Arrow Lake And strange thoughts that in no way occurred to anyone
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All Welcome 
Bumped up to April 21st.

The days plodded on, as they were wont to do, and Dragomir continued to grow and explore his surroundings. His dream realities were all but gone now, whisked away on the winds of change as his mind began to shrink. He would always have an excellent imagination, but there was only so much that one mind could handle, and external stimuli had quickly taken the place of internal wondering. That left Dragomir firmly rooted in reality, where he spent his time chasing his sister in the thicket, eating larger and larger portions of chewed up meat, and learning.

Sometime in the morning, Dragomir's ears popped. He didn't really notice it when it happened besides blinking and looking around himself, but hours later, the sounds began to grow louder. It was like coming down in an airplane and waiting for your hearing to clear up, only it was much more drawn out for him. It felt sudden, however, arriving with a titter of birdsong; he was racing around the thicket on sturdy legs, tumbling every now and then when he started going too fast and his hindquarters tried to move past his shoulders, when suddenly a sharp trill made him halt in place. He wobbled there, frozen, and for the first time his ears—now larger and more triangular than the nubs he'd had when he was born—perked up to listen.
wearing my dream like a diadem in some better land.
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idk what this is umm have a rambly 9am novel ??


Aure awoke late that morning with a muted, whimpery indraw of breath that had tears pricking the dark cradle of her lashes. Scarred lips curled over needly fangs and pink nose scrunched. The silver’s willowy, dove-boned figure crescented out; thin shoulders cinching over gaunt hips; belly strained out as she arched her spine in; long, long legs quivering and pinker toes reaching.

Aure soon relaxed, and wilted into this position to massage the muscles and organs within her midsection. A schnik of pearls ended the petering yawn, and the mother was left whetting her lips with her tongue; fatigued, lisping smacks as she tried to ward off whatever slumber still clung to her mind like spiderwebs.

For a while, she gazed all unseeing, thoughts listless as the buttery light of spring morning spread itself throughout the thicket. Mothering is hard, her mind peeped, and Aurëwen turned the statement about with a few, bleary blinks. You know that parents make mistakes, and couples argue all the time. Everything will work itself out at some point. She’d stopped wondering why she’d initiated that brawl  ( nearly a fortnight ago )  and had done her best to keep after her children.

Aure liked to think she’d been doing a watchful, well-meaning job; a good one, despite her mullsome presence, as far as motherhood went. But she still felt so mute; unable to even reason with her faults; unable to tell anyone. Any sleepiness was now burnt away by simmering, hurt indignation as her lashes drew heavily to cheekbone. What more could she do, than nurturing? Give, than all her love for the children?

With a dreary little sigh, Aurëwen warily pushed up onto her elbows, gave a hazy shake, and finally looked about. As for her own ears, one of them pained her, and she leapt to the conclusion she must’ve slept on it wrong. Too crabby to work the ache from it, her sights eventually landed on Dragomir, beaming up into the thicket’s light; ears perked, as if... listening? To what? Balaur?” came her soft chirrup.
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Drago's eyes scanned the canopy for any sign of the noisemaker, but there was nothing but the usual light-and-shadow shimmer of the glade. Then came the trill again and the cub snapped his vision to the left. Once more, he saw no sign that anything was amiss. His tail stirred with hesitant curiosity as he gazed up through the leaves, only to start when Aure's soft summons reached his ears.

They perked rearward and he spun around, fixing his dam with an inquisitive blue-eyed stare. Over his brow, the flopped tips of his ears trembled, straining against their bonds for another taste of sound. The bird twittered again, but this time they just twitched in response and then flipped forward once more.
wearing my dream like a diadem in some better land.
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At the sight of those ears, Aurëwen couldn’t stifle the gentle snicker that pranced from her even if she wanted to — which was to say, she did not want to. Her children made her heart feel so full to bursting that there was nothing left in her but abysmal love. She loved that she loved them, that dragostea loved them, and that their night-star creations, their children, smothered them with love in return. Isilmë’s stubbornness was a force to be reckoned with  ( and adored )  but inquisitive Dragomir was an entirely other district of endearing.

With his wide, gleaming, previously-sapphire eyes, the mother wedged her scarred muzzle between dainty paws — and then scuffed one along the spring growth. “Drago, oh, my Drago?” Bony hips and tail tilted in a lazy cradle of playfulness as she scrunched her nose at her son; wriggled and inching towards him, beckoning, attempting to entice him back to her with syrupy words. “I see you, balaur.”
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Again her voice lilted across the glade and again Dragomir's ears pressed forward, flaring at the bases as her voice sweetly beckoned him. The boy's tail caught on before the rest of him did; it wagged from the tip to the base, and then he smiled an intrigued smile and inexpertly wiggled his ears. Yeah, that would take some getting used to. It wasn't as intuitive as just opening your eyes, although no doubt it would be second nature soon enough.

Aaaah ba buh blegh, Drago babbled nonsensically, only to freeze and crane his neck as if looking for the source of this newest noise. He had been babbling like this for a few days, but had only been able to feel the buzz of it in his chest before. Now he was too focused on the sound to notice that the sensation was the same, and wrongly he assumed it was an external source. Aaaaaah? he inquired, ears quivering as he spun in a slow circle, searching the shadows of the thicket for another Aure.
wearing my dream like a diadem in some better land.
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A once-rare smile crescented, scarred lips parting in a beam as she rested her cheek against the earth to watch Dragomir assemble himself in tail-smile-ears. Saw and heard him babble, indeed, and her  ( not-so-rare-anymore )  smile only blossomed further; blossomed the way it had when she'd first known Verx. As her son began to seek the source that was, in fact, his own voice, another cooing giggle left her, and the silver eventually wobbled up to stand and make her way towards him. When she was close enough, she tenderly pressed her nose to his chest; wriggled the pink of it teasingly at the broad little barrel of it.

Aure hummed an ardent mockery to the tune of his babbling, still smiling like a moon-loon as she gazed down her marred muzzle and into her son's eyes. "Minlamad," she mused. In Rhaesuial, there was Arphent, where first words would be said that were anything but babbles. Should she try to coax one from him now? After a few beats of hesitance, she suggested, "Emer, Drago? Emer?" using a more minute phrasing of her tongue.
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As he did when anyone attempted to touch him uninvited, especially now that his individuality was emerging, Dragomir instantly backed away from Aure's scrunched contact, though he was noiseless and seemingly not offended by it. He didn't dwell long, but turned instead back to the twittering bird outside until his mother spoke once more. He whipped his head back around to fix her with a beady stare, smiling a wide infant's smile once more.

Ah buh bah, he babbled back, not understanding her any more than she could understand him. He was still one paw in the world of wolves and one paw in the mind of a baby, unable to form words or understand them, but capable of every known sense. It was a period suspended between two stages of his life known as the socialization period, during which Dragomir was utterly fearless and would develop his knowledge of what was good and safe and what was unknown and dangerous. Later, when the world world wasn't quite so vastly interesting and new, the words would begin.

But right now, swaying on his feet with a toddler's precarious balance and eyeing his mother cheekily, all Dragomir could reply to Aure with was, uhbuhbppptth.
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Most of her had known that her blackberry remained much too young to keep his tongue coordinated enough to form words, but she’d still wanted to deviate a little bit; try at something, even if Dragomir hadn’t developed to that stage so close and yet so seemingly faraway. Aure supposed that before even that point, though, she’d have to help him figure out how to properly curve his ears and tail... but that would be for another time.

For now, a pleasant and proud flush veiled he neck and cheeks as her son tried, too, just as she had. It was the thought that mattered, right? So she listened to Dragomir babble and sputter away; and though she knew recent, familial tensions did him no good, she couldn’t help but be so distant, and remain as near as she possibly could. Such self-absorption was out of heedless habit; other times, it was for some paltry protection.

But Aurëwen met her son with her own impish simper, and when he began to wobble, she started — and then thought better of it, settled back, and implored once more, ”Fly to me, balaur mea? Do you think you can fly to me?” Whether Dragomir wanted to stumble her way, or careen right for her, his mother would be there to catch him  ( and hold him right to her heart once more. )  She settled on her belly, maw pressed between dainty paws, expectant and observant.
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He didn't understand her words, but Dragomir was lured by the way that Aure seemed to lurch, then pause halfway and settle back. So when she asked him to come to her, he came. It was on wobbling legs that sometimes built up too much momentum, as they did now; he started walking rather normally, with his tail a-wriggling behind him, but then somehow his paws began to speed up. His back end always somehow ended up faster than the fore; his back arched as he seemed to collapse in on himself, transitioning into a careening sidestep before tail-spinning out of control and bumping roughly into Aure's shoulder rather than she chest she had presented.

Umph, was the sound of his impact as he flopped back on his bottom and shook his head, permitting his newly risen ears to flop loudly and comically against his temples. A sound that made him freeze and stare, bug-eyed, at his silver-eyed dam.
wearing my dream like a diadem in some better land.
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Those argent eyes widened in anticipation and approval as her son shambled towards her—and then, in the next moment, came whirling into her thin shoulder with a pudgy heft that did, indeed, jost her. Aurëwen sniffed hesitantly at the air about his face, but he only seemed to suffer from a bit of vertigo. ...Yes, he was quite alright—

—but then he shook his head about frivolously, this way and that, before stuttering to a halt and gazing up at her with a look both wondering and... disturbed? Aure looked to his ears and their bowed tips; and as she restrained herself from nibbling at her son this time, the mother bit her marred lips, adoring him. 

”It is all right, balaur,” Aurëwen crooned, looking from his face, to his great ears, and back again. ”Just promise me that if you are to fly, you will not do so by taking to ze skies by ear.” The imagery caused a little laugh to bubble up, which she smothered by another bite to her lips. Flight of any sort, though, was quite enrapturing to dream of.
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Those long ears waggled disapprovingly, but soon the novelty of sound began to wear off. The twittering of distant birds continued to pull Dragomir's attention away, as did his mother's soft voice, but it was snagged by something else now: a length of torn hide that he and Isi often played tug with. His sister was presumably sleeping now, which meant Dragomir got to have it all to himself.

He dove across the thicket for it, clumsy as he tumbled over it and began to worry at it with needle-sharp teeth. The sound of his jaws working prompted his ears to flicker front and back, but soon his focus was wholly on the hide as he slouched onto his side and leaned against Aure's haunch, paws reaching to secure it in his jaws while he chewed away.
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And the mother continued to watch him, flight suddenly seeming rather paltry in comparison to her insatiable son. Her blackberry soon returned to her, though, huffing against her boney haunch. The silver curved the neck Drago’s father thought graceful in order to inspect whatever their child worried at. ...It was some threadbare hide, not unlike the one both whelps tussled with.

The curl didn’t leave her lips, and though Aure intended to leave him alone  ( soon! ), she couldn’t resist inching her scarred snout closer... and closer... until the edges of the hide tickled at her lips. Suppressing laughter through wavery breaths from within her breast, Aurëwen tentatively latched onto the scrap of felt and nibbled; wondering how, and if, her son would fend her off.
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He wasn't used to getting anything to himself. His whole life was shared with Isilmë, for which the boy was both grateful and occasionally jealous. Being young as he was, it was difficult to categorize these feelings, but it welled up in him all the same when Aure reached for the hide. She may as well have been his sister then, who was her father's daughter and fierce. She often won these tussles, though later in life he would often win other ones.

His muzzle wrinkled and a tiny growl burbled up from between his teeth, accompanied by the forward stretch of his ears. He held fast to the scrap until Aure's lips found it. Then he stood and tugged sharply on it, his growl intensifying although there was no malice or savagery behind his voice. He sought only to claim it for himself so he could curl up with it and nap the afternoon away.
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Eyes crinkled in merriment, and after a few more heartbeats of resisting him, Aurëwen gave way and released her end of the hide with as much care as she could; not that her son couldn’t handle a little tumble, but she nonetheless didn’t wish to see him go careening head over heels.

The silver nudged at him, then, and whether Drago decided to nap in his little pocket in their thicket or cozy up to her, she curled up all the same; meaning to sleep the afternoon right away with him, and with Isilmë.