Tuktu Hinterlands spades&diamonds

rush of wings above his head and then weight between his shoulder blades. it shifted, talons settling into the callouses there. the raven did not pause in his actions, slim muzzle folding the herbs carefully into the maw of the rabbit, using a weather-smoothed branch to force them further down the creature's esophagus. when his maneuvering was complete did he shift the creature into a shallow grave, covering it loosely as if some attempt had been made to cache it.

something guttural, harsh against slim boyish features, slipped from his maw, and the crow atop his spine shifted once more. wings moved smoothly against its body and yet it remained in place, and the raven turned back on the rabbit and moved through the trees, making for a replica of the first he'd placed near the edge of a wood.

She is a streak of fire against the Hinterlands, and she knows it does her no good to hide.  She does little to conceal herself as she moves; her footsteps are only light out of habit.  Her wildfire fur is enough to give her away.

She approaches him boldly, having only caught the end of what he has done.  She had a million questions for him — Why was he digging?  What did he bury? — but she does not speak them for now.  Instead she just watches him walk away into the trees, and she falls into step behind him.

she is not hard to miss.

the raven finds her in his peripheral and shifts his shoulders; the crow wings silently into the canopy above. the boy moves as if he does not intend to deviate from his path, adjusting instead so that his limbs carry his slim frame through a tangle of underbrush. it is in the midst of the brush that he slips suddenly to the right, moving perpendicular to his original path before sweep back around and meeting his tracks once more. he intends fully to trail the flame as she trails him; yet does not know if his initial deviance is enough to shake her from him long enough to catch onto the rear of her trail.

She does not know why she follows him, at first.  Perhaps it's the peculiar way his fur lays — or rather, doesn't lay — atop his body, wiry and windblown.  Perhaps it's the raven that sits there upon his shoulder, something she's only seen before in one other.  She watches the bird as it disappears into the trees, and when she looks back to where the boy was, he is gone.

The trees around them are shrouded and the wind does not favor her.  It is not until he moves at her rear that she bristles in surprise, eyes widening as she lets out an involuntary noise of surprise.

his forepaw finds a branch when he nears, snapping it neatly. she makes a noise of surprise, and he watches her evenly as he decides that she is not them. festering animosity dissolves, and instead he surveys her evenly, waiting for his silent presence to produce some other reaction; words; an explanation. he is patient and he is silent, gaze glossy and void of much anything.

I'd love to continue this sometime, @Abraxas, but since you've gone PPC I've edited an ending on.  Feel free to revive this and I can edit it out!

The intensity of his stare causes her to bristle, and the tight line of her mouth flattens as her breath catches in her throat.  She has never been exposed to anyone truly sinister.  The worst wolf she'd ever met was Screech, and he was just a boy who had been misled and shat upon by the world.  She didn't understand the disquiet in her gut or the swirling within her.  Her ears flattened swiftly atop her crown as she blurted, What did you bury?

Whatever it was, she didn't want to stick around and find out.  No longer drawn by her curiosity, she turns tail and bolts home.