+7. I'll raise your table with another silly one! Also, I'm pretty sure they got back from the caravan expedition by this time..?

Wood. It was all the orange-eyed male could see as he lie in bed and stared up at the ceiling of his shack. For once, in a long time, it was quiet save for his breathing. The pups were not around, and he was glad for that. But it was something the coywolf would never tell, certainly not to Skye, like a child keeping hold of a precious secret. Sun streamed in through the window above him, caked with dust and grime. It was a filter to the real light from outside, where Bangle was supposed to be.

Thoughts weighed him down, though, as if holding him to the bed. There was not much he wanted to do that day, except enjoy the silence and lack of destruction brought on by the miniature versions of himself. Being a father was exhausting, but it sometimes had its rewards. At first it was all talk - of how glamorous the life would be. Bangle had been sold by the idea, ironically enough, but found he was more often disappointed; he felt tricked.

And not only tricked, but robbed. Life wasn't hard enough, he had lost one of his own to the wild... and Bangle only hoped 'Thaniel was as much of a gypsy as his father used to be. "Used to.." He muttered aloud into the dust and the dim light, before finding the strength to get out of bed, out of his funk, and out of the grimy, filtered light. The bat-eared male did not pack anything for travel, only brought the few things he needed when the craftsman decided to wander about his home.

Hopping off the front porch, and into daylight, he turned towards his tree, clutched its branches and ascended it. Bangle had hoped to work on a personal tree fort up in the large oak, as it rained leaves and made noise with the coywolf climbing within. Life got in the way, though, and it wasn't like it used to be. Finding his perch, which gave a natural window to the world around him, Bangle sat and leaned back against the bark, an itch finally scratched.

He saw many things in Thornbury, as expected. The tops of the buildings, some used and some not, the large painted caravan - back from the expedition and being looked over for damages, the horses that whinnied in their stables. But Bangle, too, saw a flash of blonde up ahead, and it was moving towards the more open part of the town. The craftsman blinked, removing his back from the tree and leaning forward for a better look, out of curiosity for the stranger. Sure enough, it was a white female with short hair, who seemed to walk about as if she were familiar with the place, light hair gleaming like a beacon in the sunlight.

"Oi there!" He belted, sure she could hear him even with the oak in the distance. He wasn't sure who she was, exactly, but it did not look like anyone he had seen before. The Guffawri male scrambled to get out of the tree, nearly jumping from its highest point, feeling his feet tingle as they landed and started in her direction. His bangles rang out like a song, his dreads moving which way and that. The closer he got, however, the more he could not believe what he saw before him. Orin had returned. He stopped mid-step, his foot dangling a few inches above the ground. "O-orin..?"

Without much thought, the coywolf strode towards her and got a closer look. It most definitely was the female, though she had changed her hair. Bangle gave a loud guffaw, stepping up to her and giving the woman an enormous hug, before jumping back. The day, just then, had become as bright as the woman's now golden hair. "Yer back! How--? When--? N' yer puppies..?!" Too many questions sputtered from the man's tongue, nearly leaving him breathless. The last he had ever heard from her, was that she ran with her remaining puppies after the huge incident in Cercatori, one that nearly tore the pack apart. But that hardly mattered now, as he looked at Orin with a large, goofy grin, the lighter part of his chest heaving for air, breathing through his teeth.

WC: 659. You know, I found it strange so I talked to Sunny, and she said Skye definitely would have told Bangle that Orin returned.. but let's say, for all purposes of this thread, that she just forgot or he wasn't paying attention XD.

He did not pay attention to how shocked the now-blonde woman seemed to look as the coywolf ran towards her, his decorations making so many different noises it was hard not to see him coming. The coywolf stopped just short of bowling into her, embracing her fiercely like a friend he hadn't seen in a long while. In the excitement, Orin was momentarily hoisted off the ground, and when he let go of her his golden eyes sparkled, where moments ago they were but dim lights in the darkness. "Well.. that's good.. I'd miss me, too!" He quirked, a grin stretching his face from ear to ear, feeling a moment of happiness for a returned companion amidst the trouble he had been faced with.

There had been many changes in the lives between the pair that stood in the open of Thornbury, among the ashes of the firepit that he had made for their recent celebration. Orin had changed physically, much unlike him, from the now straw-colored hair to the shapely figure that returned after her pregnancy. What they did share, though, was a common heartbreak, as well as emotional changes that, for now, were put aside. Bangle found himself panting from his exertion, shaking his head at her question. "She's been busy, a'course.. pro'bly forgot!" Or it could have been the other way around, as the male's mind drifted as often as he once did across the lands.

Frantic nodding came from the male, his tongue rolling out of his mouth as he heard about the two daughters of Orin's.. and Shaw's. He briefly wondered what they looked like, but they were at least healthy and safe. A part of the coywolf knew she would return home, but never again to live in the house where the tragedy occurred. His head consciously turned in the direction that was her former bookstore, and though it still stood it seemed like a dark, creepy, and haunted mansion. There were times Bangle thought he heard noises coming from the store, as it was across his own rickety wooden shack, but it may have also been the strange noises that infiltrated his own home.

There was a mention of Treetop Terrace, where Shaw lived and now so did the rest of his family, and Orin. He knew of the place, but had been to preoccupied with his own minions, and other things, to adventure through the bridge-swinging trees. "Leave it t' a carpenter like Shaw t' make a house out'a scraps, eh?" Bangle said as he examined the woman, who looked different and yet the same to him. He turned in the direction of her waving hand, and looked back at his large oak tree. He remembered when they met, and she climbed up with him in it, and they could see all of Thornbury from it. Bangle had also mentioned the likes of a tree-fort up there, mostly for himself, but since Shaw's disappearance and the trouble within Cercatori, it was left undone.

"'Fraid I haven't 'ad much time," he said, shaking his head as he turned to look back at her. "Things've been a lil'.. hectic, since Shaw left." Though the timing couldn't have been worse, even as things slowly began to settle down and return to their former state, Bangle thought about asking Shaw to build the tree fort up there, if only for his kids. But it had become the coywolf's place of quiet thinking, a peaceful place where no one could touch him, not even the world beneath. "Been thinkin' to check Treetop Terrace m'self, after th' things I've heard 'bout it. What better place t'build a tree fort fer th' lil' rascals, eh?" The coywolf then nodded over to his own tree, which he had decided then and there would be his own place of escape. "Yeh wanna see it fer yerself? Not much 'as changed, bu yeh can still see all of Thornbury from it."

+5. Pp permission allowed!

The moment that the girl with pink hair had left the painterly pack, things had changed. For her and for the better of the pack. It had seemed that Orin had not lost her sense of fun, or childish mirth that always pursued her even after she became a mother. The same could be said for the coywolf, though he felt a bit "tamed" due to his unruly pups, but had managed to hold it together all the same. It had delighted him to see Shaw and her again, and hopefully there would be no running away again, as he had almost done once.

Ears swiveled as he listened to her speak of Treetop Terrace.. and the more she spoke about it, the more he wanted to see it for himself. Briefly he thought of asking her to take him there, but to her it was 'home', where the pups and their father stayed. Surely she was here in Thornbury to get away from it all, and Bangle shook his head. He would ask that of her another day, or find it himself. He watched as she took initiative and began walking towards the tree that shaded his wooden shack, and he follows her, matching step for step.

Bangle beamed when Orin brightened up at the idea of a tree house - for all their pups, even. At first he had been thinking selfishly, but the idea for all of them was an even better notion. The toothy grin on his face stretched without much notice, widening even as Orin presented the idea of making pup-sitting a relaxing job. "A place t'play and watch 'em? Yer brilliant! Careful Orin, yer after my own 'eart," he japed, wagging a single finger at her. He watched as she looked up at the tree, and he followed her gaze. There were only a few things that hung among its branches - spare lanterns, long strings of beads, shrunken doo-dads, and who-whats-its that made noise when they collided with one another in the breeze.

Then he watched as she wanted to go up, and he nodded swiftly in agreement. The tree may not have been as tall as any in Treetop Terrace, from the sound of it, but it was still an escape from the world. And today Bangle was happy to share it with a dear friend. He rolled his eyes as she asked for a boost, knowing full well she'd be able to climb it herself. Still, Bangle stepped up behind her and cupped his hands under her foot, and boosted her up to the first lowest limb. "Thought yeh were a regular tree squirrel?" He teased, watched as she climbed higher. He followed suit, finding the sturdiest limb near the top which the coywolf favored.

From that vantage point, the oak leaves were more sparse, and some holes allowed to see all of Thornbury within its sights. Being this far from the earth was freeing to the coywolf; it suspended him, kept him still hanging to the world, but allowed him to dangle his feet in the air. "As good as any view, eh?" He nudged Orin with an elbow as he sat next to her, remembering the time they were up there, when they met. It was the only other time he had shared his tree with another. Even Skye hadn't yet ventured up there with him - but to the craftsman, it was his escape, even from her. As much as he hated to admit it, it was, but it never occurred to him to invite the red-headed woman up here as easily as he had asked of Orin.

WC: 669

When settled on the thick limb, the craftsman swung his legs back and forth as would a child when in such high a place. It thrilled Bangle to no end to be up and away from the world, and had half a mind to ask Shaw to build him and his family a hut up in the big treetops, too. He and Orin shared the same thought, if only briefly, and when she spoke about Skye the craftsman's legs stopped swinging. "What're yeh sayin'? Yeh look.. dif'rent!" He raised his hands up, palms open towards her, as if to dodge a blow that would be coming his way. "Not sayin' it's a bad thing, a'course," he nodded, looking her over. The only physical differences he saw in her was the loss of her protruding belly, and the normal color that now made her part of the crowd. Bangle had thought it was becoming of her, but now it was harder for him to single her out amongst others.

However, her observations were as sharp as ever, it seemed. Bangle looked out into the whole of Thornbury, as he had several times before. It was true that Skye had changed in the last few months, becoming physically and emotionally stronger. Not just because of what had happened to the pack that she now had to lead on her own, but what had happened to her son. She was strong, confident, and seemingly capable to take on so many things at once. He often saw her training with a knife in the woods, or patrolling in her four legged forms. Her remaining children saw her as a strong leader, but they were beginning to notice the absence.

After a few moments, he nodded to woman next to him. "Y' could say that.." The coywolf muttered, clearing his throat. "Hasn' really been th' same since, well, we lost.. our son." The last couple of words were a whisper, as if it were a bad omen to mention what the couple had lost. Bangle blinked, refusing to show weakness even towards a close friend, and attempted to shrug it off. "But who can blame her, y'know? Cercatori is in better shape now. N' she's very glad t'see you, Shaw, n' th' girls again though."

He tried not to focus on the bad things that had happened, shrugging again as he leaned to press his back against the large trunk to his right. What had happened happened, and Bangle had to focus his efforts here, at home, where he belonged. The wilds was no place for a young pup, so another search would surely prove useless. Folding his arms across his chest and looking back out in the open, he tried to picture what Treetop Terrace looked like from its highest vantage point. A smirk stretched his face when he thought of it. "Th' sea, eh?" The endless expanse of blue was intriguing to the male, and he mentally made note to head to the shores when he could. He often wondered what other worlds lay beyond its expanse, or if it stretched on until the edge of the world. It held mysteries, and possibilities, all of what Bangle wanted to know, taste, and someday see.

The craftsman was nearly startled when a sharp jab came from the women next to him, and his body jumped at the reaction. He uncrossed his arms and placed them to either side of him, gripping the wood beneath his fingers. For a moment he sat looking at her with a blank face, before the guise melted away into one of artificial grief. "'S'a handful! They're raucous terrors, loud n' destructive an'...." He paused, along for a bigger grin. "An' jus' like their father. No wonder meh own mother exiled me," he remarked jokingly, though the reasons of his leave were for another reason entirely than just his unruly behavior. "Gotta be harder t'be a mother, though," Bangle remarked to her, tilting his head to the side. "..Right?"