Little darling, I feel like ice is slowly melting . . .

OOC: No problem ;)

She didn’t see anything, yet she could have sworn she had heard something.

Ears fully spread, and with her right paw lifted in concentration, Suvah tried to distinguish the little sounds the night brought. No luck. The sounds that surrounded her were just the usual, and there weren’t many of them; it was the quietness of the winter, her first winter to be precise. Her ears turned back as she grinned at herself. She had decided she loved winter, the quietness, the chilled wind caressing her thick coat… it almost made up for the lack of hunting she had been getting.

But that night was different.

Her stomach was full, making her feel content for the first time in almost a month. She had managed to swallow a pair of critters earlier, her only meal in two days, and what a meal.

Full of energy, and feeling as proud as she had ever felt for getting that much meat in such a difficult season, she had decided to do what she liked to do the most: explore. And there she was, heading to what seemed to be the boundary of the forest. She had never been there, and her heart was pounding in excitement just to see what was outside. The gray wolf felt how her tongue lolled out of her mouth as she trotted in an effort to satisfy her pup curiosity faster. It was such a relief to feel like that. All she had met for months had been hunger and desperation, and she was more than happy to feel herself as if she was a little cub again.

She stopped the movement of her limbs, trying to see what was behind all that foliage. Licking her lips just to stick her tongue out again in short breaths, the young fae took a time to get used to the light of the immense clear. All she could hear now was her own breathing. She padded forward, feeling the softness of the field in her paw pads as she sniffed the fresh air of the night, completely unaware of her lack of solitude.

Here comes the sun, and I say . . .

It's  a l r i g h t.

Little darling, I feel like ice is slowly melting . . .

Suvah ran, making small furrows in the cold snow as she trotted happily though the open land, bordering the end of the woods. Her nose felt wet, aching as the cold air passed through its rough black skin. It didn’t matter, the wide range of new smells made up for it.

She barely remembered the last time she had gone out of the forest. Used to the sounds of the life in the brushwood and the feel of trees above her body, she felt as free as she had ever felt, and overwhelming feeling that occupied her whole mind, making her forget any other preoccupation.

The young wolf stopped. Her sore nostrils had caught something. The smell was weak, maybe because of the melting snow that covered her claws, but it was familiar. She tilted her head, still sniffing the chilled air, searching for more information to calm her hungry mind. She had felt that smell before, she knew it, but, for some reason, her mind seemed to be too busy or cheerful to remember where did that scent come from.

Her paws moved, following the subtle trail the familiar smell formed on the ground. She walked, her clueless mind ignoring any consequences of her mindless behavior, and tracked the scent just for the sake of satisfying her curiosity.

The smell grew stronger at every step she took, and soon she found herself climbing what looked like a small hill. She ended her movement mid-way, hesitating, and her orange orbs scanned carefully the land in front of her. The smell came from there, she was sure, not even the snow would hide something so near, but she couldn’t see anything with so little light to illuminate her way.

And then…

A howl.

The youngster jumped. The cry sounded so loud she could have sworn it had come from her own throat. Her heart pounded quickly inside her chest as she struggled between running out, or laughing at her own stupidity. Now she saw it, the dark silhouette of another medium-sized wolf that howled at the stars, either unaware of her presence, or ignoring it. Suvah lowered her tail, it was too late to hide now.

Here comes the sun, and I say . . .

It's  a l r i g h t.

Little darling, I feel like ice is slowly melting . . .

The more she thought of it, the more she wanted to scram away from there as quickly as her clumsy paws would allow her.

Well, there was no doubt. The howl, the husky voice, and now, the highly recognizable frame that stayed just a few steps away from her trembling body. It was a wolf, and a mix of his tone and the now nearer scent made her believe that he was male; a young one to be precise. His individual smell had caught most of Suvah’s sensitive nostrils, but the familiar odor that originally caught her attention remained, hidden under the more immediate tones. Her mind, however, decided not to find out, not at the moment.

She squirmed, both scared and slothful at the thought of what was coming next. It was either getting introduced, or being mistaken by another individual, and she had decided she wasn’t willing to receive a tackle, -or being attacked in any other way- from a complete stranger. Forced by the inconvenience of the situation, she headed to the silhouette almost in a thrust, giving him the most curious and alert of looks. All of her intentions to show herself as dominant merely melt as the distance lowered, and all the youngster ended up showing was curiosity and caution. Hesitant, and with her bushy tail almost lifted and wagging in sudden interest, she approached the other animal, giving a few final pounces to reach her destination.

At a pair of steps from the stranger, Suvah’s neck seemed to stretch as she tried to catch more and more of his distinct smell, sunset eyes wide open to meet with the other one’s orbs.

Here comes the sun, and I say . . .

It's  a l r i g h t.

Little darling, I feel like ice is slowly melting . . .

Suvah could feel the rough skin of her spine shivering under the tight silver pelt that now pointed at the sky in nervousness. Her muscles petrified for a second, and her tail lowered a few inches as she waited for the darkened frame of the stranger to show his own intentions. She felt his nostrils acting, catching her scent just as she had done a brief moment ago, and she then knew that if she was not welcomed, that was the time she’d find out.

But she liked to think of her as a lucky being, given how little times she had fought to an equal in the past. And maybe it was luck, or maybe there was something in her stance or her smell, which made the other wolf avoid her body contact and merely greet her; a much better beginning that the possible ones her adolescent brain was planning, passing through her mind in form of tragic images of the stranger snapping her young neck.

She snorted at the winter air, maybe trying to make a sigh of slight relief a little tad less obvious, and proceeded to convince her own body to loosen a tiny bit. At least enough not to show herself as the goofy pup that had gotten dramatically startled over the howl of a young wolf. Projecting another look full of uncertain, she stepped a few times in the same spot of stir snow she had pounced on, still unsure of what to do.

“I’m sorry,” she promptly barked, her ears tucked as her insides filled with a cloud of agitation and shyness. “I didn’t see you… I was exploring and just… caught your smell.”

Smell. That smell… that same essence that was driving her mind crazy. What the hell was it? Her orange eyes wandered, refusing to look at the powerful shadow that stood a few steps ahead to look at her own insides. A few images danced, picturing moments of her solitude, the period she had passed in which she had searched relentlessly for her small pack. She blinked abruptly, eyebrows lifted in surprise. A pack! That was it. He had the solid smell of what must have been his pack impregnated all over him.

Suvah hardened the muscles of her face in an interrogative grimace. She could remember catching that smell from the limits of her beloved Wildwood, but she had never dared to even pose a paw over those terrains. The young fae had never had an encounter with a pack, or even a pack member before, but as her parents wisely taught her and her siblings at the youngest of ages, the scent of a pack is their home, a barricade one must never cross unless one wants to join their cause, or meet the their mighty –and deadly- fangs.

She gave a soft retreat of one of her claws. Her unskilled mind was betraying her, making her think the worst about a situation she had never lived. Maybe standing there wasn’t the best of ideas, after all.

Here comes the sun, and I say . . .

It's  a l r i g h t.

Little darling, I feel like ice is slowly melting . . .

Orange eyes trembled facing the dirty white ground. The little Avani didn’t have a very positive opinion on premature confidence. She was careful, just as many others forest vagabonds whose life hangs on their ability to avoid unnecessary risk. It was just the way she had been educated, being a child of a pair of roamers who had no other defense for them or their beloved that that of their own instincts. Suvah appreciated the knowledge her honorable parents had gifted to her, but her mind struggled daily trying to envision her own opinions on the case. There were days when she’d been endlessly grateful for her excessive sensibility, while in others she’d find herself to be the most perfect of chickens. This day –or rather, night- could be called one of the latter.

She dived under her brain cells once more, seeking a way of ending her cowardly stance at once. What was she afraid of? The grim-pelted brute didn’t seem to be very interested in attacking her, at least not for the moment, and she was almost certain her eager steps hadn’t lead her to the inexorable dominion of any pack that she knew –let alone the one the stranger supposedly belonged to.

Her faded snout huffed once more, whiskers moving with the now flattened skin of her face. She was ashamed, and felt tremendously stupid at the same time. She didn’t feel like being a chicken right now, she didn’t want to be seen like that, not that night.

Finally, her foggy tail relaxed, and her head motioned down for a second, just to rise once again, eyes still avoiding the boy’s yellow orbs. A muttered chuckle came out of her throat as a response for his words, “That’s good to hear,” she whispered as loud as her throat permitted her, tail flicking timidly in a few seconds of uneasy silence. “… it’s just that… you do smell familiar… do you happen to belong to a pack or something?”

Suvah’s round eyes shone in curiosity. Here it was, her puppy self revealing itself once again. It had been there for as long as she had had her plentiful meal of the day, and it looked like it wasn’t planning on hiding any time soon. Truth was, the adolescent had always possessed a ridiculously big passion for knowledge, and the pack subject was suddenly found as the tastiest of bones to nibble on.

“My name’s Suvah.” the fae decided to say at last, her thick tail stroking the back of her hind legs in a soft wag.

Here comes the sun, and I say . . .

It's  a l r i g h t.