Umbra Copse amaryllis

Snow fell at a steady pace, having long coated him in a damp chill that couldn't quite quell the burning desire at the pit of his soul. Having traveled through a fair portion of the winter season, there was a weary sort of feeling lingering in his bones, but it was not enough to deter him in his path. All he had was a bit of information to go on — a direction — and it had finally paid off. Where days old scents had been nothing more than a trace, they had finally began to pick up steadily. She was here, somewhere. While his allegiance was perhaps to many stakes in his Issumatar's claim, truthfully he had aligned himself with her. But she was a flighty thing, but never quite alone.

Against the dark wood, he stood out in sharp contrast despite the snowfall. It was early morning, but even there it seemed the twilight clung onto every little recess and crevasse. It drew it out in long shadows that blended with rich hardwood limbs; at times for untrained eyes it would have been perceptible to suggest there became a definite difficulty in determining where land started and tree ended. But Mezzo had seen dark woods such as those before, many times over. Trailing an equally dark beast through them was no particular obstacle. But the trees may as well have had eyes, knowing full and well they were far from empty.

Quiet beneath snowfall, he meandered in wait to be discovered, his thoughts dissolved from from one native tongue to another. He longed to address her in their common tongue, a tongue that stemmed so dearly from his long buried maternal family. But he would not call for her, feeling (perhaps arrogantly, he had pondered) she would know all along he had been following just beyond arm's length.

i always knew that the damned would inherit the earth
(as soon as they learned to speak we would be suffering)

Marking this before finding Tuwa/Miyako/Phineas finding thread so I can force you in that after.

Siku had not been able to quell the desire to expand even after pressing her claim at Wyldernis. That claim lay there still, and forever would in the battalion lead by Skull. He was Tartok; he led them now. Siku, the Matriarch, knew her expansion would not end there. But she would put an end to her claim beyond this reach, allowing her cubs—and the cubs she would have in the far future—to expand her name as well. The purpose was to spread the line of strength and wisdom both. For not all in her pack were large-boned and savage-minded. There was Miyako the bright, and Mezzo the quick, both skilled in herbs. There were the small and swift, too; Tuwawi. Siku preferred those of similar girth to her, but she could never deny the worth of the wolves that she had named Tartok. And they were most worthy of bearing the name they had defined together. Siku had remained at the Copse. She had traveled here some time before Phineas to retrieve her cubs, but would find him again. She had sent Aves and @Ataneq off to achieve some mission. She was sure that they would be back in time, and she had told them of the scent they would track. Ataneq had a nose as keen as her own, inherited from her. He would have no trouble in finding them; her trail would be obvious, and with Sitamat alongside her such a thing was a given. A chilled wind nipped at her moist nostrils, and she was given pause, forearm lifted and lingering in the air as her head turned so that she may look over her shoulder. She could not forget the male that spoke her tongue, nor did she desire to; he was invaluable, and a worthy companion and subordinate both. Surprise flashed in her eyes, but other than that her facade remained as stoic as it ever did. She altered her path and moved in his direction. From time to time, there would be that familiar scent on the wind. Perhaps she had always known he was at her tail, but she had not truly acknowledged it up until now. That he truly followed her was not a thought in her mind then, though. Ears pricked as she broke through the dark and dense wood, following a stream. She departed from its side quickly as the trail of Mezzo grew all the stronger. She would not stop until she found him, lifting her head and releasing a long note, calling to him.

There was obvious verisimilitude in his belief that he would eventually be discovered there. The woods would suit her, he thought, finding them to be similar to some of the dredges he had come through. Not to mention that the territories around them smelled rich with equal beasts, though almost anywhere he had been in his time on the earth had been packed with them at one point or another. There had been lulls naturally, but deep down they were all social creatures. Whether or not they wanted to be found or not, they were from time to time, inexplicably drawn to others like moths to flame. So when she beckoned him, he knew he had been found.

Briefly, a thin smile spread on his muzzle. It seemed more of a smirk in all truth and perhaps it was. When he had wanted to be found, Mezzo made himself easily found. But he had vanished just as easily from grounds as he had traversed them. Much like his past, he found it sometimes to be too easy to be like a thin wisp of smoke carried away in a eastward wind. In this case he found himself turning back into that wind, inhaling deeply and counting off mentally the seconds in preparation to cast his own voice back.

I am here, it seemed to suggest in its own high tones once it left his lips. She would be upon him in due time, no doubt little effort exerted from equally well-traveled form.

(This post was last modified: Apr 16, 2013, 10:22 PM by Mezzo.)

i always knew that the damned would inherit the earth
(as soon as they learned to speak we would be suffering)

His voice lifted over the treetops, and she need not pause even for a moment to catch the direction from where it had come. She had conveniently been moving toward him, all of this time. Her strides lengthened so that she would not delay him; her enthusiasm was not revealed in her step, but in her swaying tail. She knew nothing of love, but the closest thing to it were these wolves, her true family: Tartok. And here came another, surely for her; for it was for her they had always moved and marched. The Matriarch. The First of them. Siku knew that one day, her time would come. It was a long, long time from now, but when it did come, there would need to be another named. The head of it all. It would be a direct descendant of her, though of which line she could not be sure. It would be her cubs that would decide, by the only law they knew. Tooth and claw. She found him. He was not haggardly looking, nor hungry, despite his time alone. Perhaps it had been short. The non-saccharine woman moved toward him without slowing, moving to embrace him in a wolfish display of dominance and excitement, to reinstate their permanent bond to one another. Leader to subordinate, soldier to soldier. He may be a man of medicine, but he was a soldier of Tartok even still. Her tail moved slowly left and right to display that she was quite pleased to see him, but as was truly typical of the Issumatar, she was wordless. Her dialect consisted of deep rumbles and growls, then, and she reached to nip roughly—but fondly—at his whiskers.

(This post was last modified: May 02, 2013, 08:04 PM by Siku.)