><Alone By Choice>< (Breeze)

[Haniyya]

When Haniyya’s family made it clear her presence on their land no longer pleased them, she submitted to their will and left, although she walked into the gaping maw of winter (well, actually the gaping maw of late autumn – but that didn’t have the same ring). When she stood on the boundary they told her that she should wait until spring, but she’d heard enough of their grumbling about the prey she caught, and their ‘right’ to it, that she knew such protestations were nothing but last-minute regrets. That sort of compunction did not last as long as a broken-winged bird in the company of stoats, so she paid them no heed and went on her way. She knew she would survive – hadn’t she been accompanying the pack on hunts for a full turn of the seasons?

Time did not pass so quickly when she had nothing to do but hunt and walk – not when she had once been used to the company of her siblings; however much she resented their hungry mouths – the way their multitude made it a constant threat that food would run low, and how their parents’ flanks grew thin – they had always been entertaining. All the same, she would not dip into puppyish games such as chasing her own tail. She felt the urgency of preserving energy – what if she collapsed, panting, after a bout of play, only then to have prey wander across her path? It would be a stupid way to end up with an empty belly, and Haniyya detested the sensation of hunger.

Which explained why she put such intent focus on prey when she found it, particularly now that the life of a loner had proved harsher than she’d expected. Haniyya could smell the rabbit’s blood, a faint trail through the undergrowth, and she had no intention of letting easy prey slip through her jaws. She could also smell the territorial marks of a wolf pack, too near for comfort, the scents pungent and indicating health as well as decent numbers. She curled her lips back in something between frustration and fear, but continued to track the rabbit, her tail hung low between her haunches in preemptive submission and senses alert for the actual boundary lines.

When the rancid smell of fox crossed paths with her perspective prey, Haniyya sniffed at it vigorously and wondered if she might have just come across dessert to add to her main course. A more experienced wolf would have expected what she came upon not far from that place: the damp fallen leaves disturbed, twigs snapped, and blood making viscous mud beneath the place where the rabbit’s spine and ravaged head lay like a gruesome trophy. She stared at it for a long moment, ears cocked forward and eyes wide in comic surprise. Then she paced forward, a frustrated whine high in her throat as she nosed at the bones and then at the ground around them.

She could smell nothing but abundant signs of a good meal now gone to the gullet of a fox, the area too mussed by the struggle between predator and prey for her to determine in which direction the canine had gone. She might have found its trail again had she worked her way around the kill site in a circle, but the fox was not such an attractive mark as the rabbit had been, and she feared she had come far too close to the pack territory in her hunt, as it was – what if the fox cohabitated with them in hopes of stealing caches and bits of kills? Frustration bubbled in her gut like too much acid; the wolf lashed out at the rabbit’s remains, the crunching bone and strange taste of spinal cord lending a bit of relief.

Not as much as a meal would have, of course; the thought made her drop the mangled bits of mammal in her mouth, the better to heave a sigh. Resigned to continuing her aimless wanderings without a full stomach, she sniffed at the air in an attempt to determine which direction she need go to avoid meeting another of her own kind.

[Breeze]

Cherry considered it was time to go -- her mother had returned to the den safe, and her father was confronting the other strangers. Perhaps her mother did not want her to leave -- some silliness about the ferocious male still being around, or something -- but Cherry could stay penned up no more than the rest of her siblings, and so she went.

Every day was a challenge -- but it was a challenge she was determined to win. She figured she had succeeded in this one. She had been a good daughter and stayed inside, and then her mother had lavished her with praise and comments about how naughty Nathaniel and Zeng were, how she and Horris were the only good wolves in the whole pack -- it let Cherry's ego swell, and her hopes that perhaps someday she would pass this test and be able to leave.

Then she had ignored her mother's whining and left. She was a favorite. She could go if she wanted, and so did. Away from her worrying mother, away from the crazy Zeng -- Vang said she was nuts -- and towards the unknown. She was young yet -- barely a year old, not old enough to leave the pack persay -- and yet she secretly hoped some wolf would appear and take her away.

Thus the female's ears perked and a smile crossed her maw when she scented a strange wolf just beyond their borders, seconds away from trespassing. If mother scented her, she would drive her off like she was a ferocious male -- that Cherry knew. Should she howl to let her parents know she would take care of it? The stranger smelled barely older than she, and barely younger than her own mother, for that matter. What would her mother possibly do that Cherry wasn't already able to do?

Yet a howl may drive off this stranger, and so Cherry chose to be silent. No need to inform her mother of an intruder and drive her off. No, Cherry would approach stealthily -- it just so happened that the wind was on her side, after all. Thus, the female got quite close -- close enough to spot the female's dark fur among the foliage. It was at that point that Cherry stopped, tongue lolling, ears perked.

"You're almost trespassing, you know."

Her words carried easily toward the other female, or so she hoped, but there was no threat in them. Rather, Cherry sounded amused by the female's stumbling -- after all, she could smell that Haniyya had not been the one to kill and eat that rabbit. Already, Cherry considered herself above this female -- she could track fairly well, if she stumbled during her hunts.

"I'm Cherry. Who are you?"

She stated her "name" jokingly, as her siblings didn't consider it a real name and so she didn't either. She figured she would get her true name eventually, when she had proven herself.

[Stan]

((Finally, right? Present tense because I was a paragraph in before it struck me that I was writing wrong >.>))

Haniyya can taste teasing hints of blood and bone in her mouth, and her stomach makes noises like an opossum she once caught just by the hind legs, so that it clung to a tree with its forelimbs and sniveled while she gagged on its tail. Ugh. As if she needs to be reminded of other unsuccessful hunting adventures; the thought makes her nose wrinkle and ears flick back, mind turned away from current business. She might have heard the other wolf’s approach, if not for that introspective focus – as it is, the wind might as well have blown away the sound of the wolf’s steps as well as her scent, for all Haniyya is aware of them.

Her inattention makes for a spectacular startle when the pack-wolf speaks, a grand bristle of red-black fur and a flash of teeth and scarlet tongue. A defensive grimace twists Haniyya’s face, her crouched legs bend at odd angles, and her mind whimpers Don’t hurt me because her pride is too much to voice the thought. Being small and young means that the presence of a pack-wolf prompts such a reaction before tone of voice can be processed, means that when the wind shifts and Haniyya can smell the mixed scent of other wolves on the stranger’s fur, all she wants to do is slink away.

Around the time her tail touches her belly, the other wolf’s tone communicates to Haniyya’s mind, and she catches sight of the lolling tongue and doggish grin on the other female’s face. A spike of indignation jams into her heart – she thinks, I might be a threat! – but she can tell that the other wolf, although younger, is larger. Besides which, with a pack ready to answer her distress, it’s a fight that would be over as soon as her family's paws could bring them to her aid. Resentful, with a swallowed growl thin sustenance for her hollow belly, Haniyya takes a step backwards.

And freezes, confounded, to be addressed, and with a note of laughter in the pack-wolf’s tone besides. As if the wolf’s name is a joke, which is strange – perhaps something bandied about among her family? Haniyya, never one to imagine another’s motive to be innocent, thinks that perhaps this is mockery of her status as a loner, and the fur on her back bristles in more than defensive submission. The idea of the insult stings, although she does not even want a pack. For a moment, she thinks that she will not answer – and, loathing herself, knows that she will, rather than tempt the stranger's anger and retribution. Voice grating and low, she replies merely, “Haniyya.”

[Breeze]

Cherry smirked at the reaction that her presence had on the other wolf. Her family tended to react with groans, rolled eyes, or gentle smiles. It was good to think that someone didn't think her existence to be one large joke, though she supposed using such a clumsy wolf to bring herself up was not in her best interests. Then the other wolf crouched, tail tucking and taking a step back. All talk and no action, then.

Then the wolf bristled at her reaction, and without thought Cherry's posture became more dominant -- tail high, body taller, instinctively puffing herself up to let this stranger know that she was a pack animal, and this was her land. Still, the wolf grinned at the loner's grumpy answer. What a sour animal. And she thought Nathaniel was bad!

"Oh, that tells me a lot."

The female came down from her high position, tail waving as she paused and sniffed in the loner's direction. She did not come too close, lest the hungry, grumpy wolf try to eat her for lunch, but she had no doubts that the closer proximity would make the female even more uncomfortable.

Cherry had no problem with that.

"Leave your pack, huh? Seems to working well for you. You should have at least waited until after being taught to hunt."

Cherry grinned again, tail waving at the jibe, and bounded back and away from the female. No doubt the grump would snap at her for the insult. It was no guesswork, though; Cherry could just smell the strange wolves on the female's coat, though they were almost gone now. It explained why she couldn't smell it at a distance.

It also explained her incompetence. Cherry's family drove her insane, but she knew better than to leave at the moment; she was still too young and clumsy to survive on her own. If she left now, she wouldn't be any better off than the wolf before her. That, she felt, gave her another point against this stranger. At least she didn't make rash decisions.

((If Haniyya left a long enough time ago to not faintly smell of pack, let me know and I'll fix it))

[Stan]

Haniyya tensed a little more at every new insult, but nonetheless she managed to reason herself out of an intemperate reaction; even Cherry’s response to her name drew no more than a twitch of the loner’s lips. Haniyya knew that she could not afford injuries, even if her ego urged her to take the price of the insults out of the she-wolf’s hide. Yet level-headedness did not so prevail that she could bring herself to properly submit and redirect her gaze to the forest floor when the other wolf came closer; eyes wide, fur all bristled, she crouched down and waited for the fight which seemed to her increasingly inevitable.

The jibe brought Haniyya straight-legged, mad-eyed and with fangs bared to the gums; yet she held herself back from a bite, and some sane part of her mind, futile gesture, kept her tail to her belly. “You—” she snarled something inarticulate, teeth and spittle, and saw Cherry’s wagging tail, the grin that stretched the other wolf’s mouth. Her gorge rose with the anger and embarrassment the sight prompted – almost above all other things, Haniyya detested being the victim of mirthful mockery. The red wolf stood still and shivered, good sense fighting fury.

Voice shaking as bad as her bones, she growled, “An ill-bred cur like you wouldn’t understand the need to be free from the stealing and lies of your pack. Or maybe they don’t care enough about a stupid thing like you to steal your kills.”

She felt, even as the words strained between her teeth, that the words said more about her than the one she wished to insult. Her ears pinned back at the thought, and with a wild glance at Cherry and the trees all around, she took a faltering step backwards. Instinct, like the iron teeth of a bear-trap around her ankle, forced her not to step forward, to take vengeance with her teeth as she could have if Cherry were a sibling and packmate, someone obligated not to kill her. The rift in her mind left Haniyya looking a mess: posture mixed up and face twisted, narrow chest swelling with her breath.

((... This is slightly more off-kilter than I originally intended the character to be, but it makes for good RP, right?))

[Breeze]

Cherry figured that maybe she should be more careful about teasing the wolf, but she couldn't resist. Her siblings didn't react so much to her teasing anymore; they were used to it, and knew it was better to just grunt or ignore her entirely. That wasn't a fun reaction, no, and it took too much effort and guessing to get a decent one. With this wolf, it was easy; she didn't even have to say much and the wolf started snarling and bristling.

Of course, she knew she was risking a fight. The wolf was pretty much not submitting at all, instead baring her teeth, and apparently was so angry that she couldn't even speak ((spit)). Cherry paused, tail wagging and tongue hanging from her mouth, one ear tilted back -- silently asking "Yes?" She kept on her guard, of course, noting the shivering, but she knew if the wolf attacked she could just call her pack. Or fight her off herself; the thin thing probably wouldn't be too much of a challenge.

Then, at the wolf's insult, she laughed, an honest laugh rather than one made to anger the stranger further. She wouldn't know? Lies were rampant in the pack. All of the puppies could tell that their parents didn't really like each other, and that Serra only liked Horris. And Zeng was always stealing her and Horris's food, then being chased by an irate Nathaniel when he was caught. Indeed, she didn't laugh because of how preposterous the suggestion was; she laughed because it was so true.

"Oh, trust me, I love spending time away from my psychotic siblings. Why do you think I'm talking with you?"

Cherry grinned, tail waving.

"But my time to leave hasn't come yet. When it does, I'll run away and not look back."

Her words were cryptic, as if she was betting on some otherworldly signal to let her know when she would finally be free of her family. However, combined with the grin and wagging tail, who knew whether she was being serious or joking around. At least she hadn't teased Haniyya much in that breath. She almost agreed with the female, after all; no doubt it would be nice to get away from the pack once and for all...