So I'm assuming she washed up on shore mid-territory? Also, welcome back. :3
The dead of winter, as Jefferson had realized the year prior as he endured his way through his first amnesiac year, was definitely not the most favorable of times. Mentally, Jefferson was as sharp-witted as always; not even the seasons could yield the grumpy cyclops and his foul-mooded mischief. Physically, however, the poor beast had seen better days. In the summer, the arm in its sling on his chest could sense incoming rainfall even days before it might happen -- in the winter, it simply throbbed on and on from the cold's sting. There was no sensing involved, or if there was, he couldn't feel it over the pain. That said, it wasn't the winter that made him more irritable than usual, it was the pain in his gimpy arm that was cause by the winter. Clearly, there was a difference. Jefferson was not about to go blaming his mood swings on something as simple as changing seasons.
Naturally, though, his normal moodiness was doubled by the stress of the war outside his packlands. Sure, Phoenix Valley was not directly involved in it -- he had declared the pack a neutral party -- but Dahlia de Mai was run soleky by his troublemaking half-brother and the Valley had experienced several problems with Inferni. Compared to Crimson Dreams or Cour des Miracles, Phoenix Valley was more likely to end up involved somehow than the others, or so he believed. The cyclops relaxed somewhat knowing Ember and Dawali, along with all of AniWaya, was on their side no matter what. That peace of mind did not solve the problem of guarding the borders from intruders, especially during an outside war. The scent of a stranger, though it was irritably hard to detect, was enough to stand the furs on his neck. By the time Jefferson found their intruder, she was standing at the coast innocently while he was bristling with suspicion and anxiety and fighting an unending, biting pain in his arm. It wasn't the best of days, clearly.
"Who are you?" He snapped, but quickly tried to relax himself. She was drenched with ocean water, which he could only imagine as freezing considering the time of year. The coastline was hardly a place for attack from Inferni considering it was facing the opposite direction. The brute calmed himself quickly, breathed, and straightened. "Who are you?" he asked again. "What do you want here?"
