Wheeling Gull Isle contagion, i exhale you

for @Hviske

abel had never strayed too far from the mouth of the den. if he stayed close, heda didn't have to worry about him (or rather, he gave her no efforts to thwart). his littermates had started to explore, though — the other day, he saw ava on the beach playing with judah.

she didn't get in trouble. so he waited until night time, when the reflected light from the sand was softer and didn't hurt his eyes so much, and decided to do some exploring of his own.

he still didn't go far. there was plenty to look at. up above, the meteor shower continued. he found himself a nice spot on the precipice and turned his eyes to the sky.

The farther he strayed from his once-companion, the more he felt... confident in himself. He was doing it, surviving on his own and for the time being Hviske had decided to give himself the space he needed. 

He kept her words in his heart. It wasn't his fault that anything happened. Maybe... he could start to warm up to the idea that he could be part of a pack again, now that he didn't feel so helpless and alone. A change of scenery was always good, right? 

The yearling didn't expect sand to be so hot, or that it smelled like salt and heat in an unfavorable combination to his forest-kept nose.

So he waited until nightfall, and it was there he finally looked up. Light danced in his eyes, his tail-tip wagging from its place at his side. Wait... who else was there? His nose twitched. 

A... pup?

when his stargazing was interrupted, he expected it to be one of his littermates, or less likely, one of the older ones. but he had never seen this wolf before.

if he realized this was a stranger, he may have called for @Heda but he was not quite there yet.

instead he stared dumbly at the newcomer, waiting for him to do anything at all.

nightworld and the stars above. heda found the energy to keep her eyes upon the beach head. now that their first children were old enough to explore the island, and the second litter too was finding their legs, heda saw more opportunities to unite them in play and in stories.
but her form was up, and rigid, for there was a stranger among them, somehow appeared.
the island mother was a ribbon of pale light, and then she was between the boy and the newcomer. mother's instinct vied with her kindness, and heda advanced quietly, meaning to urge the man backward, away from her pup.

So the little one had a mother? Or at the very least there was someone that was looking after him. Yellow eyes watched the wolf approach, as pale as moonlight. The fur along his spine stood at attention. 

Her care for the pup cut him to his core, and he swallowed the lump in his throat. Family, there was a family here. One that certainly wouldn't involve... him. They were just fine without him, clearly. Stupid plan, indeed. 

His form stepped backward, tail curled between his legs. I- I am sorry for getting so near- he wanted to leave, torn between going back across the water and flooding into the forest to wallow in his own tears. His tongue wanted to ask her if there was anyone willing to take him in, that he was desperate for a family but terrified of the concept. So much to say, so little time. What could he possibly say? He'd never been on the receiving end of a mother's wrath.

I am... glad... he has a mother, at least.

please skip me moving forward! one small consideration is that hviske now has two threads in sweetharbor before he has joined - it may be worth it to see how this one plays out first or scoot this one after that one.

heda appears on the scene as if his thoughts held the power to conjure her there. he wants to press against her, but the rigidity in her body tells him she’s on high alert. 

the man begins to spin his sorrow to abel’s back; the boy slinks off to the den, hopeful he might go unnoticed.

noted! <3

"go back to papa," heda murmured to her boy, before turning to the stranger. "this is sweetharbor. it's peaceful. but this is our home. leave now, come back. join us properly." it was the harshest she had ever been, and she felt the sting of it.
heda stepped forward again, not wanting to attack, but to urge the stranger up and off.

A mother's love. 

Something he didn't know anymore. Something he wanted, so desperately, but couldn't bring himself to ask for. 

At least the little pup was cared for. 

The yearling nodded, speaking but one small sentence before he couldn't take more and left for the shadows. I am sorry for the intrusion. 

I got excited :>

fading <3

she watched quietly, and when she felt it was safe, heda turned away. she would tell the others about who had come, and as she caught up with abel, heda only glanced back once.
her faith was in the solitude of sweetharbor.