Spectral Woods keep calm and let it snow

For @Sahalie and @Larkspur -- morning, patchy light snow, 40F/4C.

While no one could accuse Marina of ever being an early riser, the seal was starting to spend less time napping, and more time sticking her nose very much where she shouldn’t be (much to the dismay of many adults, most certainly). As she would tell anyone, she wasn’t a baby anymore – who needed that much sleep? Not the little Coho, certainly!

For that very reason, she was crawling out of the den the moment she peeled buttercup yellow eyes open. Breakfast was the first thing on her mind, but that may have to wait – for something small and white and very cold fell on the girl’s nose.

“Hey!” she whined, brows knitting together as she tried to get a look at her own snout. Eyes strained and crossed – but the mystery speck had already disappeared; where it vanished, another fell, and another still. Shaking her dark coat, the girl glanced upwards, only to realized that hundreds of these little, tiny things were falling through whatever leaves were left on the oak trees littered throughout her mother’s territory. The girl’s eyes grew wide as saucers and she yipped.

“Sahalie! Sahalie! HAL! HAL, COME QUICK, COME SEE! YOU GOTTA SEE! HAAAAAAAAL!!”

His day hadn't started out well, and the nasty gash on the tip of his nose was a clear indication of that. He licked at the small wound, which stung far worse than it looked. The man's head hung low as he walked away from a cache, which was now one rabbit down thanks to a deceptive mink. The loss was barely anything to write home to, but it was more about the blow to his ego than the stolen rabbit. It was still early, and though his mood was shot, he wasn't exactly tired enough to attempt to sleep for the rest of the day. He had a choice: try to be in a better mood, or be miserable for the rest of the day.

Lark went to work, sniffing out his usual spots. Rabbitholes, the hollows of fallen-down trees, bushes. But the man was persistent and patient, which was rewarded. A lone rabbit, fat and happily munching on some sort of root, sat just ahead of him. He froze, ears perking forward as he prepared to jump in for the kill and save his ego the day.

HAAAAAAAAL!!

It ran off, and with it any hope that the day would be good. He let go of the breath he had been holding in and stood to find the source of the annoyance: a small, dark pup. He knew of the pup, and even her name, but up until now had managed to avoid her. It wasn't so much that pups weren't his forte, he just... preferred to keep his distance. It was better that way, he thought.

Then he realized what the girl was going on about: it was snowing.

Lark walked to the excited pup, "It's just snow," he told her. "More a curse than a blessing."

(This post was last modified: Oct 01, 2016, 06:27 PM by Larkspur.)

Shallow water has trapped several fish in a small pond. Hunt Opportunity

derp

Sahalie had never been an early riser—ever. And now that each day was colder and colder than the last she found her eyes staying shut longer and longer each morning. She stayed snuggled up next to whatever warm body was with her, usually one of the puppies, no longer Alastor. She was so wrapped up in whatever dream she was having, lovely as it was, that she did not notice that Marina had slipped from her side some time ago. At first the sound of someone calling her name did not rouse her, though she heard it in her dream. "MMm?" she mumbled, but in the act of attempting to answer whoever the dream-caller had been she accidentally woke herself up. The shawl of sleep had dampened all the ruckus of the waking world, but now with her eyes slowly opening she heard the shouting loud and clear and nearly jumped through the ceiling of the den.

By the time she had hastily clawed her way out of the den and into the overcast day she realized that no one was in danger. Marina was just excited. Over what? Her dark knee rubbed against her eye, trying to itch away the last few fuzzies of sleep. Pricks of cold were landing on her nose. Confused, the girl cracked her other eye open.

Snow?

Already?

Last year the snows had come... Actually, the girl couldn't really remember when the very first snow had landed but this seemed much earlier. Sahalie could remember, however, how much wonder and exhilaration filled her as she had danced through the powder the first time as it fell endlessly. Tongue lolling out of her mouth, she yipped back at Marina, paws spanking the ground. Then suddenly Larkspur appeared. And with his ornery attitude he brought back all the memories that came with the snow: playing with Kyna and Nalda to make a form out of snow, sliding in the snow, slipping gracefully on the ice. But then there was also the den getting snowed in and the hard packed grown making her paws bleed as they interred Anna's broken body into the ground. She shivered.

"Snow is what happens when its supposed to rain but it's really really cold. All the rain gets so cold that it turns into flakes!" she chirped happily, trying to at least make a more neutral, educational statement about the snow. "It's awfully early in the season, so their probably won't be much, but in a few months the whole forest will be covered with these little flakes. Can you believe it?" Sahalie was sure if someone had warned her as a child that such a thing would happen that she wouldn't have believed it. To Lark, the girl turned and smiled, "Some wolves just don't like snow."

But she did. Of course she did.

@Larkspur -- That is the coolest pixel wtf.

The wolf she expected to arrive was, in fact, not the wolf that appeared. The young girl glanced up, about to bounce over to her sister – but the voice was decidedly male. This guy was a guy, and he was bigger than Hal was, and he was old. Marina’s ears flipped backwards as her brows knitted together, golden eyes scrunching up as tipped her head to one side.

“Snow?” Just snow her tail! There was nothing just about this – it was amazing. Exciting! Why was this guy being so sour about it?

Thankfully, Sahalie arrived before she could open her big mouth back up and demand answers. This time, the pup did go lolloping over, big paws thumping as she wriggled up against her older sister. The wolf was greeted with kisses at the bottom of her chin, her tail thumping against the older girl’s side as she peered back up at the snow filtering from the treetops to rest in the understory.

“Cold rain? Wow,” she murmured softly, her buttercup eyes twinkling as she glanced from her sister’s face back to the little white flakes. Lark was given a skeptical look. “Grumpy gills,” she muttered under her breath, stepping back up to open her mouth and stick her tongue out. “Can ya eat it?” Better to ask forgiveness than permission, right?

Ahh thank u!!

@Sahalie appeared and the little one went to greet the girl with the enthusiasm of... well, of a pup, of course. She offered a much more educational explanation as to what snow was, which is when Lark found himself being thankful that it was snow instead of rain. He sat down, his head tilted up as he watched the white, frozen flakes fall from the sky. He licked the few that landed on his nose, ear twitching as they tickled them. He actually did like snow. There was something particularly beautiful about the first snowfall of the year.

"I heard that," he shot back at the pup, but she was already moving on. "You can. As long as it's not yellow." He, too, tried to think of his first time experiencing snow. But that had been years ago, and now he could barely remember if he thought it was amazing like Marina thought now. All he could really think of then was enjoying last year's snow with his pack, how they'd found sweet syrup in the snow under trees, how he'd shake trees and make great big heaps of it fall to the ground.

They should have been happy memories, but they just weren't anymore.

But Sahalie was right, it was early in the season for snow and would probably melt and be gone before the end of the day. This time of the year was the season for jumping into leaf piles and chewing on pumpkins. "But the trees will change before it really starts to snow, then they'll fall. In spring, they'll grow again."

(This post was last modified: Oct 02, 2016, 03:14 PM by Larkspur.)

@Marina

The girl's eyes glowed with warmth as she watched her younger sister wiggle up towards her, and she had to wonder if she had ever seen anything as cute as Marina. Sure, there was a spot in her heart for all the cubs and they were all very cute. But there was something different about Marina: something about her sweetness that wrapped around your heart and left Sahalie completely beholden to her open mind and easy smile. Sahalie wondered if she had been this cute at this age. It was hard to say. Perhaps, she figured, Marina would grow up to be the new darling of the pack, and this brought out a smile as she gazed down at the vibrating bundle of fluff full of amazement. "Mhm!" Sahalie chirped in response, later laughing at the name the child had chosen for the white man.

"I'm sure Larkspur would appreciate it if you called him by his real name, Mari," she gave the cub a playful shove with her nose. Her tone was probably not stern enough to be taken seriously, but she could at least try to impress some manners upon the unruly beasts. Sahalie was glad that the man chose to entertain the pair of them with his time, though, even going on to answer the little one's questions. 

Her paw lifted to bump the girl's chin towards the sky, so she could indicate the leaves as Lark had mentioned. Already the green was mostly gone from the branches, replaced with vibrant orange and yellows and the occasional deep red. Already small piles had begun to form here and there, blown about in the light breeze and often entering the den in the morning when the fog lifted a little. "Yep! Before there can be more snow we gotta lose all the leaves. 'Cause right now we're still in Autumn. And Autumn is great for—" suddenly, the girl stopped, a light bulb going off as she remembered something, "There are these giant berries, y'see, and they only come in Autumn. They're huge and orange and grow in bunches just south of here. I should take you and the others sometime." It had been so long since she visited Hidden Berry Hideout that time with Kyna. Her eyes swung, curious, towards Larkspur, wondering what wisdom or ire he would have to add to the conversation.

(This post was last modified: Oct 02, 2016, 11:34 PM by Sahalie.)

“…not yellow?”

For a moment, the girl wrinkled her nose as she dropped her gaze from the sky, studying Larkspur a bit more closely than she had before.  Why would the snow be yellow?  She had half a mind to ask, but--  Maybe not.  Was he pulling a joke on her?  Sounded like something Mako would do.  Perhaps she’d ask her sister in private later, where no one could laugh.

Fortunately, neither of the older wolves seemed to linger on the color of snow, nor the pup’s general desire to put everything in her mouth.  “Lark, huh?”  Her mouth twisted in a sideways slant – she might have had more to say about the pale wolf and his silly name, but Hal was directing her gaze towards the sky.  It was much more difficult to be grumpy when her sister was trying to teach her about the snow, and quite frankly – the child was more than eager to learn.  Her tail began to swish again as she glanced upwards, sticking her tongue out for another taste when Sahalie mentioned something about berries.  Mari’s stomach rumbled at the thought.

“Berries?”  Those sounded waaaaay better than snow.  (Which, she had found out rather quickly, didn’t taste like anything at all.)  “Can we go find some?  To eat?  Gotta be lots of kinds of autumn berries, right?  Right?”  She glanced between the two adults eagerly.  Snack time, it just had to be snack time!

(This post was last modified: Oct 04, 2016, 04:21 PM by Marina. Edit Reason: closing tags. )

Larkspur shot the girl a bit of a glare. Well, maybe not exactly a glare, but a look. He almost corrected her, but suddenly felt like he didn't have the energy to bother with it. With the two girls, he looked up. More cold snowflakes landed on his nose, which were quickly licked away. He absentmindedly listened to Sahalie go on about Autumn, but then she stopped mid-sentence and he gave her a puzzled look. He glanced around, unsure if she'd seen something, but then the girl went off on a tangent. His brows furrowed when @Sahalie went on about berries.


They were okay, he guessed, but to say he'd go out of his way to find berries when it was much more satisfying to pull down a deer would be silly. Marina seemed excited about going off to find berries, and looked between him and Sahalie with eager eyes.

Berries were easy, and certainly something new (or new-ish) and sweet would be a lot more entertaining than something delicious and bloody and dead (were berries even alive? Lark wasn't sure, he hadn't thought of it before). "If Sahalie knows where to find some..." he said, looking to the dark girl and successfully giving her the reins. No way in hell was he going to lead a berry-searching excursion.

Huzzah! Short, but done!!

hello it is i, your resident pile of steaming crap. I'm guessing we can just wrap this one up here? if ya'll wanna do a backdated continuation where they actually go to the pumpkins we can do that @Marina @Larkspur

Sahalie had to suppress a giggle at the little girl's innocence: asking about what made yellow snow so particular. Still, she smiled. Eventually, the yearling figured, once there was enough snow and the girl had to go to the bathroom she would put two and two together. But there was no real need for that sort of talk at the moment, and Sahalie, though she waxed pedantic at times, wanted to leave some mystery for her little sister to investigate on her own. She couldn't go around giving all the answers. Flicking a subtle wink in Marina's direction, her attention flipped back to Larkspur.

"Mmmm!" she bobbed her head, "There's a huge patch of them between the mountains and the Fen, where the ground starts to get drier. I haven't been there in ages, though." Tail wagging, she looked down at her little sister practically bouncing with excitement. "Do you want to round up the others so that they can come with us? Hidden Berry Hideout is more fun when you've got a lot of friends with you. I claimed it with that very idea in mind!" Though, proud as the girl was of her club-house of sorts, her plans to round up all the younglings on the eastern side of the mountain had never come to fruition at all. In fact, most of the cubs she had encountered at Marina's age she had never even seen again, save for Arion and Cernan. Her ears flopped.

"Well?" Her forelegs slapped the ground before her in a play bow.