flee on the spot, Saena would seat herself, apparently interested in remaining here a little while longer, and conversationally asked, "do you like this sort of thing?" Once, Saena would've been overcome with the brilliance of nature. She could even potentially explain it. Now, she had none but a passing interest in the phenomenon and wouldn't bother with even an educated guess unless Nanook confirmed her suspicions: the girl had an interest in naturalism.

Then maybe Saena could be of some use to her. She no longer held the title and didn't intend to take it back anytime soon, but she still knew some stuff. Perhaps she could teach someone who was more interested in it than herself.

The other wolf's voice carried over the din of storm, and Nanook turned her gaze from the rain - if that was even what the great wall of water was. Recognition dawned on her, but only in visual memory. Somewhere swam the elder's name, but for the moment, it was lost on her.

Curiosity pricked her skin at the elder's question, and she felt the urge to draw closer to both the alpha and the storm. Yet Nanook remained in place. She'd come out here to be alone, and that stubborn conviction held her tight. Yet the drumming of the rainstorm held her the same, and the growing need to figure out the meaning of the great water wall kept her from turning away.

Slowly, she canted her head, a question in itself. "I don't know what it is." She had seen her share of rain, even the storm that tore away their den, but Nanook had never seen clouds or rain like this before, where the torrent scored a line in the air and turned only half the field into mud and sopping grass.

"Rain," the woman offered unhelpfully in response to Nanook's admission, though a split second later she realized what a stupid answer it was. Saena was a former naturalist and should've had more to say than just "rain". "I don't know why it's doing this. You can see rain coming and it comes in a line like this, but..." here she struggled before concluding, "it doesn't stop."

She met the youth's orange eyes for a moment, then cocked a grin and asked, "d'you think it's a special kind of rain?" She didn't know. Weather systems and how they interacted were well beyond the scope of her knowledge. Yet, as if to test this theory, the alpha female took a slow step forward, then another, and plunged into the wall of water. She'd half expected to be stopped somehow, as if an invisible wall separated the rainy side from the dry side, but there was nothing between them and soon she was standing in the downpour. She glanced at the sky overhead and found no answers there either. Nothing to suggest anything special about this rain.

She glanced back at Nanook, curious to know whether something had changed from the youth's side of the rain curtain, as her fur flattened with dampness.

Nanook's ears slicked against her skull. Of course she knew it was rain, even a pup knew that, and she frowned in both embarrassment and offence. Yet the woman managed to cool Nanook's indignation when the alpha revealed herself to know as much about the phenomena as she.

Her question probed the Apaata's mind, and she turned her attention to the sky and bit her lip thoughtfully. There certainly seemed to be something special about this rain. Unlike the storm in the Valley, this one prickled her spine with its uncanny behaviour. If the sky had birthed Leo through the torrential rains in Bearclaw, Nanook couldn't imagine what this rain intended to bring.

Her alpha's sudden movement distracted Nanook from probing further. She caught sight of the woman just as she plunged into the downpour, and Nanook jumped from her crouch with a sharp yelp of alarm. Something terrible would happen, and Nanook locked her gaze tight on the prone figure on the other side of the curtain. But the rain did nothing more than forge rivulets through her alpha's fur, and Nanook's heart steadied with every second that passed.

Nothing had changed on Nanook's side of the curtain but Nanook herself, and she didn't as much give the rain another sniff before she plunged herself into the downpour alongside her alpha. The rain met her with a constancy that made her squint, but the liquid did little more than drench her. She turned to Saena to say something, but the words escaped the moment she saw the older woman with fur plastered tight to her body and soggy like the grass. A strange warmth tickled her chest and something a kin to a giggle slipped from her mouth. She had never seen an adult look so funny before, and the sight made her forget the fear she had felt just moments before.

This one's pretty old, so I'm gonna fade here, hope that's cool! Feel free to post once more or just archive it.

Saena didn't have a mirror with which to see herself, but she could feel the weight of her fur slicked onto her sides and knew she must look ridiculous. Nanook seemed the share the opinion, for the girl graced the Alpha with a rare smile and giggle, and Saena herself chuckled as well. "C'mon," she beckoned, hoping to entice the quiet young thing into playing around in the rain. "It's warm!" And it was; certainly warmer than most downpours, thanks to the sun peeking out from the other side.

The Alpha grinned, crouched low, and then darted into the rainfall, not looking back to see whether Nanook was chasing her or not.