Barrow Fields permafrost giants

The mountain slopes leveled out the further north he went, becoming a series of gentle foothills, shadow-draped, crowned in icy winter-white. Burial mounds, they appeared like, and Skífa felt an itch grow along his backbone as if he was walking through a graveyard.

Thick fog curled around him like a high wall the color of eiderdown: gray, white, a hint of brown; and the sky was full of clouds. The air smelled salty and wet and smoky, and there was snow in the lee of every hill. It was hard not to feel like he was being watched.

He made a low, amused sound. Half-chuckle, half-growl. He wondered if his cousins would have led his old pack through these hills, or if they would have insisted on going around them. There was something eerie about them. Not even the prey animals seemed to linger. He wondered if he wasn't foolhardy for trekking right through. Premonitions and superstitions played hide-and-seek in the back corners of his mind, and he couldn't stop the fur on his nape from prickling on end. 

Skífa breathed deeply of the cold, damp air that engulfed him, ignoring his foreboding, and crushed the frostbitten grass like aluminum foil beneath him. Then he thought he saw something in the periphery of his vision. He startled, stopped. Raised his head and pointed his ears. But there was nothing there. Or the fog obscured it. He grunted, and turned, and continued trotting northward.

If it was a spirit, it would have to do more than that to frighten him.

He'd wandered until he found himself here, in the distant snow covered mounds to the north. The sea was close by, Corvo could taste it on his tongue, and although he had a hidden desire to see the ocean for the first time in his life, Corvo lingered here, drawn in by something... other. He couldn't place it, the feeling that came over him as he walked this ground, following the rise and fall of each hill that he came to. A graveyard. Surely. He'd never seen nature create a place such as this. Something had made this place. 

A whisper in his ear raised his hackles and Corvo whirled, expecting to find someone there. But there was no one. Just him and the mounds of dirt and the snow and the fog. 

He shook his head and went on. Until he heard something again. His reaction was slower this time, knowing what the result had been previously, but unlike the last time Corvo found another wolf. He was covered in a range of colors from dark to reddish to white, and his eyes were very dark, reminding Corvo of the night sky just after sunset. Who was he? He had no idea. He'd never met this wolf before and he wasn't sure if he should steer clear. Regardless, he'd been spotted by now, surely. So he waited, body tensed for his next move.

There: a ghostly black wolf with yellow eyes materialized out of thin air.

Skífa stopped midstep and cautiously squared his shoulders. He stared at the stranger with an intense hunter's expression, wary and apprehensive at first.

Then he prowled one single step closer. Then another. His ears pointed stiffly forward. His head lowered and his hackles bristled like pine needles on his shoulder blades. He smelled the other wolf, now. He saw the tension they carried in their body.

Skífa smiled, barely exposing the points of his teeth between his dark lips. The rigidity in his shoulders eased and his hackles laid down. "I thought you might be a ghost," he confided, amusement in the low sandy tones of his voice, "... Or a god." He almost chuckled. But for his apparent sense of good humor, he exuded little warmth or kindness, and he continued to watch the stranger with hawkish intensity. "What is this place?"

The stranger came closer, albeit carefully, cautiously, testing Corvo's reaction. The black wolf did not move a muscle, golden eyes locked onto the other male with sharp focus. He waited for the aggressive, for the warning, just in case this territory was already spoken for. He wasn't familiar with the area so he had no idea. Save for the key clue of other wolves scents, Corvo had no way of knowing if any land he crossed was spoken for. 

Seeing the other wolf relax, if only slightly, eased a bit of Corvo's worry. To the male's mocking words, he raised a brow. "Were I a god I wouldn't have chosen this place to grace my presence with," he answered in his own joking tone. He glanced past the stranger, examining the land around them once more, and then he met his eyes again. "I haven't the slightest idea. I'm not from here. You?" His eyes narrowed.

"Heh." Skífa let his gaze wander for a half-second. This seemed like a good land for a god, but he didn't care to argue. He doubted this other wolf revered the same gods he did.

"From the north," he answered, a little brusquely. Skífa flicked his ears and narrowed his eyes at the fog, jockeying himself slightly sideways as if to continue on his journey. "This place feels like a graveyard. Wonder who's buried here, huh?" He clicked his teeth thoughtfully. His gaze landed on the stranger's dark face again, and he flashed him something of a vague, toothy smile. "Which way you going?"

Nodding Corvo shifted his body, angling in the same direction the stranger did. He appeared almost fidgety, but this place set Corvo on edge so he couldn't be sure if this was just the wolf's nature or if it was this land around them. 

"Wolves of old, maybe," he answered, following the male's gaze until it returned to his own. 

Corvo did not return the smile. Instead he continued to stare, silently suspicious. 

He hesitated to answer the question, wondering if he could trust this wolf he did not know. He didn't even have to consider that. Corvo couldn't trust anyone but himself. 

"Whichever way the fog leads me I suppose," he answered finally, his eyes wandering toward the north, toward the scent of the ocean. "What about you? What brings you so far from home?"

The stranger reminded him of his former pack leader, Yar, because Yar always met his smile with the same stony, suspicious stare as this wolf. Skífa's smile grew bigger and pointer, amused. He shifted his weight back a step, looking even more relaxed when in truth he was prepared to retreat if he had to. His hackles slightly tingled again, as he wondered if this other wolf was going to make an aggressive move. If he was anything like Yar, Skífa had to stay on his toes.

"Ah, I go that way. To the coast. See the ocean. Look for food... I come here after..." He trailed off momentarily. His smile darkened and then wavered for a second. "I have no home. Can't go far away from it if you don't have one, huh?" He snickered and took one restless step away. "And you - why let the fog lead you far from home?" He wasn't sure why he kept asking questions. Maybe because the other wolf seemed hesitant to answer them, and that was entertaining. Or maybe... maybe because this place made his skin crawl, and he wasn't sure he wanted to go back into the fog alone.

Cowardly, and probably wrong of him. He was probably safer alone, as always. Still, he was reluctant to leave just yet. Maybe in another minute, when the stranger ran out of patience and chased him off.

As his smile grew, so did Corvo's apprehension. He did not like the slyness to the other male's smile, the way he seemed at ease in such an eerie place. He listened to the answer to his question, but the stranger trailed off, making Corvo wonder what it was he had meant to say. Perhaps, like him, this wolf had a past he did not want to remember. Perhaps, like him, this wolf headed for vengeance. 

But he went on, explaining that he had no home to leave behind. Despite his suspicions, Corvo couldn't say he didn't understand the sentiment. He didn't have a home either. Not anymore. How he wished he could return to what he once had though. 

"I guess because I want to go far," Corvo explained, almost to himself. 

He let the topic drift away with the fog, and decided instead to introduce himself, since he'd rather give that information than any about his past. "I'm Corvo, by the way."

"Mm," he acknowledged, catching on to the stranger's proclivity for non-answers. That was fine. Skífa didn't know what he'd do with a real, genuine answer anyway. Feel bad? No, not likely. Still, his dark gaze lingered thoughtfully on the black wolf. It sounded like Corvo was trying to convince himself, more than anything. Maybe Corvo didn't want to go far away from his old home. Skífa couldn't really relate.

"Skífa." It was the first time he'd exchanged names with anyone in a long time. The sound of his own name was an odd thing to hear after not hearing it for so long. "Corvo, you want to travel with me little ways? Up the coast, catch something to eat?" Or at least until he got out of the Barrow Fields. He didn't necessarily care if Corvo wanted to travel with him any further than that. But he was still feeling reluctant to be in the fog by himself. Skífa drifted another step away, though, feeling stupid. He masked it with another uncivilized smile.

Corvo didn't immediately answer, as was his tendency. He looked Skífa over, considered the likelihood that the other male would kill him at the first opportunity, and decided it was not probable, at least not with the information he'd gathered thus far, which wasn't much. He was willing to risk it, at the chance to get something to eat. Hunting alone wasn't easy, even with one additional participant the odds of success went up a great deal. That was another pair of eyes and paws lent to the task. There was of course the issue of sharing whatever they caught, but Corvo was willing to cross that bridge when they came to it. 

So, he said with a curt nod, "For the time being, yes."

He would not remain with Skífa for long. He didn't trust him enough for that. But for now, it was a promising option.

Waiting for an answer felt mildly awkward. Skífa swallowed his insecurity and let the smile linger on his face. The measuring of trust felt almost palpable. Skífa mentally teased the stranger for it, knowing full well that he was not trustworthy in the least. He didn't trust Corvo either, but he thought Corvo was probably predictable enough to be safe - safe enough to take with him through the fog. 

So when Corvo agreed, his lingering smile brightened, actually genuine for once. He even wagged his tail briefly. "It's good to have your trust, huh. I won't disappoint you." Then he glanced into the bland, sense-dull fog around them - the barrows rose like waves of snow and frosted earth at the fringes of their visible range. Dark hills with dark eyes. The premonitions from earlier continued to play tag in the grottos of his mind. He eyed Corvo again, and his expression was more somber than before. "Let's go, yeah? Spent too much time around these ghosts already. Wolves of old - not my ancestors, but someone's. I don't want to know whose."