Heron Lake Plateau how cheerfully he seems to grin

Residual from the night before and fading fast, a pillow-top of fog was being pushed by a strong breeze in an uneven spread across the packlands. It was quite early still, and the delinquent they so-called Svalinn was already up to no good. With one eye open, he watched Caiaphas depart, waiting until he was sure she had gone far enough on whatever task beckoned her that day before fox-crawling covertly out of their den.  

He had been given strict instructions not to mishandle the younger brood piddling about the plateau, so in general he avoided areas he knew might get him in trouble, but today he planned to put that rule to the test. With his tolerance for punishment growing right along with the size of his bean-sprouting body, Svalinn could not avoid the allure of there existing a number of wolves that he could overpower. Half-strutting, half-ground-snuffling, the Eyjolfur thug made to find someone subordinate to him.

@Phoebe

In less covert conditions, Phoebe did not stray far from the den. So far there had been little reason to today and so she had taken to roughing up the surrounding scenery in a flash of solo play time. The long reach and bend of a stalk was enough to occupy her while her siblings busied themselves with other things—notably driving their mother and father insane—and it was not an opportunity she passed up lightly. Not that there was anything wrong with chumming with her siblings.

With a growl that seemed too big for her still small frame, she pulled and wheeled backward on the stalk, trying to pull it free from the soil it had planted roots in deep. To her it was quite a task, but for the stalk it was yet another day where it remained, tattered and thoroughly chewed, unwilling to relent. It hardly resembled what it was supposed to be, which Phoebe had forgotten the name of some time ago, but she tugged and tugged at it, every vicious note a stern demand for it to come free.

With all the barebone craftiness of a bandit-raccoon, Svalinn made a beeline for the alpha's densite. His arrival was particularly well-timed; there was a single target exposed, and no adults to be seen. The miscreant child wasn't yet proficient enough to be able to tell if either vigilant parent was about at the moment, but he was keen enough to know an opportunity when he saw one. In a hesitant slink, he stalked closer to the toiling girl, ears flickering with each crescendo of her churlish growls.

Because she hadn't noticed him behind her yet, his plan of attack went to the wayside and was instead replaced by the idea of a mischievous prank. It was hard to sneak up on Raleska, who was even older than him, but this dark cub was too young to have the same wits about her, and he was eager to put his "surprise!" ability to the test. Landing a solid fwump, he closed the last few lengths between them with a jump and a "RAWR!"

She felt something slip between her sharp milkteeth—perhaps this time, the stalk was relenting. But alas it was not meant to be, for it was only another layer of its thick body sloughing off. She realized the error of her calculations about the same time she heard something gallop up behind her; her ears flicked backwards just in time to hear a voice come booming out of the unknown behind her.

She screamed. A girlish shriek unbridled from clenching jaws—to hell with the murder of plants. The stalk was forgotten as she rushed forward into the thicker brush, intent on escaping whatever, rather, whomever had unleashed the battle cry. Phoebe wasn't foolish (or maybe she was) enough to look behind her and find out who had been so cruel, but it hardly mattered as she wildly searched for somewhere appropriate to hide. The thick brush provided some cover that she was swift to use to her advantage, though by then a flash of anger had flickered into her gaze as she hunkered low in the sticks and leaves... but was the monstrous bellower in pursuit?

Much to his own surprise and subsequent delight, Svalinn's scare-tactic had elicited a satisfying response -- a ringing shriek and dash -- and after recovering from the shock of his first success, took off after his quarry in laughing pursuit. Ahead of him he watched as a black blur streaked into the thick folds of a rambling bush, its leaving quivering in her wake. The harrowing rascal didn't let up that easily, kicking up dust and gravel as he skidded before the mouth of her sanctuary, and yapped "ferociously" between cackling for her to come out.

He nipped at the bush-leaves, but otherwise couldn't proceeded without a face-full of whipping twigs. She was safe... for now.

From in between the snags and snares of her sanctuary, she caught sight of him again. A little golden furred monster, no, wait, he was a tyrant. A hellbound goblin adorned in far too colorful, spirited threads that danced his awful little jig and sang his awful little songs. The intimidation factor wore swiftly—she had brothers who were wont to do the same after all—and the budding anger set her jaw.

To herself, Phoebe huffed as she drew her legs up beneath her. Her options were far too few and while she was every bit inclined to call for her mother or her father for them to sort the offending subject, it would have just made a bigger scene. No one liked a tattle tale, that much was already well known between the alpha's pair quartet, and she was not about to go snitching.

So even with a thundering heart, she decided to spring out of the shrubs in the best attempt at being terrifying as she could be. Which for a child still relatively young was quite a feat and far from scary to the average adult, but those milk teeth were still sharp and she had no problem aiming her gangly almost overgrown paws right for Mister Goblin Goldilocks's face.

Just when he thought he'd rattled the inky flit of royalty into acute submission, Svalinn was surprised to find that the princess harbored more than a little bit of heart in her— and the gold hobgoblin was delighted to suddenly find himself challenged. She delivered him a few sanctimonious slaps, making it quite clear that she wasn't to be bossed around by voice alone.

He thought he might try to bully her physically, but just as he reared with a vile glint in his blazing expression, the boy recalled the stiff touch of Caiaphas' muzzle at his nape when she decreed something. It were as if she were pulling him back in that moment, and all her stertorous training seemed to pay off as Svalinn thought better of his actions. Doing anything more to this girl would mean something painful; this much he understood, and it sent him careening back into the woods, away from temptation.

To himself, the boy snickered. He knew he had come close to some... amazing source of power he'd yet to ever experience, and it wouldn't be long now before he felt brave and strong enough to accept or ignore the consequences of his actions.

*ends mysteriously*