Drooping Willows Broken, Battered and Bruised

OK, I know it hasn't happened yet, but to save throwing the poor boy off Bramble Falls, I am going to set this after Ruiko/Aeylen go... If that is ok... If not I can adjust it.

<blockquote>The wolf that made his way through the willows truly was a distortion of the wolf that had passed here last. The last time he had been here he had been relatively carefree, beautiful, intact. The wolf that passed now was broken, battered, bruised and half starved. On the right side of his face, his fangs were constantly exposed, his lip, torn from his face, ears tattered and body scarred. He carried a mild limp today, exhausted from his travels... He had finally found a way back, through the rubble of the landslide... and he was a long way from Copper Rock Creek, if Copper Rock Creek even existed anymore. Ruiko’s scent was gone, Aeylen’s too. Perhaps they had moved the pack elsewhere?

His head swung from side to side as he took in his surroundings, left eye clouded from where his sisters tooth had pierced through the sensitive membrane, although it was hardly a disability, he could still partially see from the damaged eye. On bright days, it was worse, and so he stuck to the shadows. His bones were clearly lined, making his sparse fur stick out at all angles. He was lost in his own thoughts, but he still had his wits about him. Probably more-so now than he did that night...

Finally, he happened across a strange but familiar scent... The last time he had met with her had been at Grizzly Hollow, but it would seem Elettra finally had a pack of her own. Mixed emotions passed the golden wolfs twisted face. He thought for a moment to howl, but the border was well marked. If he just waited long enough, patiently enough... He was sure someone would pass by perhaps they would have need of him. He needed to be needed.</blockquote>

As she searched on, keeping her distance as she trailed the stranger, downwind, she could not recognize the man as one she once knew. No longer would he hold the scent of Copper Rock Creek and having only met him once for training in the art of healing, she could not register him as a wolf she had once known. This wolf was but a bag of bones, a weak creature whom was on his way to his death bed. Though of course, Elettra had nothing against a scarred individual. Though Elettra herself had not been permanently maimed in all her battles, she too held various scarring under the lush of her black pelt. Skana was a part of her pack, an older woman riddled with scars, mainly that along her muzzle and a torn ear. However, there was strength in Skana which she did not see it this wolf. He did not look a creature whom had fought and was victorious, but a wolf whom had fought and been left for dead.
He stopped then at her boarders, settling in patience as though awaiting someone to come to him in question. And so, of course, Elettra did. Only when she was close enough to take in the features of his face would he at all become recognizable. Though his ears were torn and his lip was ripped apart still the same eyes stared back at her, a memory of the past. "Kanosak...." She breaths out his name delicately, coming around to his front to face him fully, approaching slow, should shell-stock hold the man from the obvious trauma he had endured. "Whats become of you?" Last she had been told, by Nina no less, he had left the pack lands without note. Obviously something terrible had occurred to have him leave, as opposed to just abandoning his home out right.

<blockquote>It just so happened, that the wolf that stumbled across him was the only one at this new pack that he knew, and he wasn’t at all surprised it was she who approached him first. The lady before him had always been active, loyal and dutiful to her pack. It was good to see that she had finally achieved what she had worked so hard for. She deserved a pack of her own.

Ears flicked back instinctively as he rose to stand in her presence, head dipped low and tail equally so. He was but a loner standing before a queen, and he would show no disrespect, particularly to one who had been so kind to him in the past. His name on her lips held an almost dream-like quality for the golden wolf. It had been so long since he had heard it uttered from another’s mouth, and one of his tattered ears momentarily flicked forward to relish in the sound of it. Yes, he was Kanosak… wasn’t he? <b>“Lady Elettra.”</b> He responded quietly, his head dipping lower in the process. She remembered him. It was a start…

Her next question was a little harder to stomach. What <i>had</i> become of him? He was still trying to figure that out himself. One minute he was searching for Wille, Rebecca, Rolu… Kinis, and all the other wolves who had vanished from the Creek, the next he was hunting down his sister, to see if the stories were true… and then that scent… The scent of <i>his</i> family <i>tainted</i> by hers… It sent him <i>wild.</i> His eyes stayed trained on the paws of the queen before him, as he drew in steadying breaths. He would not lie to the lady before him, but he wasn’t entirely sure himself. He wasn’t proud of the wolf he had become. The golden boy had fallen. Hard.

<b>“I was searching, for the lost ones… but I got…”</b> <i>distracted</i> was the word he was looking for, but there was so much more to it than that. His head had lifted a little more as he tried to find the words to simply <i>explain</i>. <b>“I found a trail, it led up the mountain. My sister… I wasn’t… Me. We fought, I lost.”</b> His head dipped even lower with his last word. There was little justification for what he had done to provoke her. He had lost his mind certainly but even he felt sick to his stomach at the thought of what <i>may</i> have happened if he hadn’t been caught. <b> “There was a landslide… not that I was in any state to be scaling mountains…”</b> his tone was bitter. He had done this to himself.

Deep down, he was sick to his stomach, finally admitting to himself that <i>he</i> was in the wrong, and just as bad as all those who deserted the pack before. He didn’t deserve a second chance, and it would serve him right if she chased him from her lands with a few new scars on his pelt. <b>“I can’t hunt as well as I once could.”</b> he confessed with a little more passion in his voice than before. <b>“And I fucked up. Big time.”</b> admitting that, hurt the most of all of this. <b> “But I’m not afraid to fight, it’s not like I can do much worse than this…”</b> he added with a bitter twisted grin. It was a scary sight to say the least. He was happy to relegate himself to border patrol once again. It was the one thing he was good at.

His fate was hers to decide.</blockquote>

i'm going to make this vague since it hasnt happened yet and not ask about CRC and why he wont return there.

She was certain of this now, that this torn, battered and seemingly dying wolf was Kanosak, by the way in which he had addressed her. Certainly, the title 'Lady' had stuck with her for quite some time now, whether it be because others knew her to truly be of royal birthing or simply because the way she held herself, though none the less, he had been one of the first to offer her this nickname and so, she remembered it of him.
She listened to him as he began to explain, as the former Second of the pack went in search for the missing members whom had abandoned him. Instinctively, she did not like what she heard and her body tensed to it. Kanosak had gone off in search for the missing members of the pack and n turn abandoned the pack himself. Had he scent word and knowledge of his plans with approval of his leaders, this would have been okay, but from what she heard from Nina, it seemed as though the pack did not know where Kanosak had disappeared to. This brought a bitter memory to boil on Elettra's tongue, a memory of Borden as he had done the same himself. Apparently he had lost himself somehow and fought his sister in the aftermath, only to be taken down not only by her, but a landslide as well?
Elettra would be left to eye him critically, sizing up the situation. He began explaining himself, his abilities lost but abilities in which he still had. His limp had been obvious and he would be the second wolf to come to her stating his weak side for the hunt. There was no other reason for the loner to be at her boarders but to be accepted, to have a second chance. Elettra was accustom to offering second chances- a next start, a new home and a new reason to live within the home of Willow Ridge. She took those whom ether moved on or failed and turned them into greatness.
"I won't ask about what you and your sister fought about, for in time, I expect you to tell me on your own. After all, if what your saying is true, it is that battle and the natural disaster after that which kept you from going home, and I'd like to know it was for good reason. What is her name?" She does though ask this, curious due to the fact that there was a pack without the mountains which she knew little of. If she was going to bring in Kanosak, she wanted to know whom she would have to keep an eye out for in the long run should Kanosak's demons come banging at Willow Ridge's door. "Without telling your leaders your plans of travel and where you planned on heading, you abandoned them just as those you were searching for...." She pauses, allowing him to soak this in, stringing his already open wounds with her words so he knows the wrong before his face, even if he knew it already. She had met him before however, knew his capabilities as a Second and a healer and knew his dedication to his pack when it was there. It was these things which kept her from chasing him off her land now, but his line was thin one. "How can you prove to me certain that this will not happen to me? To us?" She speaks, as her silvery attention scans the Willows around her before landing on the scarred honey male once more.

<blockquote> Her words stung like salt on open wounds, no matter how many times he had told himself the same thing, the words sounded different from the mouth of another. It was confirmation. He didn’t deserve a pack. Instinctively, he sunk lower. He didn’t realise what was going on until he felt the earth beneath his back, his stomach and throat exposed. If he didn’t have a family to protect, then he didn’t have a reason to live... but he needed a way to prove it to the wolf before him.

“H-her name is Naira. The last time I scented her was on the other side of the mountain... She got locked out too...” he didn’t know if it would make any difference to add her rank, as surely she no longer held it. Her pack would think she had forsaken them just as his own had, and yet he added “She was the female lead... Up on the mountain...” His heart sunk with the shame of it. He didn’t know who his parents would be more disappointed in, for in the end they had both abandoned their families, although it would seem she had done it for better reasons than he.

But to prove. How to prove? He knew he could prove through his actions, if she chose to let him stay, but otherwise, he was not sure. “Without a family, I have no reason to live.” he confessed quietly. “I could prove through my actions, given a chance, but that would mean you having to risk the same happening to yourself. I could understand that being unappealing... Would you set me a task to complete? Or would my word be sufficient?” He knew in his heart that words held little meaning, for though he would lay his own life down to keep it, he had seen first hand how others had used them to deceive. Although his words rang true, it may not be enough, and he would happily be relegated to the lowest position until he earned her trust and the trust of the pack.</blockquote>

And just like that, he fell. Fell before the salty toes of Elettra Archer, rolling on his back in both submission and perhaps, pleading... Her softened pitch ears fold back against her skull, her tail arching in the air at rigid angles towards his display of complete exposure to her. Through the pale, wild nature of her gaze, she remains still, neutral as he speaks on. It was a woman known as Naira, the former leader of the Poison pack along the tops of the mountains, hidden around the Lake. She knew only this of the pack and little to anything more, savor having scented a few wolves of the pack as well as meeting one formerly quite a time ago. If she had gone as well, whom knows what had happened to her and if she would ever return. It was perhaps a problem that Elettra would overcome later, should the time come.
"When I had met you...." She speaks, her attention still places down upon the man laid upon his back before her. "...you showed loyalty, passion and obedience to your pack. You were a prettier man..." She pauses with an upturning of her lip to a half smirk. "...but still the same man as you are now, none the less. I'll take your word and grant you acceptance into my pack, but it will be your action and dedication you showed formerly which will gain you my own, and my pack's, trust."

happy to wrap it up here if you are?

<blockquote> At her words on his appearance, a smile crossed his upside down face, possibly the first genuine smile in a very, very long time. His tail twitched in the beginnings of a wag, even as the twisted roots of a willow dug into his ill-protected spine. He listened, so closely to her next words, and the relief he felt was indescribable. He rolled to his stomach, posture still held so very low, ears pinned back as he moved forward to bump his nose against his leaders jaw in respect. He could not still his tail, nor contain his pleasure at the unexpected turn of events.

His resolve was set. He would not let her down. He would <i>never</i> give her the opportunity to regret this decision.</blockquote>