King Elk Forest Everybody lies.

The sun had finally breached the horizon and brought light, heat, and comfort to the world again. A faint haze of frost clung to the lower reaches of the forest. Through that, the light took on a moody affectation; as if knowing the night had been quelled yet again, birds began their chirping. It was an idyllic moment of perfect calm and contentedment within the coppice.

From deep within the forest, something else called. The namesake elk lifted its mighty crown and bleat a series of shrill notes. On the second cry it went louder, higher, the sound carrying through the trees — and without being able to stop herself, Bronze lifted her body free of its hiding place beneath some shrubs and cast her own head back, calling out with a canine drone.

She didn't know why she felt so compelled to match the note. Had she been a dog, she would've probably howled to the sound of an ambulance passing on the street, or the siren of a fire engine screeching on by. Her sound was more canine, and candid, and broke the peaceful quiet for a few moments as she howled a clean — but ultimately meaningless — accompaniment to the unseen prey.

The forest beside Silver Creek was beautiful and never-ending. Sunspot had spent many hours traversing the Creek's hunting grounds, enticed by the scent of prey and the almost effervescent quality of the mist that was both hovering in the air and sifting down from between the trees. Sunspot, though usually adverse to being wet, had paid no mind to this mist as it found ways to cling to her pale, sun-burst pelt. Her sides were slimmer, now, the fur there now plastered to her flanks by moisture, while the thick fur on the back of her neck had down the opposite and now stood like the quills of a porcupine. If not for the happy sheen to her eyes and the lazy loll of her tongue, one might assume she bristled in anger.

But Sunspot was not angry - not even when the elk she'd been stalking was startled off by the ungodly call of another creature. The pale matron turned her head and then quirked it in confusion when she saw the call had come from another wolf. It seemed an odd thing to do, but - deciding that she was not irritated by the loss of her quarry - Sunspot decided to try it out herself, and let loose a loud, bellowing call to mimmick the other wolf's, rather than the elk's original cry.

Her call died away, and then she waited, watching the trees eagerly and pivoting her ears with the dull hope that the elk would call again. Instead of the elk however, there came a mirrored song upon the wind — a summoning perhaps? But she did not recognize the voice, and had already begun to forget about the elk and her own call.

The voice on the wind meant there was someone else here, and that made her happy. Her tail whipped behind her, catching the loose snow which had freshly fallen the day before. Bronze chose to seek that sound, and managed to get pretty close to its origin point before the task began to grow fuzzy in her mind, and then slip away almost entirely by the time her eyes landed upon the stranger in the distance.

The girl stopped and loosed a bark without thinking — then followed it up with doggish cheer: Hey! Hello! You're pretty. You look like me, are we related? I hope not. I mean, not that I'm gay. Unless I am gay? That'd be awkward. Is the forest always this quiet? She'd stopped a few feet away from the stranger, although was eager to get close and sniff at her breath, her butt, whatever would count as a normal greeting, because honestly she'd forgotten even that much.

"I am pretty," Sunspot eagerly agreed, immediately appreciating her new friend. She came closer, tail whisking, and took in the other's scent. She smelled, pleasantly, of woman and frost, and Sunspot sidled close with an happy chuckle warm in her throat. "I'm a little gay," she freely admitted, thinking that it certainly wouldn't be awkward if the other shewolf had similar tendancies. She didn't voice this opinion, however, and refrained also from answering the woman's question about the forset - that one, she simply didn't know the answer to.

"You don't seem to know much about yourself," she commented instead, feeling a bit of protective concern for the lone shewolf.