Wheeling Gull Isle not all girls are made of sugar and spice and all things nice
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try as hard as she might, priixu finds it increasingly hard to ignore the call of atlan. much to axolotl's great disappointment prii spent majority of her young life ignoring the demands of the sea deity and the duty her father groomed her for. she didn't want to be like him and all the other atlanians. they turn their back upon what they want the very moment she demands for them to. she can run and she can try to deny it but prii knows that she cannot deny the fact that she is a daughter of atlan and despite herself she found herself following her father's studious directions, walking the path of the coast. there is comfort in the lulling roar of the sea, a familiarity that tells her she is home in the salty sea brine that surrounds her, to the warmth of sand between her toes.

priixu's steps pause as she moves closer to the sea, her waves crashing along the shore, beckoning her to bathe in the waters. she hasn't since she left, but the smell of saltwater clung defiantly to her fur even after a month of traveling as in-land as prii could. atlan's refusal to relinquish her hold. as her father told her, the sea receded and a sandbar rose up from beneath the waves and the young daughter of axolotl padded along the sandbar, splashing in the water of the sea that rose every now and then to lap over her paws. atlan's welcome. the island grows larger the closer priixu's steps take her and her steps slow and come to a halt all together as she nears the beach. there is evidence of life, of a pack's claim on this island ...just as axolotl had spoken it would be. something akin to nerves batter restlessly in the young girl's stomach as she tips her head back and calls, announcing her presence to the wolves of undersea.

axolotl had been unable to inform her of who led the pack, evidently when her father'd been apart of it there had been a power struggle and no definable leader ...but that'd been some time ago and evidenced from the fact that she smells a strong pack someone leads it. it is one of those unknown leader(s) she hopes for though she would not oppose the company of someone who might be able to help her fill in the blanks of information in the meantime.
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Ooc — mixedhearts
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Moorhen knew no god. No one had ever explained the concept to her, but if they had, she would have thought of Doe. Sometimes she looks as the yellow sun as it hangs over the ocean and remembers being small and helpless, trapped under the power of the red woman's gaze. It is a secret that only she and Coelacanth know; they had both been her supplicants, once upon a time. Sometimes, Moorhen wants to ask about those days, but she is a simple creature. She doesn't quite dare.

Doe was far from her mind as she set eyes on the stranger. Here, she is the adult, the god, the protector. It is her duty to get to the call before Coelacanth - to assess the threat before the sweet-natured Aralez showed up to spread mercy and goodness. If the girl was worthy of such things, Moorhen would not eject her before Doe's Shadow had the chance to arrive.

"Hello," Moorhen ventured as she approached, stalking up to the stranger with her spine bristling but her gaze merely questioning. "Why are you here?" Moorhen hoped no one else had died.
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it does not take long for someone to arrive. the other young woman is draped in a coat of dark chocolate brown with cream markings on her face and sides and her guard hairs bristled as she stalks up to her. for a moment, prii is taken aback. it startles her only because even as an apprentice atlanian ...she is used to being greeted in a much different manner. but, this isn't nootka sound, her previously held position means nothing here. ...a position, she reminds herself, even as atlan's waters lap against her paws that she ran away from. priixu adjusts her posture to one of neutrality but respectful nonetheless as the question is posed.

"my father. his name is axolotl corten...he told me of this place and i ...my curiosity got the better of me." axolotl's stories of adventure, even though during his brief time here there'd been civil unrest among the ranks — had sounded grand. ...and prii was attempting to run away from a life she hadn't chose. daughter of the sea or not ...it didn't seem fair to her that she couldn't make her own path. that she had to take up the mantel of atlanian like her father before her. "i'm priixu, by the way. priixu corten. but uh, i like 'prii' better." in case it mattered, she wasn't sure if it did or not. if she was turned away she supposed then, no, it wouldn't much matter. why did her tongue feel like lead and insist on twisting around words she knew she could speak?
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Moorhen finished her appraisal of the girl and stood still to listen to her explanation, ears quivering upon the familiar name. She was a Corten, then. The seawolf blinked owlishly at the younger girl, bemused by the emergence of yet another of the Shadow's line. Sometimes she was jealous of the small army of family the Aralez had amassed, but the bitterness could never really take hold, since Coelacanth shared her family freely, and because the mark of Doe was on both their souls.

"Prii," said Moorhen, glad to have something simple to call the other girl. She gave a hesitant wag of her tail, knowing she ought to be friendly, if it was family on their shores. "I am Moorhen Cairn," she introduced, the words feeling clunky and unfamiliar in a mouth more fit for growling. "Moor."

There - they were friends, now. "Did you come to stay?" she asked curiously, "or for visit?"
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Ooc — KJ
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Gradually, the Aralez regained her strength and stamina, though the fires from Elsewhere continued to burn and send fine flecks of ash and choking tendrils of smoke across the sea. When Priixu’s summoning howl struck the air, Coelacanth paused to invite @Sixgill, @Grayling, Koi, and @Thresher along. Whichever puppies chose to remain in the Labyrinth would be guarded by their doting father. She splashed through a curtain of falling water whose flow was gentle enough that her babies would not be washed away, and led a small procession to the Strand.

Moorhen was already there, a fact that the sheepdog gleaned from scent, sound, and silhouette before she broke free of the treeline, and was greeted with immediate affection but no surprise. The smaller canid butted her tapered muzzle against the girl’s sturdy hip and regarded the stranger at first delightedly: “Ax — !” and then with utter confusion: “ — oh?” His name was exceptionally difficult for her dumb tongue, but fortunately, this wolf wasn’t him. The awkward silence that followed her blunder was therefore acceptable, and she followed it up with a more demure, “Peace be.”

She motioned toward herself. “Coelacanth,” she breathed. “Corten.”
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When Coelacanth nudged affectionately at Moorhen, Koi, the little pearl, followed suit (but quite by accident). The Seelholms, raised beside the sea, were accustomed to moving expeditiously through sand — but Koi had stopped to chat with an inquisitive looking ghost crab and grew dizzy with surprise and excitement upon seeing her sister. Clumsy puppy paws tangled together as she bounded toward the banded Cairn, and she thumped headfirst into Moorhen’s hock. She recovered neatly, shaking her head to clear the ringing in her oversized ears, and flopped down in the sand with a soft huff to regard the stranger with a rapt, fawn-eyed expression.
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priixu offers the other girl, moorhen or moor, a soft smile and a soft wag of her tail. "nice to meet you, moor." she says sincerely. growing up prii hadn't had many friends ...her training to be atlanian was secluded and often times lonely. the warrior priests were more or less hermits and that life had always seemed dull to the adventurer in prii. "to stay," she says very decidedly, only to temper her enthusiasm a bit. "if i'm welcome, of course." she adds sheepishly. just because her father been welcomed once upon a time doesn't necessarily mean the same courtesy will be extended to her. she wasn't her father.

but it was a common enough mistake to make at first glance that she doesn't at all hold it against the pretty, ink coated woman that approached, the beginning of his name falling from her lips only to be cut off by surprise as far as prii can tell. the woman is trailed by a pup who looks at her with owlish eyes. prii offers her a soft, warm smile but is hesitant to address her, unsure of how it might be taken. she might look like her father but she's a stranger to these wolves. "hello," she offers the ink dappled woman with a respectful dip of her head as she catches the name. coelacanth. "priixu corten. prii," she offers her own name and the nickname she most prefers. "axolotl is my father." she explains her physical resemblance to him. "he speaks highly of you." she tells the ink dappled woman. "well, y'know, when he speaks of things other than atlan." she says it as a slight jest but also seriousness and winces because she knows better than to make fun at atlan or her father's expense. alas, it was true. getting stories and information out of him about his time in these wilds was like trying to pull an alligator's tooth: strenuous and potentially dangerous.
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Ooc — mixedhearts
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Moorhen didn't know if the girl was welcome. A jaded part of her couldn't help but think probably with an air of quiet sulkiness - Coelacanth let just about everyone in, no matter how suspicious Moorhen found them. Of course, she couldn't claim to see anything suspicious about the girl. She'd need to be carefully watch all the same.

Luckily, Coelacanth appeared to take over. Moorhen stepped aside, ready to defend her Aralez but doubting it would be necessary.

Feel free to skip her!
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I put you on PPC so that you can reply at will, and I’ll update your rank once you do! ♥ I’m sorry for the wait.

Poor Moorhen. It wasn’t Cairn nature to be so blindly accepting, but the banded girl’s loyalty belonged to the poster child for ingenuousness bordering on idiocy. Coelacanth had grown accustomed to her lamb’s compliance, even if the choices she made proved problematic time and again, and thus Moorhen’s resignation was accepted, appreciated, but ultimately something the sheepdog expected to receive. This paragraph is really stupid, and I could’ve summed it up by saying the following: Seelie do what Seelie want, and has gotten really used to getting her way, for better or for worse. Poor Moorhen, for having to go along with it all the time. So, just pretend I said that, but, like…in a much more eloquent way. My brain is made of mush.

Anyway, “Fee,” was what the Aralez eked out, her dumb tongue tripping uneasily between her teeth. “Free.” It would take a few more attempts to get the girl’s name right, but her feathered tail fluttered eagerly nonetheless. “Only?” she entreated in a silky susurrus, wondering about Priixu’s littermates — or lack thereof. With markedly less eloquence, she extended the invitation that Kirynnae and Riptide had offered countless others: “Corten welcome ever.” Of course, any wolf who chose to deny the unofficial clan tenets — namely, listen with your heart, strike seaward, respect the earth and its inhabitants, and don’t be an unprovoked asshole — ran the risk of losing the right to the patronymic, but Seelie had never actually seen it happen.

At mention of Atlan, Seelie made a face, wrinkling her nose innocuously with an apologetically playful flurry of her inky plume. Axolotl was so serious! — and while she respected his beliefs, rituals and all, they were just stories and songs to her. She regarded Maegi and Komodo’s gods with the same awestruck reverence, but believed privately that religion certainly seemed to make things heavier than they needed to be. “Maera ŭmma?” she assumed, though she could see no evidence of the flame’s vivid russet flickering amongst Priixu’s creamed-coffee-coat.