Stone Circle I shall now expose my chest, don't act like you're not impressed

Ever since his talk with Nikai, Burr had busied himself each morning with learning to track down small animals. It was out of a sense of obligation more than real dedication or interest; he felt like he should be learning to hunt by now, so he tried his best to teach himself. Unfortunately for the Saefyn, it wasn't going as smoothly as he hoped. Most days he muddied up his trails and ended up following the wrong one. When he did manage to actually find an animal, he was hopeless at getting close to it.

Today was no different. The sun shone weakly overhead, casting pale shadows across the land, and Burr was hunkered down in one of those shadows, peering intently at an unaware squirrel across the clearing. He hadn't yet discovered why sometimes he was instantly noticed and other times he wasn't; the direction of the wind wasn't something he ever considered. His curled tail flicked behind him as he mentally counted the paces between him and his target, but he misjudged many other factors. When he rose to his feet and began his charge, the squirrel was quick to turn and head up the nearest tree.

With an uncharacteristic sound of frustration (born not only of his failure but other bottled up feelings as well), Burr flopped to the ground and glared up at the tree trunk.

@Valette!

Thank you for starting!

Valette was becoming more active again. The female hunter was eager to get back to doing her little tasks for the pack. The female studied the herds again and noticed some changes. There were new faces for the month she had been away. She wanted to make sure she was up to date with the new routine so she would know when the deer would be the least alert. The same was for the bison herd that mingled more with the deer. She was not sure if they were cooperating yet but it seemed they made use of one another.

Today, Valette moved through the woods when she heard a rather unfamiliar sound. It did sound like it came from a wolf. Valette turned towards it to check it out. What she found was a pup against the ground with a glare on his face. Her eyes traveled to the tree where she saw a possible home for a squirrel. Valette realized this was Burr and she really wanted to make amend with him. Valette sounded a chuff as she came closer. "Hi there," she greeted. "Trouble hunting?," she asked.

The flicker of a bushy tail taunted Burr from the top of a thick branch, and the boy scrunched up his nose in response. "Stupid squirrel!" he snapped at the tree, just loud enough that Valette might have heard him. It took him several long moments to notice the Alpha female—in fact, he was oblivious to her until she spoke, stealing his attention away from the squirrel.

He didn't know whether the distraction made him feel better or worse. On one hand, she hadn't insulted him or insinuated that he was a poor excuse for a hunter, and Valette's appearance kept him from moping over his failure. On the other hand, it was Valette, and Burr was feeling less than confident lately when it came to the pack adults. He rose up slowly, noticing with a start that the top of his head came almost up to her muzzle, then melted compliantly into a perfectly submissive posture with his tail pressed down tight against his hindquarters.

He wasn't really afraid of her anymore, Burr realized after a moment. He was much larger now, and much older; both of these facts surely contributed. He also now fully understood her reasons, and after all, she did have reasons. It wasn't the same as Murdock's uncalled for hostility, and that put him marginally more at ease, enough to answer her with, "why's it so hard?" rather than the sullen, sulky no that had threatened to part his lips a moment ago.

Valette had to chuckle softly when she heard the frustrated words coming from the youngster. She remembered when she was trying to learn how to hunt and how difficult it was for her. Valette was glad to notice when she stepped close Burr's first reaction wasn't to cower in fear. She was glad for it. But then again, it was some time ago now.

"It is probably much more difficult because you don't know all the factors of hunting yet," she explained to him with a smile on her lips. She sat down. "There are many different things to know about hunting. Take a squirrel, for example, they are very fast. Perhaps even too fast. We can't climb trees as well as them."

Valette glanced up at the animal. She never bothered too much with them as they lacked the meat. "I would suggest you would try a racoon if close to the water, or a rabbit if you are out on the plains," she suggested. "I can give you lessons if you want? What do you know about hunting? Can you tell me?"

The tip of Burr's tail wiggled hopefully when the Alpha addressed him not only politely, but kindly, offering explanations and tips alike. Maybe, as Illecebra and Mawk had told him time and again but failed to convince him, she wasn't as bad as first impressions suggested. He hoped in time, she would come to know that his first impression wasn't great either, and would find value in him as a pack mate as he grew older. Rowana was already so much more mature than either of her brothers, but Burr had the potential to surpass her very quickly in matters of the mind, and he hoped that someday soon, he could prove it. Maybe then things would be better with his pack mates.

Burr tilted his snout up at Valette as she explained, We can't climb trees as well as them. "We can climb trees?" he asked with widening eyes that darted questioningly over to the tree where the squirrel was hiding. Hopes and dreams of maturity aside, he was still just a kid, and sometimes he still missed the point. Burr had to admit, he'd never had the desire to try to climb a tree, but if that was something wolves could do, maybe he could be good enough to get that squirrel. Someday.

Enough about that. His attention snapped back to the pack leader when she asked about his hunting knowledge. He fidgeted for a second, torn between pretending he knew more than he really did and telling the truth. In the end, the lesson that Nikai had imparted on him about lying won out, and he admitted, "I don't really know much. I just... know I need to chase things and bite 'em when I'm hungry. My body tells me to." No one had taught him that, either. That was an ingrained wolf instinct that had only recently awakened in him.

Valette had to chuckle softly when the boy took things perhaps a bit too literal. The female quirked up her lips. "Well, we could. I never tried it though. I don't think we would be very successful," she responded to him. It would be quite a funny sight to see a wolf try and climb a tree. Children would most likely try until they reached a certain maturity.

The boy followed by telling her what he knows about hunting. It wasn't much. It didn't matter to the female. It would mean that he just had a lot to learn. Valette nodded. "That is basically the idea, but there are a lot of other things that need to be checked as well." She got up to her feet. "First we need to track an animal. We can do that by scent or even footprints."

Valette looked at the boy. "Let's see if we can find some fresh marks of a raccoon by the river. How does that sound?"

After his first outburst, Burr had the common sense not to ask further questions about climbing trees. Valette had received his inquiry well, but a small part of him felt silly for having asked. Of course wolves weren't well-equipped to climb vertical surfaces. He should have known that, but he just couldn't help his brain running away with him sometimes.

In an effort to forget his self-imposed and likely unwarranted humiliation, the boy focused attentively on Valette's advice. His instincts dictated that he followed scent trails, so he already knew that part, but he had never thought to look for tracks before. In fact, Burr hadn't even considered the possibility that there was anything but scent trails. Tufts of fur, scat, footprints and other signs of passing were valuable for tracking animals, but somehow he had never thought of that.

"Okay," the boy answered unsteadily as he digested this newest revelation. Valette was still frightening in her own way, but she was also quite smart and he felt okay with admitting that, "I dunno what raccoon feet look like."

Valette smiled when the other admitted honestly that he didn't know what raccoon paws looked like. That was a fair enough comment. Valette motioned him to follow her. She walked to the river that was close by, careful to not step on any of the possible raccoon pawprints. She kept her nose to the ground to see if there was any lingering scent.

The dark female quirked up her lips when she found one. She stopped and turned to Burr. "This a raccoon pawprint," she pointed out. "They are smaller than ours. They can use their front paws to grab things, and... oh here, look that is a back paw. They are longer. So they don't have the same feet like deer do on all four legs. The ones in the front are different from the ones in the back," she explained.

When beckoned, Burr followed obediently until Valette stopped and motioned to the faint imprints on the ground. They were strange looking, that was for sure. The boy inspected first the forepaw print—much smaller than his paw, but with longer digits—and then the hindpaw, which didn't resemble anything he'd ever seen before. Long, slender, and narrowest at the heel. Burr's brow furrowed the more he looked at them and tried to imagine the animal's locomotion, but coaxing an image to mind was harder than he wanted to admit.

He caught a whiff of something from the print he was currently investigating and lifted his head, wrinkling his nose. "They smell gross," he commented, pitching his gaze and ears back to Valette for confirmation that that was normal. Like something fetid and rotten mixed with meat and vegetation. He had never seen a raccoon before, at least not that he could remember, and he wasn't familiar with their particularly nasty scavenging habits, but if this was what their pawprints smelled like, he wasn't looking forward to meeting the actual creature.

Valette let out a short chuckle. "They smell strong, not gross," she corrected in a friendly matter. The female wanted the other to know that there weren't many gross smelling scents, just strong ones. "If they smell so strong it will only be easier to track. Perhaps you can find some scats or pieces of fur as well?," she challenged him.

She had seen some pieces of fluff down by the bushes. Perhaps with Burr's youthful nose, he could sniff them out as they were just out of sight now. "Once you got their scent perfectly you can start tracking them," she offered.

Admittedly, he wasn't eager about having to sniff out that raccoon stench again, but Burr complied in part because Valette still made him wary and in part because he wanted to take this seriously. Burr doubted that he would ever make it as a pro hunter, but he knew the value of knowing how to do it, so he welcomed the lesson even if the animal stunk. Wrinkling his nose, he bent his head to sniff gingerly at the tracks again, then began to bob and weave his way along the trail.

He had to loop back once or twice, but at last, he found one of the things that Valette had requested: a snaggle of coarse brown hair on the end of a barbed twig. Burr lifted his nose to sniff at it, noting that its smell wasn't as strong as the stink of raccoon feet, then rose to call out, "I found something!"

Valette sat back on her haunches and watched the young male try and catch the right scent. She felt it was very important to him that he was taught this skill. He was doing good so far. It was only normal that he couldn't keep hold of the scent. Valette watched how he found it again. She cheered him on mentally. The female pushed herself to her feet when the youngster found something.

"Well done," she praised and smiled. Her tail waved gently behind her. "Alright. So the raccoon definitely went there. Let's track it further. If it goes towards the water try to see if there are tracks on the other side. Raccoons like to live around water, which often breaks their trail," she explained. This would be a good lesson to pick up a trail again after it is interrupted by a body of water.

The boy's arched tail swung triumphantly behind him as he stepped away from the scrap of fur, making room for Valette to examine it if she wished. He examined the surrounding forest in the meantime, but besides the pawprints, saw no other signs of raccoons. It was harder than he expected to track an animal; even now, he didn't know what his next step should be. Luckily he had a skilled huntress to show him the ropes, but if Burr was to replicate this lesson in his everyday life, he had a very long way to go.

"Okay," the boy agreed, stooping to draw in the raccoon's scent once more. His mind's eye attempted to paint a picture of the raccoon's route, but there were too many holes in it for the boy to make sense of. He padded several feet to the left, sniffing at the ground, then lost the trail. He swung back around to the right, where he located the pawprints and successfully followed them for only a few feet before getting the scent trail muddled up with other scent trails. In the end, he mistakenly found himself on a skunk's scent trail that led him right back to where the raccoon's fur was dangling from the twig, and flattened his ears in frustration.

"This is hard!" the boy complained with a huff as he turned back to Valette for further guidance.

Valette watched the pup try and make sense of the trail. Raccoons were rather difficult as they would roam around the riverbank and cross waters. However, she thought it would be a good test for the boy to do so. However, it seemed that it no frustrated the boy. "I don't expect you to do it right instantly. You are doing so well so far," she tried to encourage him.

"Tracking can be quite hard," she admitted. And sometimes they were unlucky and the animal would be far too healthy and tough to hunt. Even after all that tracking. "I see it as a game, a cool mystery to solve,' she explained how she saw it. Valette gave the piece of fur a good whiff and then tried tracking the raccoon herself. Her experience helped as she could separate the different scents well.

She stepped into the water and crossed it to the other side. She picked up on that certain raccoon scent. She barked at Burr for him to come closer. "I think it will be easier from here," she spoke, as she could tell that the fresh tracks moved more into the forest and away from the water.

With a quiet hff, Burr gave his head a shake and trotted back to Valette's side, though the telling crease of his brow never left. It was only expected that a kid his age would grow frustrated and impatient with something as delicate and time-consuming as accurate tracking. He wasn't precise enough to pinpoint the exact smell; he wasn't forbearing enough to not lost the faint threads of scent when his senses were scattered; and he wasn't a big fan of hunting to boot, which made the aforementioned impatience even more of a problem.

It was Valette's perseverance, and his inherent respect and fear of punishment, that kept Burr focused on his task. Had it been Illecebra or Mawk with him, he would long have thrown himself to the ground and given up. He nodded once and pursed his lips thoughtfully when the Alpha female compared it to a game, but ultimately, he disagreed. At least, it wasn't a game that he particularly liked, but Burr liked things easy, and this was far from it.

Burr followed as she crossed the stream, he struggling a little more with the current than she, and shook himself dry as she summoned him to her. The moment he padded over, he both saw and scented the raccoon once more—it was becoming easier now that he knew what it smelled like, and the water amplified its scent several times—and his tail gave a tentative wag. "I think it went—" Sniff, sniff, "—this way?" He gestured with his snout and took several steps toward the territory's heart.

Not every wolf was skilled in the art of tracking. Most were good at it as they needed the skill to survive, but some didn't enjoy it. Perhaps Burr would be more of a fisherman, or not a hunter at all. There were some wolves that preferred not to. Valette was there to help if they wanted to learn. To her, it seemed that Burr was quite driven. Little did she know that it was not the case.

Valette smiled when the other did better on the other side of the riverbank. She watched him for a moment and quirked up her lips into a smile. "Very good," she praised. "Do you want to continue or do you have enough?," she asked then. She was not sure what the concentration span was but he was still a child and she didn't want to force him further if he was having difficulties with it. "I don't mind if we stop here, we can continue the next time."