530 words.
####There was a war going on in the lands, but it did not concern Cour des Miracles, and Vigilante was bothered very much by the fact that Jacquez seemed to think that it did involve them. The shepherd-malamute mix simply was not willing to put his mate and her children in danger by allowing the pack to become a part of the war between the wolves of Dahlia de Mai and the coyotes of Inferni. It did not concern them in the least, and if Jacquez wanted to go fight with the coyotes, then he was perfectly within his right to do so, but Vigilante thought it a very foolish move. Whether the entire pack went out into the war or not, Jacquez’s involvement could put them all in danger. It was not as if he could stop something from happening, unfortunately, but the potential involvement meant that he did need to put in more effort when it came to border patrol, and he was very wary of leaving Ayita for too long. He certainly was not crowding her, but he did worry for her and her children, as he had promised never to let something happen to any of them. They meant too much to him for anything to possibly happen.
####Today, Vigilante was running along the borders by the coast, though he did not know if there would ever be a potential threat from the ocean. His four legs moved faster than two, so he found himself moving swiftly in that form during his patrol. If he were to find anyone, it would be easy to shift into his two-legged form if that was the form that they had chosen to take. For himself, he could use either form comfortably, though he did recall his surprise at finding out that many preferred their shifted form here. It felt like it had been so long since his arrival in this area, but in reality, it was only a little more than seven months, if even that. A lot had happened since he had joined, but he did not particularly feel like dwelling on the many things, a mix of good and bad occurrences that he preferred to tuck away to think about later. Instead, he allowed the brisk air to envelope his face as he ran, muscles stretching in ways that they had not been forced to move that way in so long. When he had renounced his profession, it seemed that his body had grown more relaxed. That needed to change.
####The girl’s scent reached him before she was visible, but his keen eyesight allowed him to see her quickly as he looked for the source of the foreign smell. As he approached her from behind, still a great distance behind her, Vigilante quickly shifted, his tall, lean form much larger than her own, and he noted that she seemed very young. “You’re awfully calm for someone who seems to be relaxing on pack territory,” he said calmly, curled tail held firmly behind him. It was different to hold a dominant posture in his two-legged form, but the stiffness of his tail remained the same in both forms.