Red Fern Forest But my hand's been broken one too many times

The woman spoke of the typically important adult things in life, almost causing Rye to scoff again, but she managed to keep it from escaping. There was more to life than simply staying fed and sheltered, and her bones themselves yearned for something more, something to keep the fire inside burning red hot with the desire for life.

"Yea, but it keeps you living instead of just surviving," she quipped back, a somewhat pleased look on her face. Rye would happily go hungry or shelter-less for a night, or even a few, if it meant she could satiate the urge for wildness within her.

The conversation was thrown back her way, but this time Rye was prepared, her body language brightening. "Gets me a free meal now and then, or little trinkets to keep myself occupied with." She licked her lips tauntingly, yellow eyes briefly darting down to the magpie for just a moment. She'd be dumb to instigate a scuffle for the bird, but Rye had never really claimed to be smart at any point in her life.

if rye attacks i understand LOL

And it was now she sneered, façade of peace and neutrality gone.

"Is that all you want? Trinkets? Bird wings and beaks for toys? Are you younger than you look maybe?"

She became ugly and unkind in that moment. A cruel mother instead of one that sought to teach with words. Andraste would be quick to bring down a hammer on the young woman if she dared to find fun here.

She was not a nanny come to teach and sit.

The wilds called to her with a fierce ravaging and she would be damned if she had to be sidetracked by a woman-child.

Ready, set, go! ;p

The other wolf's sneer had Rye reacting in turn, her own muzzle wrinkling to show yellowed teeth as her pleased demeanour shifted into one of defensiveness. Though she had started it, Rye was offended by the comments the other wolf made, talking to her as if she was a child. To her there was nothing wrong with trinkets and toys, and being looked down on for such simple pleasures had lit her extremely short fuse.

It would be only mere moments before the fuse ignited into an explosion.

"You think that you're better than me just 'cause you're older?" Her words were vindictive, hissed out from between clenched teeth, eyes narrowing and neck arching to angle her chin towards her chest.

She launched herself forward in one great big leap, ears flattening back against her skull and jaws opened wide. Rye wanted to grab the other woman by an ear or her scruff, anything near the face which she could hold onto and shake viciously to show she was not a child.

Yes, would have been the blunt answer if she did not have to respond with teeth.

The uncomfortable crook of her neck and shoulder now pierced by what she deemed baby teeth. Pointy and sharp but she was prepared in handling them.

Such as how she reached for the other woman's own shoulder, prepared to grabble the curve of the shoulderblade with her own teeth. Let the woman-child walk away with a scar that matched Andraste's own! She had not come to make friends or be gentle when challenge found her.

She had come to foreign lands to prove herself and this childish affair would be her first test it seemed.

This attack misses!

Her teeth made contact where shoulder met neck. A victorious snarl escaped her clenched jaws as she used her weight to try and gain leverage, wanting to do more than just blunt force trauma. Her neck and shoulder muscles were taut as she used them to shake the other woman. The thrill of the hunt was coursing through her veins.

Rye wasn't expecting a sharp sting to one of her shoulders in retaliation, letting go in surprise as she let out an ear piercing squeal. That hurt!

In a blind fury she snapped threateningly and audibly at the other woman's face while twisting around, wanting the jaws clamped down on her shoulder to be released.

She even cried like a child too!

Andraste welcomed this in whole, fuel to a fire so to speak. Her jaws released the shoulder she had once held onto and now searched for another mark. The blind, twisting and snapping of the young woman made it easier, it felt.

So she reached with brute force to clamp teeth over her muzzle. She did not imagine she could get a good hold on it for very long but even ripping the skin open over it would be enough for her.

After all, her only real goal above all was to make the other woman submit — or realize how horribly outmatched she was.

The ego on Andraste was not a thing to fool with.

This attack also misses!

The other woman struck like a viper, swiftly and with precision, encasing Rye's muzzle with teeth that dug painfully into the skin. She let out a shrill cry in response, almost painful even to her own ears which remained pulled back against her skull. But she refused to back down; she still had some fight left in her.

Rye lifted up a foreleg to try and sling it high over the other woman's back, not caring if she tore at the skin on her muzzle in the process. She wanted to gain the upper hand by being physically above her opponent, but given their similar size and weight it would not be easy.

Perhaps she had made a wrong decision, though it was far too late to back out now.

The cries continued and Andraste was sickeningly delighted by it all. Electricity in every nerve that fired at a million miles a minute.

There might have been concern over being toppled had they not been born with similar sizes. With a muzzle no longer in her mouth, it left her free to strike elsewhere. Especially now that the woman had practically opened herself up to an attack!

Andraste sought to land another blow. This time she aimed to slam her shoulder up into the woman's throat, surely to wind and crumple her! Unless the mountain of a child proved to be also as difficult to topple.

Had her opponent been smaller Rye's plan might have worked, but as such she wasn't used to having to reach quite so high and found herself standing unbalanced on her hind legs. The sudden shoulder into her throat was enough to topple her backwards, gurgling as she fell from the force of the blow.

She landed with a thud on her side, wheezing at the combination of air being forced from her lungs as well as the attack to her trachea. To say she was winded was putting it lightly.

Acting more like a coyote than a wolf, Rye stumbled back to her feet, angrier than she had felt in a long time. She had never been so humiliated before in her life, and had she taken even a second to think it through she would have seen that her best option was to just turn tail and run.

But she wanted to get back at the other woman.

With a strangled-sounding snarl Rye sprang forward, looking to grab at her opponents face, hoping to snag her teeth on an ear or a lip, anything to make her hurt.