The search for prey took Gent out away from Hollowheart Keep's homestead den, and each step brought no sign of anything worth running home about. He'd been lucky to even spot a hare, much less be able to capture it. The mounding snow made pursuit extremely difficult, though he'd tried at every opportunity to catch something worth taking home and adding to the cache; which at this point might have been anything. Hunger starting to gnaw at him once more, he passed through the blackberry fields in compete solitude, as though the snow had buried everything and everyone but him.



It wasn't until the ice-coated bushes began to thin and the tangle of dead field grass ceased to catch his paws beneath the snow that he at last picked up on something; something that made him stop dead in his tracks. It was not the scent of prey on the wind, but other wolves. Gent gathered great breaths within his nose, analyzing every strain of information the air allowed him, and determined that a pack resided in the skein of woods that lay ahead. He snorted, and furrowed his brow, not at all happy with this intelligence. Competition lie barely a day's worth of travel away. It was definitely something worth alerting Naira of, if she wasn't already aware.



Gent turned, considering looping down through the orchard and continuing his search for sustenance while also returning back home in order to inform his queen of what he'd discovered. He did not wish to linger here, and give this pack the same heads up nor meet any vigilante member. However, before he could take the first step that would lead him away, he picked up on a stronger scent approaching his position. With a scowl, Gent immediately turned himself directly north and started at a brisk pace. If this wolf tracked him out of curiosity or precaution, he would lead the stranger in the wrong direction. Due to the trial of his pack's escape from the blockaded mountain pass, Gent had picked up on a few tricks navigating thick snow. Hopefully, a grounded pack wolf would abandon pursuit if lead into treacherous conditions.

What he hadn't counted on was the tail to be a youth, a little girl with wide beryl eyes light as a spring grass and a stutter to her greeting. Gent instantly ceded to her presence, halting his steps and turning to face her. It wasn't the best choice if Hollowheart Keep's secrecy was to be kept, but he assumed that a lie would be easy and harmless to spin and thus this interaction would not have any negative effects. What the situation did give him was the opportunity to impress upon her; she looked at him with both intrigue in fear, a delicious mixture of emotions that often hinted at malleability.



Gent feigned surprise at her presence, ears standing tall and eyes darting around before landing on her bounding form, the snow nearly swallowing her up with each stride. A smile then effortlessly slipped forward, wry and charming as always. He moved towards her, aiding in closing the distance, until they were well within conversation-friendly proximity, before reclining, head drooping low so that they may speak eye to eye.



"Well hey there, Danica. M'names Gent," he returned, the ease of his words a stark contrast to her stuttering.



Now that he was engaged, he saw the opportunity in this moment. This pack was a threat with its immediacy to Hollowheart Keep, but a pup was unlikely to realize what his own presence meant for this foreign domain. If he could glean some information from her, perhaps Naira could use the intelligence to properly decide how best to handle the situation. If anything, it gave the conversation greater use than Gent's own forward planning agenda, and having such knowledge would help him to prove his use to his luminary.



"Something as sweet looking as you might be mistaken for a treat, out by yourself; where are your keepers?"

Of course she would ask him questions as well. It was very likely that she was the offspring of whatever duo reigned over this quadrant, making it even more crucial that the boy pull off a successful batch of lies. In which he had one hundred percent confidence that he would accomplish. She was a shy little thing, fluttering like a butterfly at his paws, but whatever unnerved her did not keep her from saying what she wanted to.



His smile curled further with warmth as she offered him a home, clearly eager to make a friend of him. She was optimistic even when mildly guarded, which was what would make this easy. In the middle of it, she name dropped who Gent would assume was the alpha of the pack, and he cataloged that information away in his mind. Hollow of the thicket.



"I'm sorry to say I do have a pack; I came south to try and find food for them. Apparently, I've wandered too far and nearly trespassed into your home, which I apologize for. I'm sure your family is hard pressed for a meal too in this weather, huh?"



He hoped she would reply in the negative, that there was a hidden herd or two still peeling bark from the trees of this forest. If that was the case, perhaps Naira would devise a raid. He imagined the feat, he and his comrades trampling this foreign pack's virtual borders in the hazy light of dawn, of Sagacity and Naira taking down a doe or two while the men kept the un-allied guardians at bay. Of Danica's tiny face riddled with horror as she realized what being open and friendly could cost her and her family. Gent wasn't a fan of causing such heartbreak, but when it came down to survival, he would do what it took. Even if it meant stealing meat from the mouth of this darling little girl.

Gent was not pleased with her response. She claimed that there was no food, making his traveling this far nearly completely worthless, and the mention of her familial sorrows only confused him on the hierarchy of the pack; who was this Hollow then, a leader or the schmuck who got stuck with some broad's bastard children? And to top it all off, he wasn't entirely trusting of the girl's performance. She might have some natural talent for telling lies, but it was hard to fool a practiced spinster such as Gent. Still, he gave her the benefit of the doubt, seeing little reason why she would not be honest with him.



The boy allowed his face to fall, feigning sympathy to her situation, but before he could offer her his (in)sincerest condolences, her demeanor melted into something unsure and the flags shot up in his head. Report? No one sent a child out to scout; so she had been lying. Gent lifted his head, staring past her toward her home, suddenly on high alert. Every sense strained to catch whiff of something edible, anything that she might be hiding from him. And then it came to him as the wind shifted, the scent of a small family of mule deer. The only thing about their presence that worked in his favor was that they lie outside of the pack's borders, and were travelling further into the blackberry fields. However, there was no way he could take down one on his own, even if they were starved.



Gent stood, suddenly feeling incredibly tense. Salivating, he rapidly ran through the options, desperate to find one that worked in his favor. He would need help, and had no choice but to turn to this alien pack. There the problems came flooding into his mind. How would they react initially, finding him here with their whelp and so close to their food? Were they starving, or was the girl lying completely and this bosky thicket held the Lore's missing herds? Were they otherwise instinctively aggressive? Would they allow him to help in the hunt in exchange for a chunk of the spoils? Would they attempt to follow him home, to seek out his pack? Was it worth the risk to try?



"Of course," he ceded, maintaining that friendly every-day-gentleman disposition. "I'm no thief."



His gaze returned to the little girl, to the blaze within her beryl eyes. She had lied for tact, and now stood her ground against a man that could easily snap her neck in one swift clamp of his jaws in defense of her family's well being. Smart girl. She would be worth following up with come summer, when times weren't so dire and she had grown into her personality.



"However, my family is starving. Danica, I would do anything for just a portion of a deer. If you could find just two others, I would help them hunt, and I would take what they see fit and I wouldn't come back."



It was clear that he was pleading with her; despite wanting to protect her family, she had to have some empathy for him. You would be hard pressed to find a heartless whelp, and even if he hadn't been completely correct on his initial judgement of her, he didn't see the darkness in her eyes that he himself had harbored at her age. It was a little risky, but worth it. If anything went wrong, he would simply need to run. The scent of the Ghastly Woods had long been covered by that of ice and sweat and the timeless rotting of blackberry bushes; if he went north, he would be able to lose any tailing enemies in the snow and no one would ever be the wiser as to where he truly had come from.




ooc: do you want me to post in the "for the attention of" thread to find two SW wolves or do you want to reach out to someone in particular? & could we please limit it to just two? i'd really prefer if gent didn't have the whole pack chasing him down if anything goes wrong ^^; like i'd really like for him to be able to cooperate and then just get like a little bit of the deer and everything goes nicely, because that would be the perfect set up for another thread i want to do with him. i made the thread private, also, so that people can't randomly jump in when they see the hunt opportunity.