On the hunt

Neela Garcia · 12-17-2011, 07:30 PM

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Word Count → 315

Neela moved along as quickly as she could, wishing that she hadn’t brought her guitar with her on this trip. She had been heading back up home from her trip into the Dampwoods when she had noticed a scent trail heading south out of the Ichikan borders. While she was still new to the clan Neela had enough experience with the members to recognise the clan scent, and was slowly gaining it herself, and that scent was not present in this trail.

Unfortunately her guitar prevented her from utilising her Lupus form so she was stuck in the awkward position of moving along on all fours in her Optime form, keeping her head as low to the ground as she could while keeping a decent rate of movement and not upsetting her balance.

The trail had led south into the dampwoods, though into a different section to that she had been frequenting the last few days. Despite several near misses involving a river and some annoying foxes Neela had managed to keep the scent trail, something that she was proud of as her hunting skills were generally nothing special.

Suddenly a snowflake landed on Neela's nose, causing the collie cross to let out a snort of surprise and look upwards to the clouds. While she normally enjoyed snow she wasn't particularly grateful for the problems it would bring following the trail. Deciding to follow a different tactic she held out her left arm, a few seconds later feeling the weight of Grynn as the Peregrine Falcon settled on the offered leather garment.

Neela turned to Grynn and gave a drawn out whistle followed by several clicking noises, speaking in low tongue in case anybody was listening. The falcon listened before nodding her ascent and taking off in the direction that the scent trail seemed to be taking, ready to call Neela if she found anything.

Swentzle Byström · 12-17-2011, 07:55 PM

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Swentzle Byström

Word Count :: 371

Swentzle was moving slowly, riding atop Hamza rather than walking beside him, with bags hanging from the bison's sides before and behind him. Hamza was calmer than he had been the past few days, probably due to the return of the old routine; the buffalo had not liked pulling the wagon, and Swentzle had decided he would train him more slowly next time--though he would keep up the training, as Antiman had paid dearly for that wagon and to not use it would be akin to spitting in his old friend's face. Hamza seemed to prefer bearing a rider, though, and Swentzle would remember that when the time came.

He had enough provisions with him to spend perhaps eight nights away from Ichika, though he hoped he wouldn't be away so long; Irinei still needed close attention, and Swentzle hesitated at leaving him even for this short trip. He'd left for a reason, though, and been reassured repeatedly that Irinei would be fine with only Fovea and Citlali for company. And Swentzle felt a desperate urge to make this journey back to Halifax; he wasn't quite sure what it was, but something was drawing him there. Perhaps in the daylight, things would make more sense, as he would be able to see clearly; and perhaps not. Either way, he had to know.

Something cold and wet landed on his nose, and he turned his eyes skyward, squinting up as the snow began to fall. Hamza bellowed beneath him, and Swentzle heaved a sigh before sliding nimbly from the bison's back, moving around to pat his neck and face and murmur encouraging words. Swentzle, and his companions, had grown up in an area where snow was rare, and so the site of it now--and perhaps the sense that there would be a lot more of it than they were used to--frightened Hamza to the point of refusing to go on. Swentzle led the frightened beast to a more covered area beneath the trees, and settled down to wait out the fit; perhaps Hamza would change his mind before the snow stopped. Perhaps not.

Either way, Swentzle had the feeling they wouldn't be going anywhere for a good, long while.

"You will find that life's a climb that takes a steady grip,
and when you're fingers ache remember you were born for this".

template by revo. <3

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Neela Garcia · 12-19-2011, 06:52 PM

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Grynn's opinions belong to Grynn and her alone >_>

Word Count → 545

[Grynn POV]

Powerful wings propelled Grynn easily through the air, the swirling snow providing only a small detterent for the swift falcon as she ducked and weaved, following the air currents as she flew along, eyes never leaving the ground as she sought her prey.

It was quickly found. Eyes designed to spot and target small birds in flight easily located the travelling shifter and its animal. Grynn let out a loud shriek to signal her success to Neela before she quickly changed direction, swooping down at a blinding speed towards the ground, expertly levelling out just below tree level despite having been moving fast enough to reduce her body to pulp had she hit something.

Gliding along an open section bordering the trees where Neela's prey was taking shelter Grynn let out a second screech, this one both a threat and an order for the pair of creatures down below to stay where they were. Still Neela didn’t think much would come of it; most shifters were very stupid and it often seemed that her shifter was the only one with enough intelligence to actually understand speech.

Her mission complete, Grynn flew back towards Neela.

[Neela POV]

Neela smiled and started moving forward as Neela's screech met her ears. A wolf and a pack animal, that was interesting and would also explain why the scent trail had been so odd. At least she hoped it was a pack animal; Grynn tended to lump four legged animals into three categories: those that she could hunt, those which were quick enough to hurt her and those that weren't, and as such she made little distinction between a horse and a bear, neither the falcon low speech or her own understanding made allowances for it.

As Neela quickly moved through the trees in the direction Grynn had indicated she heard a second screech echo throughout the forest, shortly followed by Grynn's familiar weight coming to rest on her shoulder. Neela spared a quick click of praise for the bird as she began to close in on the origin of the scent.

The animal standing besides the wolf wasn't anything that Neela recognised, but at least it wasn't a bear. Following your falcons directions to what you believed to be a horse, and ore importantly your first meal in a long time, and finding a bear was something that had left her wary of blinding trusting Grynn's opinions on ground animals. Even the brindle-furred wolf accompanying the strange animal was an interesting sight, covered in red dyed scars as he was.

"Hello there," Neela called out as she walked towards the two, her hands held loosely by her sides to show she wasn't a threat; as long as the stranger meant no threat to her new home she had no quarrel with them, "I caught your scent leaving Ichikan lands, who are you?" That didn't mean that Neela wasn't curious about exactly what the stranger had been doing inside Ichikan lands though, just not aggressively so. That being said her nonthreatening pose actually allowed her quick access to both of her knives if need be, while Neela had no wish for violence she was well aware that it would sometimes find those who did not wish for it.

Swentzle Byström · 12-21-2011, 04:50 PM

Crappy post, sorry. xD;
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Swentzle Byström

Word Count :: 276

Swentzle had only just managed to guide Hamza beneath the trees when a piercing shriek sounded above their heads. Hamza groaned, tossing his head uneasily. Swentzle moved to quiet him, and then peered up through the branches, squinting slightly to see. There was another cry, but before he could locate the source of the noise it was gone, and Swentzle was left blinking and shrugging it off. It was most probably a bird of some kind, spotting its dinner. He began unloading Hamza's back, taking off the bags that contained his supplies and laying them in a neat pile against a tree.

Swentzle had only just finished his self-assigned task when footsteps reached his ears, and he looked through the now-steadily falling snow to see a red dog, covered in snow and heading toward him. He blinked at her, rubbing at his eyes with the palm of his hand, but the snow was playing tricks on his already poor vision, and he ended up simply dropping his hands to his sides and closing his eyes to keep from straining them. Of course, this meant he couldn't really do anything, but after backing up until he rested firmly against Hamza's side, he felt safe enough.

The dog spoke, revealing herself to be female, and Swentzle performed an odd little half-bow as he processed her words. Greetings. My name is Swentzle, I recently joined Ichika--just a few days ago, in fact. He had yet to fully complete the joining process, he'd been in too much of a hurry to get out of the wild, but when he returned from this trip he'd fix that.

"You will find that life's a climb that takes a steady grip,
and when you're fingers ache remember you were born for this".

template by revo. <3

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