Mountain of Dire Searching for the Spark

She was back.

And this time she wasn't going to try and join some stupid savages pack.

Got to find him.. that dumb wolf.. find....Marmota monax... find him.. got to find him.. him.. find.. got to...wolf.. Her thoughts circulated between finding the male who bit her and naming trees or animals that passed her by. Anne was slowly losing her sense of right and wrong. At first when Nina had told her that she should stay away from other wolves, Anne had agreed with her. Stay away from other wolves so that she didn't give whatever she had to the whole population.

However now she was not able to think correctly.

A need to bite something. To destroy whatever she was biting would sometimes take hold of her. At first Anne fought it. Then weeks went by, and she felt less and less need to fight the sensation. The need. Especially when other things began happening.

Once in a while that annoying tick would freeze her whole left side. Sometimes it would last seconds. Then there were times that she wouldn't be able to move correctly for minutes until her side would unlock itself. She worried more about this than the need to bite things.

Then there was a second problem that began happening. Her throat would almost close up when her body was stuck frozen for a short time. Then when her side would unlock her throat would stay tight for a number of hours after. It made it hard for her to drink and eat anything. This worried her even further. Though most of the time her thoughts were of humans and wolves both betraying her. Worry dripped away into hate for anyone who was able to live happily in this place called earth.

An hour passed and Anne finally huffed to a stop looking down at the world below. From there she might be able to see any wolves who dared approach her sickly scent. Find him.. that stupid wolf.. find..wolf.. bastard.. Her thoughts echoed as the need to bite took her. She gritted her teeth gnawing on her cheeks while pushing unknowingly herself closer to the pack that lived upon the mountains.

It was alarming how quickly the rivers and streams had swelled due to the rain they'd been experiencing. Not that Sagacity was a xeric creature, but this flooding was a sign of Spring- and she hadn't been expecting it to come to them so soon. Mid March or April, she thought, would have been more appropriate ties for this sort of thing, but she wasn't complaining. Spring would being warmth and an abundance of prey with it; fawns, calves, all sorts of weakling animals that could be hunted down more easily than the adults of their species. And for some inexplicable reason, Sagacity was feeling good.

That feeling left her as soon as she caught the scent of another wolf on the mountain. Not that lone wolves weren't allowed to climb the mountain, but it meant that they were coming closer to her pack lands, and they were to keep that location more or less a secret. Sagacity, whose roaming ways kept her outside the pack's boundaries more often than within them, would have smelled like nothing more than a lone wolf to most others, and this was how she preferred it; this was the proper disguise of a scout.

Sagacity's devil-may-care mood further dissipated when she caught the scent of disease on the female's tracks. Still, she followed, needing to see how ill the female was and if she was ill with the same disease the coyote had died from. She followed the female's tracks up the slope, fully aware of the fact that she was likely being watched- until she veered from the path of pawprints completely. She did not want to be pounced on from above, so she circled around in a wide arc and continued to climb up the slope at a faster pace, the nimble sterling female hoping she could bypass the ill female's altitude so as to put herself in a safer position.

She assumed she'd already been detected and approached with caution until she could see the wolf in question. Sagacity did not regret following her- the females path had been bringing her closer and closer to Nomad's Pass. Lifting her tail and pricking her ears she snarled, voice drifting across the distance between them. "Come no closer." She commanded, her yellow eyes glaring at the female whose stench of sickness made the hairs along the back of Sagacity's neck stand straight up. She wanted this bitch gone, even if it meant she had to push her off the side of the mountain.

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Her eyes stared at the rocks below. The gray forms motionless as they covered the mountain with their cold embrace. Like a thousand ghosts shadowing the plateau of light. Marring the plateau's beauty. The rocks marred the hidden grasses and flowers that would cover this mountain in Spring.

Anne had sworn she'd seen something moving among the boulders below her.

However now there was nothing there. Perhaps her mind was playing tricks on her. It had been doing just that for a few days now. Demons would appear out of noplace and scare the young woman out of her fur. Then they would melt back into shadow and disappear right in front of her once bright brown eyes.

Ignoring the feeling that she was being followed Anne continued to trudge up the mountain's face. Her breaths shook as she stared at the cold rocks in front of her. A twinge of pain seared through her back after she took a wrong step and fell forward. Then, the cream and russet wolf stood back up again and continued climbing. Terra was fully unaware of the female climbing around her to reach the top before she.

The sun broke through the clouds for a moment. Turning everything around her bright and golden. Terra's eyes couldn't take the brightness and she was forced to blink back tears as she climbed. Why was it everything on earth waned to hurt her? Even the sun's normally warm rays want to burn my eyes out fo their sockets. She growled quietly to herself while licking up one of those salty tears from her cheek.

It was then that she saw the silhouette.

Another cold gray form stood hidden among the rocks above her, casting a dark shadow over the russet and gray woman. Her eyes could see the wolf shadow, but she could not at first pin point the shadows source. As its source was the same color as the phantom boulders around it.

"Come out where I can see you!" She snarled pissed off at her blurred vision that threatened to blind her. She gritted her teeth as she stumbled forward again, then stood up and contiued forward ignoring the "Come no closer.." that the moving boulder barked. Wait... why is a boulder speaking to me? she snarled angrily paused and began scraping at the rocks beneath her claws trying to kill the ghosts within them.

"Boulders shouldn't be talking! Die boulder die! I'll find you and kill you! Cause your just a stupid rock!" Her mind didn't comprehend the wolf scent now wafting towards her from the gray stranger.

Yeh she's being a little dramatic in certain parts. XD

Insanity. It was as plain as day- then again, Sagacity was an incredibly judicial creature and wasn't perhaps the best to judge a wolf's sanity given that she considered most wolves to already have one foot out the door on the way to crazyland, but there was no mistaking it in this situation. She could see the female clearly, and her ears turned back when she was told to come out where she could be seen. So the female couldn't see well- Sagacity was aware that her pelt blended in with the slate of the boulders, but she was clearly a wolf, not a boulder- which boulders had four legs and fur? Let alone distinguishable features like a face and eyes? No, she couldn't see- her mind was clouded by disease. She was maddened; she had the white plague.

The accusations which followed confirmed Sagacity's suspicions. The female pawed the ground and challenged her, or, rather, the boulder the female thought she was. Sagacity's ears pinned- she didn't want this crazy creature anywhere near her packlands. So she thought she was a boulder? And she wanted a closer look? Sagacity could give her that.

"Fine," She said, taking a step back. "Here I come," She said, gritting out the last word as she thrust her sterling shoulder against the boulder nearest her and with smug satisfaction she sent it rolling down the slope toward the female below.

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Her eyes squinted confused as the voice came from a different direction this time. From Above.. She gazed upwards blinking away the clouds that were obstructing her vision. Only a second later the sound and sight of a boulder heading for her jogged her already tense muscles into movement. Anne yelped skittering sideways on the rocks to avoid the rolling stone. The large ghost of the mountain only just missing her as it rolled downwards splitting on larger boulders below her. Panting heavily Anne turned herself around looking at the falling beast snarling.

"Ha!! You missed!" She raised her head and tail triumphantly and turned to continue ambling up the mountain. A cloud still covered her one eye but Anne had managed to clear her left orb. She spotted the silver figure with that one good eye paused and blinked. Her face turned to a growl while her head lowered in suspicion of the wolf atop the ridge.

Quickly she rubbed her head and face on her legs trying to rid herself of the clouds that marred her vision. Eventually after a few minutes she succeeded turning her now clear brown gaze up to the silver wolf form. "You're no ghost.. nor are you a boulder.." She scoffed letting a snarl wrinkle her muzzle. This wasn't the wolf she was looking for.

"Just another savage.. Not the one.. the male.. the one I'm.. searching for.. him.." Her growl turned to a snarl and she tensed herself as the need to bite something drove through her skull. Leaning her head on her forelegs Anne gritted her teeth then opened her eyes looking at the she wolf through the slitted openings. Then without a word she started padding forward again. Just staring at the she wolf. The ghost..

Another stupid cloud rolled onto the front of her eye.

"Fucking bastard.." She stoped and swore while trying to rid herself of the obstruction. Tilting to one side on three of her four legs while she used the forth to wipe her eye clear. "So who are you anyway.." She barked to the female who still stood far above her.

So the boulder had been a miss- but it was becoming clear that the female wasn't having a good time trying to see. She continuously pawed at her face as though trying to rid her eyes of a speck of dust, which gave Sagacity another idea. Something that could work better. Had she not been so wary of the female's mouth she might have charged and attacked. No, she would have. Especially when the assailant continued to fling insults toward her. At least she could now see that Sagacity wasn't a boulder. That discovery probably would have amounted to what Sagacity saw as the biggest zakuska of the female's life. Such a genius- first being stupid enough to contract this illness and then being idiotic enough while possessed by it.

The wretched thing then mentioned a male and Sagacity assumed straight off the bat that she was referring to Rhysis. Her features became darker. Now this was an insult- that they were called savages. By any other wolf the term might have come as flattery- but by one who was as insane as this one it was barbaric.

She began to move forward and Sagacity held her ground- watching in relief as the female stopped to rub at her face again. A question was demanded, but Sagacity didn't feel like answering her questions. She did, however, need to remedy the situation- without provoking a fight. "You're ill," Sagacity spoke in a voice which came with a tone so soft it even surprised her. But she felt it was right; she didn't mean it as an insult, simply an observation- and was there a tinge of pity in it? Or perhaps rue? "I'm Sage," She said, carrying on with her new plan. "I'm a healer. Come no closer and I'll tell you how you can calm your ailments." Her voice was calm and sure, now that she'd had a good look at the young female who'd been a menace only moments ago. What had changed?

She'd asked for Sagacity's name. She wasn't so insane, then, that she couldn't recognize a wolf as a being. There was still a bit of a soul in her- not something that would have normally phased Sagacity one way or another, but where her life hung in the balance, not daring to provoke the female, she had needed another way to get around a fight.

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Rust and black ears swiveled in the womans direction tasting her voice as it reached them. Her voice was soft. Unlike all the others before. Spare for the two females she'd met so long ago..Then the woman spoke of being a healer. Like she knows some plant that would help that I haven't tried!? Hmphhh. Anne growled to herself again shaking her ruff and licking at a little drool that had leaked from the left side of her mouth.

"Oh yeah? Then what herbs would you suggest? I've tried many that can still be found in this frozen waste." Her words flowed normally for once, and though she had that need to bite edging her instint her mind was clearing again. Perhaps due to the sudden fright of the boulder. Even though she was ill Anne instinctually feared termination. That alone helped to clear her head for at least a short while.

The cream woman finished clearing her eye again and looked up at the silver she wolf. For a moment she stood unbalanced and staggered to the right. Then she found solid ground and stood watching the woman waiting for an answer. There was a chance she had missed a herb that she had no knowledge of, and however small that chance might be Anne would try it. Just to get the pain out of her throat, or to calm the urges that dragged her forward. Just to be able to eat or drink without her throat closing up.

This would take some quick thinking, but luckily, Sagacity already had an idea in mind. She had to get rid of the female who could become an intruder before too long. And if one of her packmates met her and attacked her without knowing she was ill- they could become ill as well. Conventional methods couldn't be used to get rid of her, so Sagacity would have to send her on her way without being bitten, or at least without having any of the female's saliva come in contact with her...But there was a way to dry her mouth so that might not happen.

"It's not an herb. Not technically." She said. She scratched at the ground with one paw, hoping the mountain might have what she was looking for. "Limestone." She said and looked up again. "It's softer than rock; if you can chew through bone, you can chew through limestone. It'll stop the frothing, ease the dizziness. Ah," She said, having pulled a thin segment of limestone from the snow and frozen ground with her claws. It was pale in comparison to the larger rocks and crumbled a but as it was pulled from the earth. Sagacity lowered her head and picked it up.

She walked a few paces toward the female and stopped, dropping the rock so it bounced and rolled toward her, sending up small puffs of white dust as a testament to its softness. "It won't cure you. But it'll delay the progression."

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She looked at the female suspiciously. How was eating a rock going to help her?

With a growl she sniffed the stone delicately. Of course it wouldn't smell like anything. Stones smelled like stones. Like earth. What. Was she hoping that the stone might smell like the pebble food from back home?

Just the thought of her old family brought a firey rage to the forfront of Anne's mind. A snarl appeared on her face and she kicked the stone away. Looking up at the silver she wolf Anne snarled low and deep. Asking her a single question.

"Where is the sick male wolf who bit me? Who.... this curse.. who..gave..me This ."She spat the last words out waiting for the female to point her in the direction the male had gone. Surely she had to know the sick male. He'd come from the mountains, asked about someone that he must have known living among the mountains. If she was from the mountain pack then this Sage wolf should know where he was.

Her tail twitched in annoyance followed by a number of twitches up her side that stifled the womans growl. Not now dammit..Not more shaking.. She closed her left eye while losing the feeling of her left side. Would it last seconds? Or would it last agonizing minutes.

You can point her away and she'll leave. Perhaps point her towards Poison Path instead?

Suspicion. For a moment, Sagacity thought that Anne had seen through her plan, which had been to make the female chew on the rock, get her mouth full of powder so it would dry up her saliva and thereby lower the risk of Sage getting infected should Anne bite her. Of course, it had been Sagacity's intention to headbutt the female in the ribs hard enough to send her falling over the mountain's edge, but now that the female was on guard and so tense that she was shaking- or at least, Sagacity assumed it was because of tension, not paralysis- there wouldn't be a chance of that.

But the sly female was quick to think up a new plan. When the female demanded where the male was who'd bitten her...It was a perfect opportunity for the Scout to send her on her way. "That way." She said, gesturing toward the area where Lost Lake lay hidden. "I heard a male who had the disease lives in a pack near the lake." She said. She growled. "They've been terrible to us. And You- look what that bastard did to you," She said, and lowered her voice. "Revenge." She seethed, and nodded once. That's right, fill the crazed female's head with the notion of revenge- that'd get rid of her- and possibly some competition too.

Table by Tyrant <3

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