Northstar Vale Echoes of ephasia have haunted you tonight

Set several hours after this.

Saena's eyes fluttered open when a raindrop splattered against her sensitive nose. She lifted her head off her forearms, twitched her ears around to get her bearings, then glanced over to @Dagfinn. It took her a moment to clear her mind, during which she stood and stretched, but then she remembered why they were up on the ledge: the doe. Twisting her head around, Saena looked back to the river they'd last seen her at, and breathed a sigh of relief when she spotted the felled lump of fawn-coloured flesh just waiting for them. The doe's last breaths must have been total agony, but she wasn't compassionate enough toward other animals to care about that.

"Looks like she's finally down," said Saena to her companion amidst the pattering of slow droplets from the sky. About time, too. Saena had predicted about half an hour, but the doe had proved more resilient than the huntress thought, and now the sky was overcast and heavy. She passed her gaze over the valley to the east, where the buck had stood watching them earlier, but there was no sign of it now. Good, she thought as she beckoned Dagfinn. He was off anyway.

Rain drops didn't bother Dag. He was used to sleeping in bad weather, though more used to sleet and snow than rain. Still, the young male didn't rouse until the first female's voice fell soft on his ears. He twitched them in irritation before picking up his head and giving a gaping yawn. Only then did his eyes follow Saena's to the doe, and silently, to where the buck had stood as well.

Rising, the wolf followed after his leader, eyes bright as he kept on the lookout for the raging beast.

"I dreamed that the buck could turn into a wolf," he confided as he padded behind her. Part of him wondered if she would rather be quiet, but the dream had been disconcerting enough that he decided to share it anyway. "He came into the pack and, in the night, bit us all on the ankle. When we awoke, he was gone, and we all became mad - one after another."

He'd never heard of rabies before, but if he'd known the word, he might've used it for the wolf-buck in his dreams. He might've used it for the buck itself. And, if he had, he would have felt even sillier for sharing his fears with the older shewolf. As it was, he felt as though she would think him foolish, now - given to useless imaginings.

He was.

Her ruddy ears pivoted backward to politely listen to Dagfinn and his retelling whilst her eyes focused on the craggy ground ahead. A misstep could send either of them tumbling down the mountainside. She picked her way carefully, with ginger steps, even as her face morphed into an expression of confusion and concern when Dagfinn finished his story.

As a child, Saena often dreamed of a half-swan, half-dog creature. It often taught her things in her dreams, but it wasn't always kind, and eventually she'd simply stopped dreaming about it. It wasn't quite the same as a crazed wolf-buck, but she could certainly understand the fear that came with dreams. "Something's definitely not right with it to be that aggressive," she concluded, "but don't worry, it couldn't bite our ankles enough to drive us mad." Saena, too, knew nothing about rabies nor why the very notion of being bit and going mad from it was a frightening one, but she didn't want to think about it too much longer. It was like her instincts knew even though her brain didn't.

"Do you think the whole herd was messed up?" She'd detected nothing off about the doe, but she would never have expected the buck to behave so aggressively, and heedless to its own safety. It was possible she'd missed something. Either way, the buck didn't seem to be around anymore, and with any luck, they'd never encounter it again. The way it had watched them unnerved her even now that it was gone.

Dag licked his lips as she gave her opinion on the matter. He agreed that its ankle-biting wouldn't drive them mad, but the dream still weighed heavily on his mind. If he'd been one to believe in prophecy, he might've suggested they track it down with the whole pack and end this once and for all. Even without that belief, he wondered if it was something they ought to think about. If the buck was sick, it might spread its disease to the whole herd, and then they'd have a prey-animal rebellion to think about. Or something.

"The doe seemed fine," he said after a moment, speaking just as they reached the bottom of the crags. Wintery eyes darted around and short, furry ears twisted this way and that. All clear. "But the rest of the pack should know that there's an aggressive buck out there. Someone could get hurt."

And the more he thought about it, the more he came to realize that the doe hadn't gone down easily, either. It'd taken a long time for her to bleed out - longer than either of them had predicted. And Dag didn't know how badly they'd injured her, but... well, it'd seemed like enough.

"Think we ought to hunt it down?" he asked uncertainly, side-eyeing the first female as he spoke.

Saena suspected they wouldn't see the buck or his remaining does again, but she had the same wariness that Dagfinn did in mind, so she met his suggestion with a resolute nod. "Just in case," she agreed. She didn't think many wolves would go for a buck in any case, but a group of hunters overestimating their capabilities might. The last thing Duskvale needed in its infancy and with winter on the way was injury or death.

"The buck?" she asked, not wholly clear on what he meant to hunt down, and likely she was mistaken. It wasn't a bad idea by any means, if only to get eyes on it, but unwise with just the two of them. "With any luck it'll leave the valley now," she mused, "but maybe as a precaution we should look for it later. Keep an eye on it. We'll go make sure the doe is dead now." That might've been what he meant in the first place but she just wasn't sure, and made the suggestion anyway.

With that, she began picking her way westward along the base of the mountain. As she went, she tossed an inquiry over her shoulder: "do you do a lot of hunting, Dagfinn?"

"The buck," Dag agreed with a nod of his head, ears quirking toward the woman as she spoke further on the subject. He turned his head as if to look at her while she spoke to him, but his eyes continued to map out the land before them. He wanted to believe that it would move on, but the fact of the matter was that Dag was still very shaken by Saena almost getting hurt during the hunt. The first female had been inches away from being gored.

It would have been an ugly death.

Still, he concede to her words, willing to take them as wisdom, seeing as she was older and more experienced. (That was, at least, what he assumed.)  When she set off toward the doe, Dag was a mere step behind her, not willing to incite another game of tag with all that had transpired. In a few hours, he'd calm down and leave her be, but for now, he followed close and flanked her left side.

"Kyllä - Yes. I am from the tundra. We hunted reindeer, there," he explained, thinking back to those hunts. The animals travelled in larger herds were he was from, but were far less protective of each other than this buck had been of his does. "This is my first deerhunt away from home." And without his family.

It was settled, then. After they'd found their kill and rallied the pack to it, Dagfinn and Saena would keep careful vigil for any signs of the buck. Until then, it was swept from her mind as easily as old dust bunnies. Dagfinn's concern should've registered more clearly with Saena, and she should've felt more responsible for ensuring that the possible risk of the buck was taken care of, but she was hungry and unwilling to believe that a mere buck could cause a wolf pack much trouble.

The scent of blood permeated the air as they broke away from the mountains proper, and Saena licked her lips as Dagfinn explained his own background in hunting. "What are reindeer?" she wondered, feeling as though she'd never seen such a creature before. The very name confused her: was it a deer that only came out in the rain? Did it rain on the tundra? These were all questions that Saena, a more southern-y creature, could not begin to guess at the answers to.

"You handled yourself commendably for your first hunt away from home," she complimented him; she'd have thought Dagfinn was a master and not a relatively untried wolf who had only hunted with the support of his family. A family of wolves could read each other so well that their joint movements were like a well oiled machine, and the hunt was easiest with them. Strangers hunting together often had much poorer results, but Dagfinn could have passed for family any day, and that alone made his future as a hunter seem very promising.

Saena's confidence lended to Dagfinn's own - the sweet death-scent of the doe drove thought of the Mad Buck almost completely away, but he remembered himself enough to keep an eye out. If Saena got hurt out here, it would be his fault.

"Reindeer are like the deer here, but larger - and they travel in giant herds. Like a carpet of food that stretches as far as your eyes can see," he explained, eyes dancing as he remembered the Great Hunts of his youth. Many of the wars that'd been fought in his homeland had been fought for the choicest hunting grounds. Mostly, though, they'd been fought for fun. There was always enough food to go around, after all. (As far as his memory went.) "They are less protective of each other when they group together in like that, though," he added, not wanting to seem like he was bragging or anything, even though Saena's praise made him puff up like a proud tomcat.

"You got the killing bite," he reminded her, the lashing of his tail giving away his pleasure at being complimented.

Saena's tongue slid over her lips as visions of sheets of deer filled her head. She was most familiar with small herds of white-tailed deer and slightly larger herds of elk, but a herd so large it formed a sheet across the snowy terrain was simply unimaginable. "That sounds amazing," breathed the lead bitch. Saena hunted most often by herself or with small groups, so the intimidation factor of such a large group of deer wasn't lost on her. Dagfinn's assurance that they were less protective in that formation didn't convince her too much, but only because she was used to more defensive animals.

"That role in a hunt is usually not the most important one," she opined as they rounded a bend in the foothills and suddenly the river, and the felled doe, came into view. Saena was excited to sink her teeth into some fresh meat, so rather than saying much else on the subject—they would have plenty of time to discuss hunting and various tactics later, no doubt—she picked up her feet into a trot and called, "last one there has to eat the brain!"

The brain was her least favourite part. Some other wolves loved it, but not Saena.

It was amazing. Dag missed those hunts more than anything except Lotte, but going on these trips with Saena helped to alleviate the ache of homesickness. It was becoming less and less of a hurt all the time, but he still hoped that his sister would consider his words and join him here in the spring.

Like him, Saena demured from the praise, and Dag just wagged his tail as he thought about how well they'd both done today. The buck was almost like a distant dream - one that couldn't hurt him now. So when Saena called out her challenge, Dag hardly even thought about what'd happened the last time they'd raced.

"Ha!" he chuffed, taking off after the shewolf. He liked the brain, but he'd like to see her eat it even more if it meant he won. Normally, he felt strange about passing by the lead bitch, but at her challenge, he felt comfortable running his hardest.

Saena was built for endurance, but not necessarily speed. She was smaller than most wolves, a mere fifty-some pounds, with a thin and streamlined construction, but it hardly lent her supernatural speed. What Saena was, was agile. She could dart around faster than some larger, dopier wolves could blink their eyes, but when it came to flat-out running, she was only about average in the speed department. She could run for several miles, to be certain, but the black bard had the upper hand here.

She glanced over her shoulder long enough to spot his white-smattered chest drawing closer, and then Dagfinn overtook her. Whether it was easy or not, she was unsure, but she pushed herself until her legs and lungs burned, but was unable to make up the difference. He reached the doe a full two seconds before she did. Panting, she slowed to a trot and reached the doe, muzzle wrinkled in recognition of her unfortunate loss.

"Damnit," she swore, dropping her rump to the ground and heaving in breaths. "You're quick," she told him, and wondered if maybe it was the age difference, though the likelier explanation was that he was lean and his legs were longer than hers. As she caught her breath, she motioned that he could start on the doe if he wanted to. The hunters would eat their fill and then howl their location to the pack so they could also feed—at least, that was her thinking.

Dag danced around the breathless alpha, his own sides heaving as he did so. His youth did indeed lend him strength, but longer legs had won him the race, in the end. Again, the male puffed up at her praise, ceasing to dance in victory as he did so.

"You..." he gasped - "...too..."

She motioned him toward the food, but he laid down instead, rubbing his face into the snow to cool himself down and taking a large, gulping bite of it to quench the fire in his throat. It took several seconds to deep breathing to calm down the racing of his heart, and only then did he move to the deer's side to nose against its belly, searching for signs of sickness before he ate.

Finding none, Dagfinn tore in and began to eat.

She chuckled at Dagfinn's antics, and momentarily thought to join him, but the moment passed just as quickly. The snow was soothing and would douse the warmth of exercise, but she was already beginning to slow her breathing, and didn't relish her coat being any wetter than it already was. Instead, she stood and began to inspect the head of the dead doe. In warmer months, flies would already have congregated around the sticky blood and saliva flecking its lips, but in winter, it was practically preserved.

She went to work on the skull, cracking the bone with strong jaws until she was able to get to the soft brain inside. It was already partially liquefied. Disgusted, Saena gobbled it up as quickly as she could as promised for losing, then turned to more succulent prospects as she got right in along Dagfinn to the belly. When she'd eaten her fill, which was very little of the whole doe, she lifted her blood-stained snout into the sky and sang out triumphantly in a sound that the pack was sure to hear and rally to.

Should we close after this or did you want the pack to join?

Dagfinn was nearly done by the time Saena joined the meal. He was not particularly hungry right at that moment, but he ate his fill and a little bit more to last him until the next one and stick some meat to his bones.

Saited, he slumped away and laid down to clean his face and paws, rubbing his muzzle into the ground where he could not reach with his tongue. Dag finished cleaning himself up and looked to Saena with a beating tail as she howled for their packmates. Moving toward her, he attempted to clean a spot of blood from the top of her head just behind her ears before moving off to find a nice tree to curl up under for a nap.

We can close, it can just be a point of reference that the pack arrived later. :D

She drew back her head and swallowed a hunk of flesh, and then a chill wormed down her spine as Dagfinn's tongue and teeth connected with a spot just shy of her scalp. Her eyes rolled back lightly as she rumbled a quiet appreciative sound, and within moments she was feeling heavy and sleepy. Dagfinn retreated some distance away, and Saena licked her chops twice before settling down right where she was, near to the fallen doe. Within ten minutes, she was dozing, and within twenty, she was out like a light.