Silent Moon Plateau i was gonna die young

Same date as this thread but much later in the day ~April 12th - @Vesper

At long last the arduous journey to the heights was over. Iyes felt the elevation begin to relax as the plateau emerged from the mountain's slope, a lush forest of tall evergreens and hardwoods erupting around the pair. She didn't make an immediate bee-line toward Aurora Heights, opting instead for the nearer Silent Moon Plateau. Keeping her eyes fixated on the horizon she glossed over the area where she'd encountered her father for the first time only days before - no need thinking of emotionally taxing things when she was here to help out a new friend, after all.

Iyes slowed as she neared the edges of the great plateau, turning her head to look upon her tawny companion. "My pack is further north, but this is another place with some really good vantage points," She explained, her tail wagging pleasantly behind her. The night-cloaked yearling was really enjoying being a tour guide of the mountain. It was mostly a selfish pleasure, that she knew enough about her surroundings to be able to show someone else around. It was proof that she was becoming a proper packmate like she wanted to be.

Pressing her dark toes into the grass beneath them she stood quiet for a moment, allowing Vesper to look over the steep cliff into the Lore below. It was easy to see a distinction between the different forests and fields that comprised the edens. Wherever she was headed, she could find a path up here. Iyes could only hold her tongue for so long, however, and eventually the questions stewing in her brain seeped into her mouth and banged against her teeth. She didn't hold back. "So, when you find your brothers... what then?"

sorry about the wait, work has been wiping me out

Climbing up what may as well have been part of a mountain was an entirely new experience. To say that she wasn't winded would have been an outright lie, but Vesper still tried to keep that from bleeding through. Her legs felt a bit noodly as they reached more even ground, but the view had turned spectacular enough that for a while, she felt a second wind stir her into action. With her head on a swivel, she had trailed after Iyes trying to take in all of the sights.

As they drew near to the plateau's unique edging, Vesper felt a wave of vertigo wash over her. She didn't go nearly as close to the edge as Iyes dared, at least not initially. There was a wariness that she couldn't quite shake yet and that she couldn't avoid letting slip across her features as she tentatively peered over it. It was a dizzying height for her, someone who had never been no more than a few feet off the ground at any given point. Instinct told her not to test her luck and she listened.

But the view... it was stunning from there. Here there were no trees to block her view as there had been before, unless of course one counted the sprawl of the forest beneath them and its many boughs crisscrossing. She caught sight of streams and lesser known bodies of water – things that probably had names she doubted she'd learn. The wind was more prevalent there; it almost tugged at her coat like a superlative hand guiding her gaze.

The silence between them, however, did not last long.

"I don't know," she found herself saying and suddenly, wishing she hadn't. Her gaze flickered to the side where the dark-haired she-wolf lingered, but it made for the view just as swiftly. "We've been traveling for a while now. If things are good here, maybe they'll want to hang around." So far they had been through what she would have called good places, but there was usually something uneasy about them. Narrow valleys made for pretty locales, but often lacking resources – or so she had been told. Forests were coveted for the obvious and mountains, well, she hadn't put consideration into them.

"Why do you ask?" Naivety was not a very good shield, but she didn't know that either.

Iyes was not the best at picking up what others were putting down, therefore she didn't immediately acknowledge the tawny youth's hesitation to follow her perilously close to the edges of the plateau. It was only when a slim grimace adorned Vesper's muzzle as she peered upon the Lore that the night-cloaked yearling was finally clued into her anxiety. She offered a quiet smile and a slow wag of her tail in response, something reassuring but not overbearing. It was truly amazing to see the world from this high up for the first time - she wouldn't ruin it for Vesper by insisting she scoot a little closer to the edge... although it would look cooler if--

She caught the brief glance thrown her way before the other's golden eyes quickly wandered off, and decided to be polite enough not to stare back while the other answered her question. It wasn't exactly surprising that the grand plan of the siblings' reunion had no final goal. Most plans didn't work out the way that you wanted them to - a little tidbit of wisdom she decided not to impart on her new friend.

A question was returned her way and she found herself mirroring the other's actions, her amber eyes suddenly searching the trees below them to give purpose to her wandering stare. She shrugged. "It's just... hard being alone." It was too vulnerable of a statement to look anywhere near Vesper lest the tawny youth get the impression that she was (gasp) speaking from experience. The loneliness of a road traveled by ones own was pervasive. She was lucky to have been granted asylum by Kyna, and to have made a friend of the redheaded wolf, and her wicked wraith of a mate, and the giant guardian too. These luxuries were still new to the young girl, however, and she could remember being so truly aimless.

Was it the same for Vesper? Iyes struggled to determine what was too invasive of a question to slap the poor girl with now. It wasn't exactly like she herself was an open book, ready to crack her spine and offer up her sad secrets to whoever happened to be within arm's reach of her at the time. But something about the other youth felt like camaraderie and she wanted to be honest. Or maybe even just talk. She hadn't really talked to anyone in a while. "There's lots of packs that way but... I didn't really want to join any of them. It was better starting up with Kyna. It kind of felt more like my family than walking up to a stranger's door and begging them to let me warm up for a while." Her voice had begun to harden as she elaborated, a bitterness she forced herself to swallow. "Are you guys gonna start your own pack?"

adopt thea?

these two make me smile <3

Something about the way Iyes spoke told her that maybe she was speaking from some sort of experience. It went with everything else she had been told (or gleaned) thus far. Vesper had sympathy but foolishly enough didn't take into consideration that she was very much headed down the same path that the other yearling spoke of. It would all come crashing down on her head soon enough, but for now she was still rather green when it came to being on her own. So far, it hadn't been that rough or lonely, or so she thought. Never mind that she had started to feel those lonely little pangs nagging on her just hours before, right before they had even crossed paths.

Either way, she couldn't quite relate to the sensation of what it was like to find somewhere else to belong. Her friends at that point consisted of the wolves that had always been there in her life. Brothers, sisters, her parents, scattered relatives and maybe the one off non-relative or two. It had been that way for a long time and never was there any thought that it would be different. Maybe their home had turned to waste – in a sense, anyway – but they had one another even as they had became more and more splintered along the way.

"Probably," she went on to answer, pondering the inevitable outcome she could see. "That was our plan anyway. We've always stuck together." The stoic mask she had adorned over those last few moments was cast away as she went on speaking: "But maybe if we don't, I'll tell them about here. I bet they'd love to see this view! It's pretty. I'm glad you showed me this." A smile split her face as she waved her tail along. Maybe that would quell the unease Iyes felt.

Probably, Vesper said, confirming a the inky youth's quiet suspicion that this moment in time was transient as most moments went. Iyes smiled gently and resigned herself to be happy for her friend. It was not easy for her underdeveloped heart to refrain from jealousy when others had what she always wanted, but Aurora Heights helped enough that she was able to hope that the agouti wolf met up with her brothers and settled down all together, too. Fairy tales were stupid, but happy endings were definitely nice.

But maybe if we don't, Vesper continued, and naive as ever the teeniest fire of hope was lit within Iyes' chest. There was something more vulnerable about the way Vesper spoke now, a certain note of honestly that was laced within her words. And then there was an infectious grin which lit up the tawny youth's face, a toothy expression which the Heights wolf quickly mirrored. She was inclined to believe they would cross paths again in these lives they lived - a hope which felt solid.

"You're always welcome," she extended, "you and your brothers and whoever else you might pick up on the way. So long as they're not scared of heights." She grinned a little cheekily, though Vesper had definitely eased a bit since they got up here. The thin air got easier to breathe the more time you spent in it. She could be a natural with just a few days time.

Now it was Iyes' turn for honesty, speaking while her amber eyes looked north toward the various forests and valleys and fields that lay up ahead. "I think it's nice that you and your brothers all wanted to stick together. When my sister and I left..." she almost lied and said our pack, but it felt like too much of a stretch to fib that their family had been anything but themselves, "She immediately went her own way. I don't even think she thought of asking where I wanted to go, or if I wanted to come with her. But that's just what Thea was like. So... independent." Iyes too had become independent, but it was born only of necessity. She could keep herself alive. But she didn't want to be alone. Was it getting too obvious?

adopt thea?

sry for the wait, work and the heat's been killer for me

She watched, hesitant that even her words wouldn't be enough to restore just a fraction of the bubbly demeanor that had come out in her newest acquaintance. Vesper was not too keen on building up the wrong impression, or at least that was the inclination she had been imparted with somewhere along the way. It wasn't a pleasant thing to do, even more so when this time she was the wayward soul left to venture rather than watching someone in her current position try and bid their way in to somewhere. Of course she wasn't exactly in that position either, at least not yet. Once she figured out where to go and found everyone, she was definitely going to pass on that little trinket of things. Maybe then she'd seem the slightest bit more of use than a tag along.

So when a cheeky grin came crawling across Iyes' dark countenance, Vesper felt relief wash over. Keeping that lighthearted wave of her tail going was a lot easier now. And if they came back there, well the heights would take some getting used to; there was no doubt about it. Even she, in her standoffish approach to the plateau edge, knew that she could get used to it. At least if things came to that she felt she would.

Her gaze wandered off again for a moment, only drawn back as Iyes launched into a story of her own. There hadn't been much wonder over the sister she had mentioned before, but it was insight into whatever prelapsarian parts of the past her counterpart had. Therein it seemed they had more to share as well; Vesper could relate all too well over the independent sibling clause, as it were.

"Most of my siblings are that way too," she said with a nod. "Always knowing where they're going and everything. No questions about what's around the next bend... just go on and jump into it." At least, she didn't think they had ever questioned where they were going or why. If they had those concerns, they certainly hadn't voiced it to her by any means. She hadn't the faintest clue that it was her own naivety that put a damper on that – it was far easier just to go with the flow and defer to them. If their focus was on survival, hers had, well, been elsewhere.

Which was really a big part of why she found herself alone in the first place.

Not that she had figured that out.

There are several fresh rabbit tracks in the mud. Hunt Opportunity