He left his lake behind. Blue waters meant nothing when he paced the banks, thirst sated, bored. The itch reminded him of home - of long ago between hunts and between the lilt of dancing voices when no colour seized his life. Too easily the wanderer recalled a need for the constant tang of death at the back of his throat; he was not settled yet, not confident in the ability of safe to hold him like fear did. Even the lake lay quiet in its banks, a puddle compared to northern oceans and so tame... Not even the sun bothered to peer out from behind grey scudding clouds and Vafri sighed, and paced, and eventually left altogether. He might never have bowed his head except Naira offered freedom still, along with safety... Freedom to roam. Freedom to scratch the itch.


He skated down steep mountain walls in leaps and bounds and torrents of loose gravel, and when tree boughs pressed their shadows down against the white wolf's back he scowled and lowered his nose and followed game trails across dappled earth. Vafri ignored most movement in the shadows though; his stomach no longer clenched and rattled like an irate porcupine, and his interests never lay in hunting. No, the art of murder suited stronger, dumber wolves and Vafri floated along toward nowhere with swift water laughing on his right. It was a part of his lake still, he thought idly. A part of home... except home still conjured thoughts of driving snow and stinging cold, of numbness in the tips of his oversized ears. What could he do with being comfortable? Accepted? Either strive for more or strive to sabotage himself - and Vafri never had been so ambitious.


So the white wolf drifted down along the well-marked border of another pack's land and he contemplated stepping over - just once - just to see what happened, really. The trees grew thicker as he moved, the light more scarce and the air too close and full of the damp, earthy smell that meant green life. He moved more like a ghost the deeper he got - light feet, eyes darting, steps soft - but he retained the languid canter of a wolf not harried yet, not quite in trouble - yet. There must be other things to pass the time than starving in this wide world, other things to see than mountain tops and spiny thickets... With a last glance over his shoulder Vafri hopped nearer the scent of strangers without giving much thought to why. Why ruined adventures, ruined the chance to tell tales when he finished, and there was no one here for him to counsel so he had to settle for getting himself in trouble and out of it again. Had to settle for - loneliness, though he chose it without knowing.

White - the glint of ice beneath shadows, of teeth like porcelain knives. Vafri hesitated, posture dainty enough that one paw curled above the ground and hung there as his dark eyes lifted, innocent in their gleam, to sweep the mass of white fur and jagged hackles just ahead of him. Oh. Her voice rang with authority as if to forbid questioning - but he was a beast of words, a riddle on thin legs, and he only blinked as he focused large ears forward. The colour of her eyes tugged at him first; Vafri, never one to stare, stared for an instant at the deep living green so strangely placed above her nose. Maybe that tipped the odds a little farther away from flight this time around - maybe his good mood made this warm lower air oppressive and he only wanted to break though it, break something, and little females with big voices didn't scare him like they ought to. Maybe the liar knew more about spotting lies than she expected, and no hint of fear reflected in his face or in the lean cant of his fuzzy shape. Whatever the reason Vafri stepped forward rather than back, and his blunt head tilted to the right as he angled around her.


"Am I not?" He exclaimed. Vafri paused to sniff at her, nose twitching, and blinked as his own black lips twitched in what might have been a loose grin. "You know everybody in Swift River, then? Not one to question... newcomers?" His simper broadened, and the lanky wolf stepped forward with his tail held up, ears pressing toward her in a surprisingly clownish expression of mirth. He was quite aware his body language fell at odds with the cheery tone of his voice - even with the words as he spoke them. Pushing buttons was more fun than looking at trees, he thought, and it wasn't exactly rude to point out flaws in her reasoning like that... Though maybe it was rude to be confusing on purpose.


"What's your name, Miss...?" Vafri pressed. He pressed toward her, too, a little closer maybe than he would have liked, if he was perfectly honest with himself, but close enough to imply - maybe - the barest hint of a threat. I am big, read his posture. You are small. And he was not starving today, or afraid of where his next meal might be or when. Even if nothing in his voice agreed Vafri stood tall, looking down his nose at her as if he found some lack of satisfaction with the way she looked, or smelled, or spoke. The big wolf blinked and waited for her answer.

Smell, of course... All pack wolves smelled the same, individuality traded for protection and full bellies. His lip curled at the thought, old prejudices swarming in his head. Did he smell of Naira now? Of Ava? Athena? Did she recognize them hanging off his every hair and judge him lesser for existing there beneath the sky rather than here, below shade trees, where the river laughed too loudly and the air pressed close and wet and full? Vafri's skin prickled as if some unseen presence drew too close, and his dark eyes lingered on the green glow of the she-wolf's glare.


"Smart girl," Vafri quipped, his voice bright with the twist of angry laughter that now beat hammer strokes against the inside of his ribs. He moved around her as he spoke, certain to pad the space between his right side and her teeth with distance but also aware that he could claim the upper hand here, that despite her mocking threats she did nothing and if she knew Naira... He was not about to be punished for taking a walk and running into an unfortunately uptight bitch. The screws were turning down inside his head, rattling just slightly as he moved. "But which pack would that be?" he continued, hesitating now to watch her. The big wolf held his head a little down now, tail up, eyes wary of her continued posturing. He told himself he might just leave, but uncertain of how deep he stood in trouble Vafri lingered, eager to look the situation over. He was not a wolf given to trusting chance. He was a creature of survival, the clever brother and the Other in so many cases, and he shed his happy curiosity and phatic speech now in favor of the icy wolf his parents raised before he ran away. We have no choice in who the cold winds take, they always said. He always meant to prove them wrong.


The little she-wolf must be young, he thought, or nervous, because she pushed hard fast and escalated faster - jaws snapping suddenly to throw words at him in a harsh cry, and he frowned, ears pushing back for just a moment. Vafri answered without conscious thought, the ridge of white along his spine lifting to make an echo of the mountains that he left behind; his hackles added height to his already lanky frame. Tail sticking behind him like a bristle brush he answered with a soft growl and the quiet glitter of his bared fangs, black lips flashing around those fangs to form cold words. "Be quiet," a demand, sharp and derisive. He stood without attacking (yet) but waited for her to move first - expected it with her agressive posturing and frenzy in her voice. She knew too little of danger to be a threat, and she was small besides... He felt little fear here - not of her. It was mostly indignation and a rising concern for the state of things on his return. Vafri could not afford to lose what he'd so recently gained - no. Feet wet he was prepared to see trouble up to his shoulder blades before he ran.

He knew he broke a step too far, knew that smarter wolves backed down, backed off, and slunk away tail tucked to live and be regretful. Vafri ignored the chattering wiser voice at the back of his mind. Things conscience whispered only riled up his anger - as they had on another day quite long ago, when the white wolf looked back on only a year and thought he knew many things about the world. Of course he knew now that his own mind could barely strive to hold the truth of all things, and that made him wise.


The storyteller, master of lies and words and quiet meanings, wondered what it was to feel the pull of bloodlust and the tear of ligaments between his teeth. Wondered - why any of it mattered when he could hardly frighten one pale girl into submission. The laughter died in his eyes when she spoke and Vafri took the words in silently, digesting that he had no need to worry. The white wolf blinked, glanced away, returned his focus to Cali and her struggle to own even her own expressions. You are a little thing, he thought. He hated her if only because she was everything that he expected wolves to be, so brave and arrogant and filled with righteous fury. But the cold wind knows no justice.


Only death.


The sunlight broke through trees above in little shafts. He stood watching her, acutely aware of the light just behind her - all around them. Light was painful. Light was hot. The day looked on disinterested in their games and Vafri's snarl softened to a lesser thing, a low smile brightened only by the tips of his eyeteeth. "Of course," he murmured, broad paws trekking toward her, head cocked, throat almost exposed if his skull weren't so low. The big wolf's tail almost seemed to drop a bit, to lose its bristled texture - but he swept close, oh. "I was only taking a walk, you know. This could've been avoided if you only were polite." Those dark eyes centered on the right side of her lower jaw and just behind it, at the throat where blood pulsed and air moved. How many times had he watched his brother's jaws deny that air? Spatter hot blood all across the ground? Vafri moved faster than his own mind did; he moved without a thought in his head, without any sense of self and only the vain, idiotic desire to make her squeal and put her down in awe of him. He was tired of being the Other, the beast they ran from lands they called their own, the scavenger and trespasser and villain - and he had a home now and he called himself a pack wolf and if doing that meant finally settling debts with other pack wolves well then that - that rang all right in his mind. That tasted a little like revenge left cold for far too long.


His lips pulled back to let his teeth flash not for the female's throat, exactly - for her right eye. He didn't quite expect to connect. Some foolish part of him expected her to dart away, to tuck her tail and move out and submit because he was lanky but also much stronger, and much harder, and so much more feral. Without the soft laws of these warm-air creatures there existed only death and ice and coldness. He was part of it. He was a rush of frosty wind against her, was the sudden crack of fractured ice and the long plunge into a dark abyss. He could be fate, if only he willed it.

Once he started it, once the rocks began to slide, motion crashed down over Vafri in a single great cascade of sound and tactile function. The hollow click of his teeth ringing against the air made echoes down the white wolf's jaw; dark eyes swept to follow Cali and his body careened away from the clap of her own teeth. In a single catlike swerve Vafri hurled himself to the right and arched his spine away, snarling when her jaws brushed the top of his thigh. Instinct, the call of that mighty drum pounding within his ribs, spoke louder and faster than any call to decency. The white wolf moved to spin after; his jaws opened again to snap at her tail as she fled, and something strange and alien rose gurgling from the depths of his throat - a single endless, breathy roar punctuated by the narrowed slits of his gaze and the glint of his yellowed teeth.


Only something else spoke louder.


Before he staggered to the left, Vafri knew he fought the shady little female all alone. He was no fool, and keen enough to keep on living that he ran the variables before even stepping within striking distance. Suddenly though a shape roughly consistent with the size and fury of a hungry bear bowled into him and Vafri yelped, belly meeting the dirt, paws skidding and scrabbling at the leaves. The white male's head whipped around, big ears twisting up in frightened surprise, but immediately his expression tightened down again as he rose and his shoulder stung and something, something warm and dark trickled through the thick fur at the base of Vafri's neck. His pulse hammered more like frantic wings now struggling to abandon the frail bones pinned around them - dove wings, hummingbird's, prey and terrified and mindful of the endings to this kind of story, the story of the clever brother who left and did stupid things and paid for them when his tongue got heavy and the blood started to flow...


Absurdly, Vafri found time to remark on the smallness of this other wolf while his own slender legs unfolded once again. It was just... small, shorter than he but thick, perhaps, with muscle and the ruined ropey evidence of a thousand other battles won or lost - no way to tell. His shoulder begged discretion and his black lips still bared fangs to answer the primal fury he found in the stranger's eyes but Vafri stood merely trembling instead of running hard, though he bothered to back away one limping step as his dark eyes flitted to Cali. She'd run, he realized, watching now from a safe distance while the males tore each other up - and that was the breadth of it, the storyteller tricked by someone stupider than he, and it buzzed like white noise in his head, like the frantic keening of an angry wind. His haunches shuddered quicker than his mouth did, room only for the teeth to rip back once again, the jaws cracking open and slashing for whatever still made up the stranger's face, whatever might hurt in the most pathetic retaliation Vafri had yet managed to muster. He was out of his depth, a wild thing in the company of the obscene, and he could only think of hurting while he hurt - of inflicting all the damage roaring from his nerves.