Tormented Tarns i

She had traveled a long, long way. But this was the way of their kind, and she had reached the age in which leaving home had become equal parts desire and necessity. This place she had at last arrived to felt like another world. Home had always been a place one would never identify as bountiful. A cold, savage place. A white wasteland, to those unfamiliar with it. But Inge and her family had always known where to look in order to survive.

Ahead stood a string of mountains. Before that, the Tarns. It was a place almost entirely occupied by water, and Inge looked for the path that looked well-traveled. Following the trails of those that had done as she would now, she looked around her for any other wayfarers. What she saw instead was the webbed trees, and all of the things snared within. She would come close to some on the narrow strip she walked upon, but would not stop to investigate. Inge knew better than to believe she could be caught within such a thing, but neither did she want to interact with whatever had made such a thing.

This wayfarer was in no way avoiding the webbed foliage; in fact, she darted through the underbrush with delight, catching and wrapping what webs she could on the end of a long stick. There were quite a few errant strands stuck to her coat, pulling tight across her body with every movement, and THAT did not feel particularly great... but the fruits of her labor would be worth the discomfort. Caught up (so to speak) in her task, the Vitale had not yet noticed the other wanderer making her careful way across the tarns, slowly closing the distance between the pair.

Inge soon caught movement in the side of her eye; she swung her head in that direction to see what, or who, was near. Another wolf, and their actions confused Inge. It looked to be a purposeless task, and her muzzle wrinkled in disdain. Inge picked up her own pace so as to avoid their paths intersecting. The lone wolf had no desire to be near to the webs the stranger had collected, and Inge was of the mind that this one might not be of the right mind. There was no sense in nonsense, and that was all Inge could see in the others actions.

Lane continued to weave in and out of the underbrush, making sure to rotate the stick in her mouth so that the webs wrapped around the end in layers, one sheet after the other. She would have continued on her merry way, never knowing how close her path had come to crossing with the stranger's, but her path forward was blocked by a gigantic fallen tree. Lane shuddered to imagine the ferocity of the storm that had brought such an enormity to the ground.  

With her way forward blocked, Lane turned back. Her gaze swept out over the tarns, and she caught sight of the other traveler hustling across one of the strands of exposed land. Lane had no way of knowing that the stranger was moving quickly in a deliberate attempt to avoid interaction with the Web-Collecting Nutjob of the Tarns, so she let out a low, amicable woof. Her communication was somewhat garbled by the stick on her mouth, but her friendly intentions were clear enough.

Inge heard her.

She paused abruptly, long enough to stare down the stranger and give a low rrrrrr in warning. Abruptly, her ears flung forward in warning as her hackles flared. Inge was not at all interested in the friendly stranger or their strange stick, and wanted no part of the cobwebbed end of it. The warning was halfhearted in its delivery, but meant. Stay away! Her posture asked.

The stranger reacted with hostility. Lane stopped in her tracks and cocked her head to the side. Was Lane really that threatening? Or.. maybe the stranger had some sort of time-sensitive task, and she wasn't interested in being delayed by chit-chit..? 

Whatever it was, Lane wasn't going to get in the way. She sat down, signaling that she had no intentions to approach any further. Lane would sit and wait for the standoffish woman to pass, and then she would continue on with her web-collecting.

What a shame. Lane would have welcomed a short break and some conversation, but it seemed that wasn't meant to be.

Going to close, since Inge is inactive.