The Bracken Woods Apathy

Warbone loped forward with a great, sweeping stride. His ears were kept aloft and oscillating, while his nose performed slow motions to each point of a perceived compass rose, intent on missing nothing. Everything about him was tuned finely to such repetitive motions; a tracking fiend on autopilot. Survival was all he had time for, his very livelihood during this season leaving zero room for anything else. He had been unable to find a pack that would house his ruthlessness, so if the solitary stag wasn't sleeping, then he was hunting.

The clouds furled overhead, withholding and threatening all at once. His eyes kept darting upwards, regarding the sky suspiciously. Though the weather ever did little to deter the actions of the unprincipled wolf, he did consider the sky falling (in any form) to be an extreme nuisance. In fact, he was more prone to cantankerous behavior when the weather was bad.

Everything around him looked bare and sharp, uninviting to the critical eye but little more than a mild obstacle to the impassive one. Small prey would smartly choose to hide among the hampering nettles, and he would certainly garnish a bounty of thorns going for his quarry, but should he cross the scent of anything, it was going to take more than mere brambles to stop him. The subsequent rumble in his stomach affirmed this.

could we bring this up a few days? :)

The scent of deer brought her down the slopes of the mountain, where she often finds a stray licking at the salt-covered quarry, and following the tail end of a herd out toward the wooded areas north of her home. She’d been spotted somewhere in the open, her dark fur a blinding contrast against the snow, and they’d taken off together before she could herd them back around to her home. 

Thuringwethil follows anyway, loping onward in the snow and into the wooded covering of the northern most territory before the long stretch of emptiness. It had been some time since she’d come this far but she likes to further the scent of Drageda so that, perhaps, those still faithful would follow. Perhaps a long trip outward, once things were settled, to see if she could still command a coalition she damaged a few moons ago.

What she’d been following is lost entirely on here in sight and smell. She’d gone too far in one direction and trying to make her way back would send her further into the forest than she’d like to be. Thuringwethil turns her retreat as the wind shifts, bring the scent of something else entirely into her direction. She stiffens, ears twitching on her head as she sees the wolf loping along, weaving in and out of the brush.

His brutishness seems familiar but his scent doesn’t betray her nose, reminding her nothing of Seageda. When he’s close enough, she chuffs an attempt to draw his attention.

Absolutely!

Prey had no specific sound to the swain. A chuff drew his attention sharply, and the wolf's entire body swung towards her, powerful and targeting, instantly prepared to throw himself into a hungry, violent pursuit. Instead of food, however, he met the stormy eyes of a she-wolf. The stately raven that had addressed him. His tail arced in a slow swing, curious but distracted. Unless she wanted to fight, he had little time to beget idle conversation on an empty stomach.

His muzzle turned away, eager to resume what he had been doing, but then his chilled face turned once more and he eyed the black Amazonian with a critical and lusterless gaze. She was long of leg and solid of body, with bladed fur, a hawkish gaze, and a darkness to her that was not just in her coat. A single snort seemed to affirm a question he had silently asked himself, and then he spoke, his voice a deep and like a provocative fire—Burning. "Hunt with me," a question with no inflection, an attempt to goad the onyx dryad into a temporary relationship that would better his chance of survival.

A tactic on his end, and nothing more.

He notices right away, angling toward with intent. Thuringwethil stiffens, one paw hanging in the air as the space between them widens half a step. A war flashes across his face in the briefest of moments, she’s sure she imagined the haunting. The way he looks at her, through her a distance she can’t measure, sends a shiver down her spine she tightens in order to control. A few long strides forward and she closes the distance, testing their newfound relationship. 

Thuringwethil jerks her head, turning her whole body and trotting away. She might have lost the herd she’d been following but, if she could find the trail once more, she could find them again. An extra nose, able body—albeit looking hungry—they could find it once more. Heavy paws hit the ground as she moves, almost the way she’d come. His drive she’d seen a few moments ago, she doesn’t look back over her shoulder to see if he follows.

Ears cup forward, listening for thundering foot steps behind her to catch up before she starts to slow, easing the beating paws against the earth. A fallen tree up on the right reminds where she’s going and there’s a faint change in air that forces something vocal from her chest. Thuringwethil turns then, half a smirk on her dark features, to see if her new companion follows along.

For the barest of moments, as the she-wolf spilled forth like oil, their faces come near. His tail lifts and performs metronome ticks, a king's banner, but not a challenge—A statement rather, that his body was a castle, a fortress, housing the mind and spirit of an imperator. She turned from him, having decided something for herself, and leaving him behind in a river of motions so quick that the copper stag was briefly inoperable. Her lingering scent roused him, and the gears of the train began to churn; he loped after her slowly.

Frozen olives surveyed their surroundings. He stepped onto and over the fallen log rather than jumping, unwilling to expend any of his energy unless it would feed him. His heavy feet kept a deliberate pace, unaccommodating for his company, but she slowed so that they might move as one killing machine. He traveled at her hip, his head level to his broad shoulders and his eyes resuming a scanning motion as he peered to his left and then over her back repeatedly. Her presence beside him made no difference to his task. At any moment she could bail or decide that her mouth was more important that his.

He would deal with things as they came, and not a moment before.

Hunting with a wolf not of her own kind in Seageda didn’t often occur, for those in her coalition even of another clan, would benefit one another. The canine a few short steps to her side smelled of no others and there were no other packs nearby that she rules other than her own. Her own were several weeks of travel away and the thought of going back any time soon lays waste with her history. Those that came together for their time in peace likely wanted little to do with her, even if a new heda would not arise until her death.  

The scent picked up a moment ago eludes her and her pace slows to decipher the direction it is strongest. The herd she’d startled some time back, before the woods, scattered in their fear. When she didn’t expect to search for them again, sure they were long gone and too far separated for her to shepherd them back toward Drageda. A second hand, even if they bring one down, might be enough to scare their change in direction. She inhales sharply and holds it, letting her speed pick back up as she notes  a few broken branches and tufts of fur nagged in a frenzy and left behind. Her mouth waters and her tongue swells, eager for something on her stomach once more. 

Thuringwethil chuffs her command before she turns, fawn coloring catching her gaze that rips her attention from her companion. She stiffens and lifts her head, unable to keep heda’s posture from taking over in expectation. Her chest heaves with a deep breath of excitement, their horizon laid out before them with the promise of feast.

Feel free to do some PPing, for the hunt C:

At first there is nothing. Warbone was wary, but saw purpose behind the leading steps of inkwell queen. She knew something that he didn't, and he followed without a discernible fear, his eyes blank and roving. Just before any suspicion could foul his consciousness, there came the signs. A snapped twig, the violent hoof impressions of a fleeing animal, fur left in the briars. Jaws salivated, a trill wrinkling down his spine as his muscles began to pick up one by one. His steps grew lighter, carrying himself properly now that The Hunt was nearing. His breaths eased, taking in only what he needed, and everything about him preached of instinct and practice. He no longer appeared hunched and directionless. There was purpose in his stance, a power roiling and fed by the energy vibrating off his companion in electrifying waves.

In the same movement, both animals perked to the streaking of sorrel on their left. Warbone held himself in reins, knowing that he was rigid spine of his attack, while she was the stone arrowhead. He followed her smoothly, expertly—neither of them making a step outside of the other. They were synchronized. A malevolent Cerberus, influenced by impulse and the dauntingly titilating scent of fear, giving away their prey.

Entire hunt with permission. I wrote it from my phone so I hope it makes sense, lol.

The woman moves without looking to see if she's being follow; she doesn't have to. Instead, she focuses on the their goal, studying the way the young doe moves through the trees. The prey seems nervous, unsure of herself. She'd gotten lost when they all fled into the covering of the bracken woods, separated from her herd. Thuringwethil hadn't expected to see them again but her stomach flutters, moving away from the large male. He doesn't deviate far, mimicking her path to the opposite side. Synchronized, calculated; words simply weren't necessary.

Grey eyes search quickly for him, watching as they settle to watch a few minutes more. Thuringwethil slips quietly past the deer, searching for an opening large enough they'd be able to swing her into. The foliage and thick trees make it difficult to maneuver and if they aren't careful, she'll get away.

A small clearing of trees where a path has been worn into gives them the best advantage and she lingers on the other side. Thuringwethil lifts her head to search, peering through the brush. She hears a snap in the distance and, as if he heard her thoughts, barrels through with precision that surprises her. He weaves through the trees behind the doe with an impressive agility she can't deny, closing the distance with snapping jaws and rushing their meal toward her.

She rushes forward once the deer is close enough to meet her, the beast roaring behind and lunging at the creature. Her own paws steadily hit the ground, parting and ready. The crushing ground beneath her feet startles the doe into halting and backing up to change positions but the male, mid-lunge, hooks his claws into the rear.  Thuringwethil crosses he distance with a powerful thrust, latching onto what she can. Her shoulder nails into her side, and between the two the creature stumbles and can't carry their weight combined. There's a sickening snap that forces a growl from her throat, a pitiful crying from the deer, and she latches her teeth into skin and sinks until blood pours into her mouth.

It doesn't take much more effort to get the creature to the ground, writhing around and fighting for her last breaths while Thuringwethil shakes her head into a morbid game of tug and war. His weight on the creature holds her down and when the crying stops and the last heaving breath is taken, she lets go. Chest heaves rapidly as she tries to steady her breathing, blood dripping from her lips and temporarily staining her teeth.

The young doe, heavy and thrashing, was kept weighted down by the male wolf clutching the rigid arch of her spine. He kept a grip on her that was as firm as a lion's, and she stumbled once, twice, three times before the overbearing weight of both hunters felled the brackenwood deer. He ripped into the doe's fleshy rump, swallowing a mass quantity of flesh without much regard for choking. The prey was very much alive, kicking and crying, attempting to fight away the shadow near her neck and unable to guard against the beast on her back. Warbone was not consciously aware that the onyx Amazon was dispatching the catch, draining her with life-taking fangs; he only knew that the body beneath him was weakening, and her fight was ebbing like the tide. Dying.

Warbone continued to eat. Alive or not, he was desperate to sate his craving belly. In his singular status, he often chased larger prey—and though he could not take down such a thing on his own, the brute was almost always certain to take a mouthful of meat with him. Sometimes it worked out fortuitously: injuring an ungulate to the point where it died later after exertion. He only need follow. A manifestation of death when it follows.

He was vaguely aware now that the deer had stopped moving completely, and he was on his third or fourth mouthful before the black she-wolf would detach herself from the certainly dead creature and find what he was doing to their bounty. She would either join in the voracious activity and treat herself to the belly, or find affront in the starved male's lack of manners. Neither of which mattered to a feral, dauntless wolf as he.

The doe's movements cease and she eases her jaws open again, watching the male rip into the rump of their fallen prey. A knot sits in her stomach as she watches him break the flesh of their kill before him, something she's not been accustomed to for a long time now. She's not had to fight for the first break of flesh, given the first opportunity to eat above the others. The male isn't one of her own, she has to remind herself, and he's at least avoided the tender organs within whether or not a decision he made before taking his fill.

Thuringwethil breaks into the belly with ease, blood forming on her muzzle as she shreds flesh and a thin layer of muscle, sorting into the cavity to first engulf the liver before she rips apart the rest and digs into the source of nutrients she finds most delicious and useful for her body.

When her fill has been met, she licks at her lips and rifles through the mess she made for anything left behind. Her hunger hadn't been as strong or driven as the other, a pack beneath her claim to help support them, but she doesn't allow herself to waste what has been presented. Thuringwethil moves back, attempts to clean the mess around her muzzle, and watches him devour the kill they brought down together. A capable hunter, already proven, and so the idea isn't all that far-fetched once he's taken a moment after his feast: "Join me."

i may or may not have fallen asleep halfway through writing this lol

He took longer to finish than the black queen, but so had he gone longer without eating. Though the wolf didn't typically gorge himself, for practical reasons, he ate until the churn of his belly was uncomfortable and was forced to pull himself back, his hungerlust finally sated. He licked his gory chops, swallowing the last bit of blood and sinew he would allow himself for the time. Her words elicited the memories of how synchronized they had been, and the meal they had shared in relative ease; as equals on neutral ground. He heard the implication in her tone, though Warbone hardly doubted the young female was the claimer of those scents carried on her guard hairs. Those many wolves mingling like perfume on her back belonged to her— She did not belong to them.

"You would have me kneel," Warbone said slowly, his expression unreadable beneath the drab red staining his face. This, he thought, reflected on how alike they were. He did not expect a she-wolf like her to bow to anyone. How could she, of a wolf like him? He felt disrespected, if only in slight, but despite what his appearance suggested, he was not a creature governed by hairtrigger emotion.

You would have me kneel.

Thuringwethil can't help the instinctive pull that lifts her head just a little more. It's recognition enough, based in her form and words, that he knows. Heda may not be at the forefront of his mind but somewhere—it is in all wolves—he knows. His demeanor doesn't much change, either, so the silence that lingers between them doesn't give her anymore answers. His face void of expression, much like hers, and she finds an admiration she doesn't often come across.

"I would," she says with an even voice and a beat later: "Would it be so bad?" she decides, have weighing heavy on his features.

His pale eyes flashed, and for a moment briefer than a blink, the wolf stiffened with contained violence. It passed almost imperceptibly, because what she asked of him next was contradictory to the reaction in his muscles, and he forced himself to consider her question in grave seriousness. "No," he uttered at last, admitting this at great length. "Not if it were just to you." He watched her face, a plate of dark steel, but could see no definitive emotion reflected there as surely his own countenance remained impassive. "You have done me no disservice, and you are an admirable creature— a consummate enigma. But I do not just give my respect. I merely reciprocate."

He would be a danger to any who challenged or severely disrespected him. Could any pack house such a volatile spirit? One whose place was undefined and certain all the same? He could see himself following the black queen, but to be controlled? Of this he was uncertain. "Will your offer stand if I do not choose to commit this instant?"

Eh, sorry this is all over the place. I've been in a haze the last few days. :\

Thuringwethil looks upon the male as if he were already her own, eyes possessive as she listens. To her, he might follow, and she narrows her slate colored eyes a little more. She's been groomed for leadership to wolves that accepted her at such a young age, and there were those that would still follow her as a way of their culture. It had been ingrained in them for their faith to be in their commander. Heda being the sole leader of her former, Ina culture that accepts only one, she doesn't consider beyond her reach of a position she often has to remind herself she shares.

Losing Seageda may not have been a terrible thing after all, expending the reaches of the sea into Drageda and embracing what she has here. They will know her soon enough.

"My offer will stand as long as I have room," she tells him. If he cannot commit now, she will not blame him, but there is no promise in his question, no obvious sign of making a decision to join Sleeping Dragon. "I am Thuringwethil, commander of Drageda."

He would hold her to her word, as he would hold any wolf, and Warbone tipped his muzzle in affirmation to the newly introduced Thuringwethil, commander of Drageda. Her title roused him, and he shifted into a more attentive posture, his eyes flashing in a knowing sheen. The wolf was not in the least bit surprised as she finally spoke it. "Warbone," he introduced. "A title similarly earned from the place of my birth."

The earthy colossus licked his stained jaws, eyeing her in barely contained mirth. She was fathomless and yet entirely present— a myth among mortals. Irritatingly, he had the Freudian thought that she reminded him of his dragon-worshipping mother. The only true goddess he had ever seen. "I will seek you," he said, suddenly unwilling to let the enigma do her typical shadowy exit. He would not watch her melt away, leaving only a tingling afterthought...

She would watch him.

Warbone abruptly looked to the north, and took a few long, ponderous steps in that direction before pausing to look over his shoulder at the panther queen. "As the days warm, know I am nearing." He had started trotting away again before his ominous sentence had finished, and he didn't look back as he began his scouting venture of The Wilds.