Windsong Fjord Stop To Pretend

Sahalie was just as surprised as the red man, her ears twitching and stretching farther forward as she retracted her head in a flash. Just something old wolves said? Sure, sometimes old wolves—or really any adult, as she quickly realized that this loner was not much older than her—could be a little hyperbolic with their cautionary tales, but they meant well, and there was always some truth to what they were saying. There was a reason they warned her about the cold weather and the icy water, because it was actually freaking dangerous! But reality seemed to be setting in for him and he wasn't questioning her any more. Maybe, she thought, he had hit his head a little harder than she had first concluded.

At first she assumed that when the man...boy—man-boy, she was so sure he was not an adult now—said "island" he meant the islands she had seen in the western lake by Hearthwood River. Except, from how he continued, it sounded like he had been living on an island for an extended period of time, so much so that he had been convinced there was nothing else. Those islands in the west were not that big. You could see the shore if you looked out of the trees. He had been on a big island, which was just sort of mind boggling. He had come from very far away.

Suddenly the man-boy seemed to realized he had lost track of his female travelling partner. He seemed so excited, yet Sahalie's heart gave a painful thud as she slowly shook her head. His description was getting stranger. Flowers? Like she held flowers? Was that really a way to describe a wolf, she wondered, since they couldn't always have flowers with them. And all wolves had teeth, so... that wasn't an entirely helpful clue. "Green?" there was nothing to mask her incredulity.

"I think you need a nap, man," she said, patting her paw with hers in a motherly way. He was not so cold any more, it seemed, that he would risk dying of a low body temperature. And she could keep him warm. "Maybe you'll remember more after you've had some sleep."

Sahalie shook her head, and Tumblebelly felt a little bit hurt. The girl must have just missed her, or maybe not seen his friend as she escaped the icy waters. It was pretty easy for him to firmly believe in that conclusion, and completely toss away any thoughts that she could have met the icy fate that he'd avoided. "Does green sound wrong?" she had him doubting himself, despite how sure he'd felt that his friend was green.

The girl then suggested a nap, which sounded pretty excellent right then. He huffed, then plopped himself down where he'd stood. "Yeah, you're right. Nap, get up, find my friend, maybe remember things better," not in that order, but it seemed like a solid plan. Plus, he was exhausted. He'd wanted to nap after he'd managed to get out of the water, but could only imagine his fate if he'd done so. She might have found him dead instead of laying there shivering. His friend, the probably-not-green one, would disapprove. He needed to find her and figure out where exactly he was, then continue on whatever he had been doing before today.

He had intended to settle down and ask more questions. Her name would have been a good one, it would have been good to see where he was, and which way the ocean was. Instead, he'd shut his eyes one second, and the next he was snoring.