Dated 10/5 - Occasional cloud cover, dusk.
Sub-territory discovery! Dastard's Rapids occur within the northern thick of Ghastly Woods. The mountain-fed river which winds its way along the top border of the fog-ridden forest typically remains calm throughout the thawed months of the year, but nearer to the base of the mountains, this changes. A river bed upheaved both by exposed, jagged rock bed and a swift drop in elevation forms a dangerous nest of rapids within the water. It is most tumultuous during the spring thaw, when the river runs deepest due to the melting snow and ice, and least threatening during the late summer when the water level falls under pressure from the heat.
Not yet satisfied that the north's possibilities had been deplenished, the boy had repeated his course with all the more fire within his gut. River after river he had crossed, passing the peculiar rocky throne from the day before within short time, and traveling hours farther. As the wisps of fog began to snake around his legs, defended from the burning sun by the choking canopy of yet a new species of trees above, Sven felt to his very bone that this repetition, this further exploration, had been the correct choice. The landscape around him was something straight out of a horror story told to him by his mother or @Hecate, and it was all too painfully easy to imagine the multitude of ways in which harm could have befallen Piety within these Ghastly Woods.
Why didn't you turn back? his mind begged to know as he pushed on, forever his mother's fearless son. He cared not for any personal danger he may be in within the murky depths of this forest, would face them all at once if it would bring his beloved mother back to him. His pale eyes were restless within his scale, scanning the entirety of his surroundings over and over again in search of any sign, whether it be of Piety or a naredo weller who may know of what came of her.
Despite the oppressive gloom, the eerie sounds and mischievous fog, the boy unknowingly approached the end of the woods without a single incident. Certainly, there was more to the forest than what he saw, his mind determined, and so it ignored the thinning of the trees, the subtle increasing of light, the slow retreat of the mist over the ground. When the violent rush of yet another river reached his ears, he was drawn to the more violent sounding end of moving water body. He could not know from sound alone that it was rapids which lay ahead of him, the boy yet to have experienced such a formation before in his life. Yet as he approached, and his eyes lay upon the roiling, stone-ridden water, he knew exactly how utterly dangerous they were.
This did nothing to keep him away. Over and over his silver eyes searched the white froth and the sharp edges of the deadly rocks, witnessing all the different ways in which the natural occurrence could break an adult wolf's body and steal the life from it. It was impossible to tell upon the shore if the white was truly foam (an inexplicable thing to the boy's unworldly mind) or Piety's captured remains, and the child was unable to handle not knowing.
"Mother... ?" he whispered weakly, fear beginning to grip his body as his eyes and mind worked together to play wicked tricks upon him. His pale paws entered the water, the current strong even at the shallow shore. The many jutting slabs of rock made some semblance of a bridge, and Sven knew that the only way to truly know that this was not Piety's grave would be to cross. Pulling himself up upon the nearest, he began to travel deeper into the rapids.
It was difficult for him to focus on his footing, when he was so frantically searching to discern the smallest scraps of Piety's fur from the tumultuous, tornadoing water around him, and as he neared the center, a single mistake was made. In all of a single breath the boy's paw slipped, and with his balance suddenly stolen from him, his other three legs crumpled easily before the current's force. He had time only to gasp before he was plunged beneath the water's boiling surface, consuming him completely.
Ice stole over his skin, or so it felt as his coat was immediately permeated and he seemed soaked to his very bones. All sense of direction was stolen from him, pale eyes pinched tightly closed against the stinging water. His shoulder collided with something hard and abrasive, and then the same with his left flank. Dull pain consumed his flesh, and he wanted to cry out, but gritted his teeth against the water that pushed so vehemently inward on him. It wanted to flood his lungs, wanted to steal his life, and as the searing of his oxygen-starved chest built, Sven was overcome with the dread that it would win.