3/4/04
Two Eagles Bluff(#3332RJ)
To the northeast, the foothills climb upwards into the steep, snow-capped crags
and mountains. Here, the tall summer grasses bend in sporadic waves as
the wind dances on the bluff. The evergreens and aspens give way to an
open field that lends itself to a panoramic and picturesque view to the
south and east. A small stream wends its way unobtrusively through the
eastern edge of the mountain's crags, the scent and sound of trickling
water clear on the hesitant but almost incessant breeze. Wildflowers
litter the green of the grass, coloring them with touches of violet and
bright oranges, yellows and blues. Tucked in along the sloped wall of the
forested foothills to the northeast is a well-worn section of ground.
Dana eyes the big black bird with healthy respect, but no fear. She picks up
the drum and carries it over to a rock near the bag, drinking more water
but keeping half an eye on the bird.
Turtle remains where she is in the treeline, body crouching down to watch. the
bird's antics prick the wolf's ears up, and she looks like she wants to
dart out. for now, though, she stays put, sniffing but not moving.
Finds-Stories continues to make quite a bit of noise, but thats something that
Corvid's are known for.
Dana watches Finds-Stories for another 15-30 seconds, before putting her water
aside and picking up her drum again. Keeping her attention and her eyes
focused on the bird, she begins to drum again, something slow and
soothing. This time, the pattern doesn't change.
Currently in Saint Claire, it is partially cloudy. The temperature is 45
degrees Fahrenheit (7 degrees Celsius). The wind is currently coming in
from the southwest at 13 mph. The barometric pressure reading is 30.01
and rising, and the relative humidity is 68 percent. The dewpoint is 35
degrees Fahrenheit (1 degrees Celsius.)
Currently the moon is in the waxing Full Moon phase (89% full).
Finds-Stories stops making quite so much noise and straightens up, as much as a
raven can. This has the affect of makng her look a bit taller then she
really is, as she turns her head to watch Dana out of a single black eye.
Atcen arrives in silence, her approach out of Dana's view. The sticklike
fingers of her left hand are wrapped around a stick the width of a
baseball bat and the length of her arm. She stops, frowning, and watches,
holding herself quite still.
Turtle's watching the bird, perhaps with an idea of making it a dinner if she
can catch it. Atcen's arrival brings her head up further, even more
attentive. the wolf gets to her feet and abandons her makeshift hideout
to come down the slope towards the other Wendigo cub.
Dana continues playing, but seems unsurprised to Turtle's sudden arrival, mild
fear /now/ coming into her scent and expression at the Garou's approach.
She also tosses a look over her shoulder, unerringly finding Atcen in the
brush, and decides the two newcomers deserve more attention than the
raven, even for as big as it is. Her drumming falters briefly, before
resuming, but she's looking back and forth between Turtle and Atcen now.
Finds-Stories looks directly past Dana, to where Acten is standing. Nearly all
of the raven's feather's stand on end, making her look about twice as
large as she really is.
Atcen looks away from the strange woman and the raven and down toward Turtle.
The gaunt girl gives the wolf a faint smile, then looks back at Dana,
pale eyes narrowed suspiciously.
Turtle's expression tells Atcen she has no idea who the woman is, either, but
the bird looks like lunch. If she can catch it. Still, turtle refrains
from launching a hunt while the unfamiliar person still needs
investigating.
"It's okay," Dana says to Atcen and Trutle, putting her drum aside gently. "I'm
kin to Leonard."
Atcen's eyebrows rise. She looks down at Turtle, then back at Dana, and then,
slowly, starts walking toward the woman, the makeshift club still held
tightly in her left hand. "You... know Leonard?"
Turtle looks at Atcen, then at Dana, and follows the other cub forward. Perhaps
a little less cautious now, Turtle comes close enough to Dana to touch
her with her nose as she sniffs her.
Dana is wary enough with Turtle for a healthy respect, poised to react if the
wolf turns threatening, but some of her attention is on Atcen. "Yes," she
replies simply but definitively to Atcen.
Atcen stops a few feet away and looks Dana up and down, and her frown deepens a
little. "You do not _look_ Pure One..."
Turtle echoes the thought Atcen just gave, the wolf's expression showing
serious doubt that Dana's related to Leonard by blood. there's nothing
outwardly aggressive about her as she comes away from the drumming woman
and settles to the ground. Just curiosity.
Dana shrugs her shoulders gently, smiling faintly at Atcen's observation. "No,
I don't. I was adopted." Her fingers do a roll along the edge of the
drum, like raindrops.
"You know Leonard's _real_ name?" the gaunt girl with the blue eyes demands.
Turtle looks between Atcen and Dana, content to let the metis do the
questioning while she just listens.
"Brings-Buffalo is the only other name I know him by," Dana says, staccato
beats across the deeper middle of the drum imitating hoofbeats.
Turtle gets Atcen's attention by making a little noise in the back of her
throat. She tells the metis to ask what the /woman's/ name is.
Atcen relaxes slightly, holding the club less tensely. Looking down at Turtle,
she nods and asks Dana, "What is you... _your_ name?"
"Dana," the blonde woman answers. "Dana Valentine. Leonard gave me another
name, but I can never remember it," she says with a sheepish smile. "I
think it means 'healing' or something."
Finds-Stories emits a cackling caw, as she takes to the air and soars over the
trio's heads. "Wendigo, Wendigo, Wendigo," she states quite clearly, in
Leonard's voice. Followed shortly by, "Raven. Kin." In Leonard's voice,
then Dana's respectivly. Now that, was most certainly not normal and the
bird doesn't hang around, quickly disapearing into the distance. Maybe it
was a materialized spirit, or something.
Atcen blinks, head jerking up to stare at the raven until it disappears.
Yellowish teeth catch at her lower lip, biting down; the expression makes
her look young and confused, and it holds as she looks at Turtle and then
Dana.
Turtle doesn't look any less confused than Atcen. The wolf watches the bird,
wide-eyed and nervous. She's back on her feet, prancing around to see if
she can see where it went.
Dana frowns at the departing raven, her brow furrowing lightly in thought and
suspicion, but then she looks back to Atcen. "What's your names?" she
asks, knowing enough to include Turtle in on the look.
Atcen looks down at Turtle, then back at Dana. She shifts her weight a bit,
then holds the stick behind her back, both hands clasped around it. "I am
Atcen." She lifts her head, looking defiant, even proud. "Spirit of
Cannibals in Winter."
Turtle tests something, coming to sit in front of Dana. In the lupus way, she
says her own name, Slow-As-A-turtle. She doesn't expect the kin to
understand, but she waits to see if she does, nonetheless.
Dana smiles faintly, a Mona Lisa-smile, at Atcen, and gives her an encouraging
nod, but there's no trigger of recognition in Dana's expression at
Turtle's lupus introduction. She seems to be continuing to wait for that
name to be supplied.
Turtle considers shifting, looking from Dana to Atcen, a question in her eyes.
Should I shift? Is it safe?
"Her name is Turtle," Atcen supplies helpfully, then nods to the wolf. "If she
is kin, it is good."
"Hello, Turtle," Dana says softly to the wolf. "You don't have to shift if
you'd rather not, too. It's kind of cold out here, I know."
Turtle does anyway. She wears only a heavy shirt and pants--no shoes--but she
at least wants to say her own hellos. The transformation is more fluid
than it has been in the past--Atcen will notice. Practiced. "Or, you can
call me Holly," she says, when it's all done. "Hi."
Atcen smirks when Dana mentions the cold.
Dana's smile widens a ghost of a fraction. "Holly, then. Hi. Are you two new
here, or has it just been too long since I've been out here?"
Atcen shifts her weight from one bare foot to the other. "I am here since last
moon. Holly is here less."
Holly nods in agreement with Atcen. "Couple weeks, though I haven't seen
Leonard in a few days. You don't know where he is, do you?" she asks.
Dana shakes her head, blonde hair slithering across her shoulders. "No, I
don't, I've been busy with work, and other things." She frowns worriedly.
"Do you think there's a problem?"
Holly looks more disappointed than worried. Her answer comes in a simple shrug.
"I don't know, honestly. Maybe Jacinta will know."
Atcen frowns. "He... went." She shrugs, apparantly not knowing more than that,
and drops her stick. "At... ~moot~, he speaks to Shadow Lord for rank,"
she adds, dropping into a squat with one hand against the ground.
Dana purses her lips, but then turns faintly curious. "Jacinta?" she echoes in
question.
Atcen nods. "Jacinta is our teacher." She frowns, eyes narrowing thoughtfully.
"While Leonard is gone, she is elder, I think."
Holly pipes up, "She's been teaching me the Litany. And about our history." The
Wendigo cub nods each time she mentions something. After a long pause,
she asks, "So, how'd you get adopted?"
Dana frowns a little at Atcen's realization, the frown vanishing as she smiles
that same slight smile at Holly. "It's...a complicated story. Someone who
was close to the Wendigo was killed by a Children of Gaia. Leonard told
the Children of Gaia elder, Andrea, that if the Wendigo adopted me, then
he wouldn't go to war with them. So, I let him."
"Oh," Holly says in answer. It's one of those cheerful little sounds that
proves the speaker's both surprised and slightly confused by the news,
but is too polite to ask after the problem. She offers Dana a little
smile and then gets to her feet. "Do you stay out here, too, or are you
just here looking for Leonard right now?"
Atcen picks at an overlong, ragged toenail, listening. Her pale, pale blue eyes
never stray far from Dana's face.
Dana shakes her head. "Neither, really. I stay in the town near these woods,
called Kent Crossing. I just came up here to..." She hesitates over her
answer. "Get lost in the wild for a time, and to drum. And I was hoping I
might run into some Wendigo, since it's been a while since I've seen
anyone."
Atcen scoots closer to Dana as the woman talks, peering at her closely, more
like a curious animal than a teenage girl.
Holly looks faintly amused. glancing at Atcen, she gestures around the Bluff.
"Well, you managed it, in'it?" She decides to collect some more firewood
to help keep her homid self warm.
Dana looks between the two cubs, smile growing slowly. "I guess I did," she
agrees gently. "Are you both from Leonard's tribe?" she asks, beginning
to tap at the drum again, barely a background noise, using her fingertips.
Atcen sits back on her heels and returns Dana's smile with a broad grin,
showing lots of too-large, yellowish teeth. "Little Brother, yes.
Wendigo. I am a Galliard. Turtle is a Theurge."
Holly finishes gathering the wood. The embers from an earlier fire lie dormant.
The Wendigo settles down in her familiar seat to wake them. She begins
building a new fire around them. "Crescent moon, that's me. Though,
sometimes I wonder about it."
Dana looks briefly confused, but then some of the confusion clears up as she
looks from Atcen to Holly and back again. "Why do you wonder, Holly?" she
asks, the tempo becoming asynchronous, slightly unsettling.
Atcen tips her head to peer curiously at her fellow cub.
Holly takes her time with the fire-building. It becomes a small architectural
project, the theurge fiddling with the details of every little twig.
"There are no other crescents around here," she states, shrugging one
shoulder. "No one to teach me what that means."
"None?" Dana asks with surprise. "What about Luke? Or Jamethon or Aubrey?"
The names mean nothing to Holly--except for Luke. That one she recognizes only
because of the gathering. "Luke is dead," she states. There's no
cushioning the news. It's said bluntly, if at least softly.
Atcen wrinkles her nose. "They are Wyrmcomer. Leonard does not want any
Wyrmcomer teaching us." She looks at Holly, then back at Dana. "He makes
_her_ stay here, all time. I only get to leave because I am Metis and he
does not even _want_ me here. I only stay because White Bison make him
and Jacinta speak for me."
Dana blinks, then sorrows, some tears brightening her eyes, but it is the
empathic sorrow of someone known dying. She sniffs, wiping her eyes
quickly, as she looks at Atcen's explanation. She doesn't seem to have
any kind of negative reaction to the news that she is metis. "I
was...born, what the Wendigo call Wyrmcomer. But now I am Wendigo. Will
you wrinkle your nose at me?" she asks Atcen softly, then looks to Holly
to include her in the question.
Atcen blinks, frowning. "You are Wendigo, you are _Wendigo_. And I am not anger
at you, I am anger at Leonard."
Holly reaches out a hand to comfort Dana when it's clear the news has hit her
hard. The cub, having never known Luke, expresses the sympathy of the
unaffected--a quiet touch and a reassuring look.
Dana gives Holly a small, grateful smile, reaching out to cover the homid
girl's hand with her own lighter one. "Being a theurge," she says,
squeezing the hand gently, "means being in touch with the side of you
that is spirit. It means walking apart, even when you are surrounded by
people, because you are different. Even from the other Garou."
Holly's taken aback by that, blinking twice and looking into Dana's eyes as if
by staring intently she might pull even more understanding from the
words. "Different, how?" she asks.
Atcen's nose crinkles again, though in bemusement rather than anger or disgust.
She reaches under her bloodstained shirt and scratches her chest as she
listens.
Dana's full smile, when it happens, lights up her face and conveys the full
impact of her beauty. "Because you," she pauses to give the words weight,
"more than anyone else, will be the one to work with the spirits. They do
not think like you or I. They are alien. It's like trying to...well, like
if you were trying to talk to a dolphin or a whale. /You/ were born to be
able to do that, and they weren't. Someday, you will."
It's hard not to get drawn in when things are painted in such a way, and by one
as intrinsically appealing as Dana. Holly's eyes widen a bit further, her
own smile growing as the importance of such a role dawns on her. "When?"
she eventually asks in the brusque, impatient way of a teenager.
Atcen's lower lip pouts out. She reaches out a sticklike arm, grabs her 'club',
and then sprawls out on her stomach on the ground, her arms folded over
it.
Dana smiles again, straightening up from the unconscious lean she got herself
into while she was spinning out the picture, breaking some of the spell.
"When you're trained up, I suppose. That's probably for Jacinta," she
stumbles over the unfamiliar name, "to say."
Holly looks almost as sullen as Atcen, nodding mutely to what Dana says. She
tends the fire for a bit. "Everyone says that. I suppose we'll see. I'm
not sure I like what I've already seen."
"Uh?" says Atcen, eloquently. She lifts her head from her arms and peers at
Holly.
Dana lets Atcen's verbalization stand for her as well, settling on an
expressively puzzled look as she looks at Holly.
Holly looks between the two. "The place," she begins to explain. "Where spirits
live? I've been there once. It happened the night I changed. I don't
remember everything, but I remember /enough."
Atcen pouts. "I like ~the Umbra~," she says. "It's nice."
Dana's brow furrows fleetingly at Holly's explanation. "How...so?" she asks
slowly.
Holly doesn't seem too inclined to be exceedingly detailed. With a small shrug,
she concentrates more on the fire than her two listeners. "There were
'things'," she says. "Nasty things. Acten, do you remember I was hurt
when I arrived?" With the question, she looks at the metis cub for
affirmation. "They did it. Burned me. Leonard and the others got to me in
time, though."
Atcen nods, remembering, her brows drawing together as her frown deepens.
Shadows gather in Dana's expression, as she nods in understanding...but there's
a glimmer of agreement in there, too, that they might pick up if they're
perceptive enough. "It's things as they are now," she tells Holly
quietly. "But, never forget this: if we remain true, then the Wyrm can
never truly win. Even if we are only the mote of purity in the absolute
corruption, there is still hope that we can defeat all the ugliness."
Atcen abruptly grins. "Jacinta would like her," she tells Holly.
Holly has to agree with Atcen. And as it happens, holly likes her too--at least
it seems so the way the young theurge brightens when Dana speaks like
that.
Dana looks surprised at Atcen's sudden pronouncement, but smiles a little
nonetheless. "If Jacinta is acting elder, I suppose I should meet her
sometime soon." She pushes to her feet. "But not tonight. I need to be
returning home." She stuff the drum in her faded SCCU duffel bag. "It was
nice meeting both of you. I'll see you again, sometime?"
Atcen nods a little against her arms.
Holly looks disappointed at the kin's leaving. Her shoulders fall a bit, and
she scratches at a mosquito bite absently. "Soon, in'it?" she asks Dana,
a way of extending an invitation.
Dana graces Holly with another beatific smile. "Sure. Soon," she agrees. "Good
night, Holly. Good night, Atcen," she says to them both specifically, a
nod and a smile for each as well.
"Good night," echoes back the gaunt girl with the bad teeth and the too-pale
eyes.
Holly watches Dana go, listening to the fire crackle as the kin disappears.
"She's nice," the theurge comments, and leaves it at that.
Atcen rolls over onto her side, away from the fire, making a noise of agreement.
Holly, for Atcen's sake, doesn't feed the fire anymore, but she tends what's
left of the flames with her firestick. "Where did Leonard have to go for
this challenge? do you know?"
Dana heads back into the forest along the faint trail.
Dana has left.
Atcen makes an 'ick' face. "He has to talk to the ~totem~ of the _worst_ of
Wyrmcomers, the Shadow Lords. He has to get a story from Grandfather
Thunder."
Holly frowns, looking back to Atcen in order to meet the other cub's gaze and
be sure she heard right. "He has to /talk/ to... Thunder?"
Atcen nods. "And get a story. But it's not _Thunder_, it's Grandfather Thunder.
He is the spirit of the Shadow Lords. When the Wyrmcomers come, long ago,
the Shadow Lords were _very_ bad about taking our places and killing Pure
Ones."
Holly may be new to the garou nation, but Atcen's words call up memories just
as old from her human nation. The cub's eyes grow dark and sullen again.
Angry. "I'm aware," she says, simply.
Atcen grumbles. "Why he challenges a Wyrmcomer... Hrmph." She shrugs and rolls
back onto her belly, shifting into wolf form as she does so.
Holly does not look any more pleased than Atcen about it. Seeing the other cub
take the wolf, she follows suit, letting the fire die down completely.
I'm hungry, she states, then thinks of the bird again. What was that
thing?
Atcen runs a tongue over her lean chops. The raven? It was big, wasn't it? They
eat dead meat. Sometimes play with us.
Turtle gives Atcen a vaguely irritated flick of her ears as she pads towards
the woods. I know what a raven is, she tells the other cub. But never
seen one speak like a human.
Atcen huffs. Yes, very strange. But they hear things and copy them sometimes.
Turtle pauses in the descent down the back end of the bluff. Her ears cock and
turn thoughtfully as she regards Atcen. The wolf stops in her tracks to
look the metis over more thoroughly.
Atcen's ears perk up, but she doesn't rise to her feet just yet. What?
Turtle asks the other cub, How often have you been to see the spirits in the
place of power?
Atcen's left ear quirks sideways. Once, twice. Why?
Turtle takes a step toward Atcen, ears pressed forward. You remember how? The
wolf looks down toward the west, the direction of the caern.
Atcen lolls her tongue and gets up. Yes. It's not hard. You want to go?
Turtle looks eager. You think you can show me? she asks, already reading in the
cub's response that she can. Before Atcen can answer further, the theurge
cub is trotting back down the path. The trot turns into a lope, the
faster to get there.
Atcen barks once. Wait for me! She bounds after the Theurge.
Turtle heads back into the forest along the faint trail.
Turtle has left.
You head back into the forest along the faint trail.
(Travel to the caern snipped.)
Atcen nudges Turtle, shoulder-bumping her. We must go to the water. We need to
see ourselves.
Turtle follows to the pool, tongue lolling a little at the run they've just
finished. She dips her muzzle into the pool, drinking before thinking.
Her nose comes up, tongue licking her muzzle. Was it wrong? Her look
asks, to do that?
Atcen puzzles over that one for a moment, then huffs. I don't think it's wrong.
But to go to the spirit-place, you have to... look at your eyes and...
_past_ them.
Turtle cocks her head at Atcen in that classic canid way. Past them? she
echoes, then looks down at the water. The theurge settles to the ground
to watch, the water still rippling from her drinking. It slowly settles
back to a smooth, reflective surface. The cub finds her own image staring
back at her.
Atcen sits back on her haunches and watches. Yes. Not at them but in them. It's
hard to explain.
Turtle may understand, or she may not. The theurge seems to have no trouble
/trying/ though. She seems content to sit and stare at her other self
through the water. time passes, and then more passes. The metis Wendigo's
patience may wain. She may get bored, but Turtle seems to take on more
aspects of the totem that lends her her name. Her patience is unyielding.
Still nothing happens.
Atcen indeed gets bored and flops onto her side, yawning. Then she hrffs. Maybe
I'm explaining it wrong. Pierces the Ice Rhya will get you a
crescent-moon teacher now that Brings the Buffalo Home Rhya is gone.
Just as Atcen starts to speak, the theurge's body begins to ripple--like the
water did earlier when she disturbed it. Then, she vanishes.
Turtle's eyes stop on her reflection in the pool at the base of the waterfall.
Turtle gazes into the pool at the base of the waterfall, and suddenly she
vanishes.
Turtle has left.
You start to reach through the umbra.
Atcen's eyes stop on her reflection in the pool at the base of the waterfall.
The landscape shimmers in a myriad of colors, and you are through.
Atcen gazes into the pool at the base of the waterfall, and suddenly she
vanishes.
Umbra: Center of the Caern
A subtly spine-vibrating thrum of power issues once again from the once-dead
caern, pricking hairs and fur. Slowly but surely, the rejuvinating
actions of the Garou have slowly been transforming the recently
spiritually dead caern back into something befitting a caern. The caern
is once again alive with a variety of spirits, though spirits of war seem
a rarity now, and Wendigo spirits are never seen. The caern, visually,
falls just short of the wildest rural utopia imaginable. Only hints of
the previous pollution remain--slightly less than green grass, young
sapling trees where there ought to be mighty oaks and pines--and these
are things that, with time and care, should eventually replace what was
lost.
The air crackles with tingles of spiritual potency, though it's obvious to
Garou who'd witnessed the caern earlier that the caern just isn't quite
as powerful and potent as it was before the BSD invasion.
Atcen follows with alacrity and lets out an enthusiastic bark, tail waving. You
did it!
The metis cub finds Turtle crouched and wide-eyed. she seems utterly relieved
to see the other cub appear, and offers up a small whine of her own. I
did it? she asks, tail twitching faintly.
Atcen bounds over toward the Theurge and shoulder-bumps her, playfully rough.
You did it! You're here!
Turtle takes the bump and then leaps up to her feet. Pride starts to work in
the theurge, enthusiasm. I did it! she exclaims and then bounces over to
Atcen to roughly knock her back. The two wolves begin to play, at some
point in that play a lune darts in front of Turtle's nose. she chases
after it, unsure of what it is, exactly.
I think that is a moon-spirit, Atcen suggests. If it is, it will like to play,
but it won't be very smart.
Several more descend on Atcen's and Turtle's tails, then begin to circle the
garou. In her exuberance, the theurge cub tries pouncing on one. It
escapes easily enough, though.
Atcen lolls her tongue and snaps playfully at those that get close to her, then
-- infected by Holly's mood -- spins around to try to catch the ones at
her tail.
Turtle watches Atcen chase the lunes, the spirits always an inch or so away
from the cub's antics. The theurge settles down enough to get her first
good look at the eerie place they're in now. Once the panoramic view is
taken in, the young crescent is once again a little unsure, overwhelmed.
She nonetheless gets to her feet and starts padding off after something
ineffably bright.
Atcen yelps and bounds after the Theurge. Careful! Don't go too far. It's
dangerous. White Bison Rhya always told me that. You can get _lost_.
Turtle pauses, looking back to where the other cub was. Even though she hadn't
gotten far, the center of the caern was already dimmer. Atcen seems to
come out of a small fog. Turtle looks around her, sniffing the charged
air. Her hackles are pricked, her eyes darting, but she heeds the other
cub's warning, although reluctantly.
Atcen sniffs Turtle and nips her ear lightly before leading her back into the
center. Pierces the Ice Rhya will find you a teacher. I know she will.
Turtle comments as she follows the other back. She has given permission for one
of the Wyrmcomers to teach. Brings Buffalo would not approve, but,
Pigeon-Feeder is to teach me.
Atcen blinks. The Bone Gnawer?
Turtle chuffs. Yes. The one others call Fat-Ripper.
Atcen's ears skew, clearly not certain about this, but then she huffs and flops
down onto her belly.
Turtle does not seem too certain either, though her expression shows she likes
Fat-Ripper, at least. She was nice, the Wendigo cub comments as she
watches one of the lunes land on Atcen's tail again.
Atcen's tail flicks, shooing the lune away. Crossing her forelegs, she rests
her head. I don't think she likes me. She got angry when I growled at the
Get cub.
Turtle's amusement shows in a brief loll of the tongue. She is protective of
her friends, I think. That is all. If the other one, the crazy one,
growled at me, what would you do? The theurge is teasing the galliard,
it's clear.
Atcen snorts. I would do again to him what I did before, Cliath or no Cliath.
Turtle's tongue lolls some more. she takes obvious pride in the affirmation of
the metis' friendship. I think you could, too, she says.
Atcen splays her ears. I would do it better, too. He does not run long anymore.
He can't. So it would be easier. I would jump and dodge and give him
small cuts to wear him down like a deer. Then knock him down and hold his
throat.
Turtle thinks that one is insane. He would not stop, even if you had his
throat. You would need to put him down. She seems certain of this, maybe
even a little afraid of him.
Atcen huffs. Then I would put him down. No one would fault me, if he didn't
submit when I had his throat.
Turtle gets up from her position and noses the other wolf, a gesture of
gratitude and friendship. With a sniff at the wind, she asks, If we
cannot explore, should we get back?
Atcen pushes to her feet, bumping her head against Turtle's. Yes, we should.
Maybe we should get you back to the Bluff, too.
Turtle looks fairly irritated at that. Yes, we should. Don't want to, but
should. She looks back at the water, ears quirking at the way it shimmers.
Atcen bumps Turtle again. Pierces the Ice will let you leave soon, I think.
Anyway. You get back the same way you came.
Turtle's ears twitch and she stares down into the water. It takes less time,
but not much. Atcen could easily get the idea that maybe they're stuck
here for a while. Or at least she is. then, like before, she ripples into
nonexistence.
By the Waterfall
The rugged walls of the canyon reach their highest at this point of the caern.
A small underground spring exits the rock face, some 20 feet up the 30
feet high cliff, spilling gently and playfully across angled rocks,
running down its face. The chilled, garden hose like flown contributes
tiny ripples upon its entrance to an otherwise placid, shallow pool of
water. A light mist rises up from this place, cooling any who loiter long.
The old growth forest surrounding the caern has been hewn down out to 150',
leaving only stumps as tombstones for the mighty trees that once
sheltered the caern. The ground has a light covering of grasses and weeds
and wildflowers and occasional sapling trees, but nothing larger than
that.
To the west, cool mist kicked up by the falls mingles with warmer steam from
geothermal sources; these mists swirl around the caern to the north. The
caern's center lies northwest of here. You can pick out what seems to be
a hazardous trail over rock and up the wall, to the side of the waterfall.
Atcen gives herself a brisk shake as she reaches back across the Gauntlet.
Defiant-Storm watches the two cubs emerge from the umbra, the motion attracting
the hispo's attention right away. The giant Get bitch reeks of blood and
lies favoring one side, not far from the pool. The appearance of the
Wendigo elicits a small growl.
Turtle nearly backs up into Atcen at the Get's rumble. She keeps her body close
to the ground and slinks around the wounded Hispo.
Atcen flattens her ears and then her body, her tail tucking under her
hindquarters. Talking about beating Joshua no matter that he outranks her
now is one thing. Facing down an experienced and pissy Fostern is quite
another. Still, she makes sure to put herself between her tribemate and
the scary Get.
Defiant-Storm watches both with unblinking, unwavering, and yes very angry
yellow eyes. she doesn't impede their escape in any way. In fact, once
they've gotten around her, she snaps her jaws--the garou equivalent of
'boo'.
Turtle lopes out of the caern, heading up toward the southern rim with a fairly
athletic leap.
Turtle starts along the trail up to the rim of the valley.
Turtle has left.
Atcen hesitates, then scuttles off after her tribemate.
You make your way along the trail, occasionally slipping, but eventually make
your way up to....
On the South Rim
A stream winds crookedly out of the dense, surrounding forest. It meanders,
making its way blindly and plummets off the sheer wall of the cliff, here
where the forest suddenly stops. The valley that cuts the land here is
roughly forty meters across, though it varies in places to as narrow as
thirty. The view across the crevice is impressive, though the view into
the crevice itself is obscured by mists below. The rush of water hitting
stone is a constant song, although its counterpart, the waterfall itself,
can't easily be viewed from here on the rim. Only a small foothold
betrays the trail leading down.
The forest surrounds this spot on all sides away from the crevice. Off to one
side, a small, narrow trail leads down into the crevice and the mists.
Contents:
Turtle
Obvious exits:
Forest Down the Trail
Turtle shakes herself out, glancing back down. she makes no comment about the
Get, but it's clear she doesn't like that one.
Atcen clearly agrees, though she says nothing. Let us get back fast. Race you?
Turtle glances back down once more, then her eyes light up. Go! she says,
cheating by taking off first.
Atcen yelps protest and charges off after the Theurge, as fast as her legs can
carry her.
Turtle heads out into the forest.
Turtle has left.
You head out into the forest.
(More travel snipped.)
You paged the room with 'Same here. But you cheated. You can win. :>'.
Turtle pages to the room: Na, you can win this time. I have a feeling come
summer I'm going to kick your ass at running across the bawn. :)
You paged the room with 'You're gonna kick my ass at lots of things. :) But I
need to get to bed soon. My brain's starting to shut down. :}'.
Turtle pages: Alright we'll leave it vague then. :) Maybe next time we can
argue over who won. Hehe. Maybe it was that close.
Long distance to Turtle: Atcen grins. Just like sisters!
From afar, Turtle nods!
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hazlogs
