Spectral Woods I've been drained

I have no idea what I'm doing anymore xD I also apologize for the abysmal size of this offering.

When he said her name it sounded a little different than the way she had said it, the way the others said it all the time. But unlike Jessie, Sahalie merely shrugged it off. He didn't have to get it exactly right, given that half the time she introduced herself with a more shortened version of her name. It was close enough, and he just seemed to eager to be right. Her head bobbed enthusiastically, as her voice drawled in the pedantic tone characteristic of the adults she lived with, "Mhm! Ya got it!"

A realization hit her. The exchange was merely half finished. "But what's your name, mister?" Her head tipped to the side as his had, her ears stretched as far forward as she could manage. "And why doncha smell like me?" Triell's daughter lost all sense of elocution as her excitement waxed. Her speech was sloppier, more rural and lazy with the pronunciation of the voiceless consonants,  "You ain't from 'ere? Doncha wanna smell like more than jus yourself? It's called...a pack. Right?" Now that she was quite sure that he was a wolf like herself, it did seem weird that he did not carry the same earthen scent of oak trees and Spieden and Drestig and her Father about him. Her meager and haphazard education had taught her enough that she lived with a group of wolves that smelled a particular way as a means of identifying each other, as a means of sharing a bond. And she had been warned of lone wolves, singular creatures that wandered around without a family. Did that mean that this wolf had no bond? Her smile faltered a little with her uncertainty. 

 Needless to say it was interesting to watch the way that she responded to his pronunciation of her own name. It was not beyond him to realise that he'd gotten it wrong, unable to weave his tongue in the way that the rest of the world seemed, but the fact that she humoured him told him quite a bit. Whoever was raising her, whichever pack was housing her, had crafted a most kind and gentle soul. With pups it seemed to go one way or the other. They could be kind, or they could be cruel, knowing only what they learned from the world that surrounded them as they grew.

Answers returned with questions though, and it was almost his obligation to respond. "My name..." he started and spoke in slower tones so that she might stand a chance of actually wording it right "Ith then... dar... oh..." Adding to the obvious kindness was the typical curiosity, questions fired one after the other faster than he could have possibly answered them in a way that she might understand, and the mere notion brought a most amused chuckle, a sound that had not come from his lips in quite some time.

"A back, yeth!" A wave of his tail was not meant to taunt, but was inevitably doing so, and thus he forced himself to push up from the log so that he could turn, tip-toeing on the spot until he had swung around before sitting back and balancing where he'd laid, reducing any temptation for the girl to lash out and bite him again.

"I don' 'ave a back, dath's why I don' thmell wike one." Simple, and true. The best and probably only logical way to answer questions poised by a youngster. "Id'd be nith, bud I don' know where do find any backs." That, and it wasn't a pack for which he was looking, unless his father was a part of it, and he just couldn't see Romulus settling down in such a hurry...

if Zen is interested in joining otb you have....three options I guess? 1. We follow up this thread with a REALLY back dated thread of Zen going to otb to join. 2. You post an OOC join thread to otb. 3. zen leaves, goes his own way, and has a current thread where he joins otb. But yeah it's up to you xD let me know if you wanna do the first option though.

His way of forming sounds made it difficult for her to determine what his name should have been. Literally she felt that it should be exactly what he said: Thendaro. But then again, the way that he made sounds and the way that she made sounds were quite different. So it was possible that his name was something else, something that started with the equivalent sound for "th" that she made. But this was a puzzle simply too hard for the little girl, who chewed her lip as she considered the name. It would be easier just to pronounce it the same way he did. That made the most sense. "Thendaro." Her smile was shy.

Finally the man turned fully to face her, which involved getting up from his place on the log and doing a very graceful circle. Sahalie was not this graceful. Her correct venture was enough provocation to widen her smile. She liked being right about things. "You can come to mine if you want!" she exclaimed brightly, unconcerned with the details or difficulties that one might have doing a thing that on the surface sounded so simple. "It is quiet an relaxed and ...yeah!" There were not many other things she knew to say, not knowing what other packs might be like or what was particularly good about her own home. It was just her home.

"D'you wanna?"

I don't think that's back dating. I think that's time travel xDDD I have tentative plans lined up for Mr. Short-Stop so he'll be going on his own merry little way.

With the replication of his name rolling from the youngsters tongue... or close enough to it... he affirmed with a nod of his that she had got it right. Were he more invested he might have spent some time trying to clarify things, but as it were he doubted that anyone she told would know who he was, and anyone she told that met him in the future would understand in seconds why the potential names, if she even repeated it to anyone else, didn't quite match up.

The wider she smiled the more his mood seemed to pick up. It was nice for once, to be distracted from so many sorrows that lingered on his mind, by something as simple as the amusement of a child he had never met. The mood was short-lived, soured slightly by what sounded like a genuine, and rather flattering offer. To join a pack? It would have been his first, and although for a split second he would entertain the thought in the back of his mind his subconscious has his head shaking just a little bit before he'd even started to construct an answer or excuse.

"Id thounth gwate, bud I dan't." At least not now, while the wounds were still so fresh, the loss of what might have been his partner for life, and the increasingly glaring absence of his adoptive father. "I hab do find my fader, an I don' fink he'th in yow back." Then again... maybe he was wrong.

"He wawkth on free wegs... wike dis." With that he lifted his right hind leg from it's place on the log and balance himself precariously on just three feet, only for a moment, long enough to demonstrate. It was an easier, more recognisable trait than giving his name, which could have been mistaken given his issues with pronunciation.

"Did yo evew thee anyfing wike dat?" A turn of his head outlined his curiosity, watching the girl with wondrous green eyes. He was hopeful, of course, that she would surprise him with her answer, and yet at the same time, he knew his hope was merely a waste of energy.

The smile fled her dark features at the word "can't." Its absence was quickly overshadowed by a her childish pouty face. In the moments between his refusal and his explanation the girl's mind searched for thousands of excuses. Maybe he was still mad at her for biting his tail, maybe he didn't like her, maybe he thought her forest was creepy. Maybe he didn't want some place that was relaxed. But Sahalie liked him, and she had thought it would be nice to have someone closer to her age in the pack. And, secretly, Sahalie hoped that if she brought more wolves into the Bend that things might get more interesting. Her pack-mates would appreciate her doing some leg work.

But apparently Thendaro was looking for his father. The girl chewed her lip. That, she could understand. Her own father was gone and, had she not been told to stay put, she would have been in the same place as the stranger here. Her dark head nodded, but her pout remained. 

The loner was right, there was no one in her pack who walked the way he was now demonstrating. How funny, how strange, it was to see a wolf with four good legs behaving so strangely. The thought of another wolf walking around like that almost made her laugh. Instead, she shook her head soberly, reminded that this was yet another missing wolf in the world, "All the wolves where I live walk on four legs..."

"I can ask them if they've seen any wolf like that when I get back...cause.. I think I should be going now..." Her pack was sensitive to missing wolves, and the girl wanted no reason to cause them any alarm. "I promise I ask though."

Once more the young lady had proven that her soul was a pure as anything, seemingly distraught at the idea that he had other plans than following her back to her lands and joining in on her pack. In another time, he might have considered the option. Were he older, a little wiser and more willing to concede that he and his father were unlikely to ever reunite then the idea would have been given more than just a seconds thought. After all if they raised young in such good favour, perhaps he could find comfort at the bottom of their ranks.

Not surprisingly he was without luck in his hunt for a three-legged resident, and though his nose breathed a sigh of disappointment he turned his mouth into a smile to cancel out the noise and avert any blame that the pup might have felt being pinned on her for his frustration.

"Dath oh-day. I unerthdand." Another single nod of his head and she was cleared of any wrongdoing in an instant, his gaze shifting for a moment to survey his surroundings, just in case any of her family lingered nearby. He'd not scented anything, but one could never really be too sure, especially around young ones.

"Dankth fow dewwin me yow name." Clearly seeming pleased that he'd been able to get that much out of a total stranger in what was his first lone encounter with a pup as young as her. "An fow athkin."

Knowing full well that it wasn't so wise to linger when she'd return home with the hints of a strange scent clinging to her fur, his mind turned to think of where he would go next. So new to the area, unfamiliar on all counts to the territories and the terrain, he'd have to take a few minutes after she'd left to make up his mind.

"Good wuck, Thawie." Ah, there was definitely a part of him that hoped they'd cross paths again.

(This post was last modified: Nov 12, 2015, 06:37 AM by Zenjiro.)