The feel of unrest he'd held was slowly fading away with more time spent in the pack. At times that feeling of not belonging returned to him, making him restless, but going out and patrolling the borders, or hunting down some game, usually made that fade, confidant that he was working hard enough to ensure that the pack found him worthy of keeping around. Today he had decided to go out and explore the northern side of New Dawn. He'd never lived close to the ocean, and when he'd first arrived had gone about avoiding it until he understood what it was. The blank looks that occasionally settled on his face when viewing the vast endless water was more than enough to prove that he had no idea what to think of it.
Having discovered that the water was not good for drinking, Tharin moved along the edge of it, occasionally glancing up as waves crashed down. It was pretty early to be out here, the silvery light that came with predawn settling over everything. He found some kind of shelled creature, one he watched warily as it moved about in a strange manner. There seemed to be some kind of large claws coming from one side, snapping at the air as it moved. Deciding that it might taste good Tharin lunged, dodging the claws and crunching his teeth into the shell. It was hard to break, actually hurting his jaws before the creature broke. The taste was a lot like fish, and it was hard to get at. So it wasn't good to eat after all. Too difficult to get the meat.
Another was out on the beach today and for once did not wander the shores on four paws. The silver Alphess was keen on the beach and often came here to run at the edge of the waves and play in the water. She loved the way her paw prints were easily molded in the soft sand, and then disappeared slowly behind her as the water forced the sand to return to its smooth state. Yet today she had come to the shore not in her Lupus form but in her bipedal shape. The sea held so many wonders; wonders that were far more easy to inspect and explore with hands than with paws.
She knelt down and picked up a large conch shell as a white sea bird chortled and soared overhead, his path taking him to the waves. Breakfast was out there for the gulls. A whimsical smile crossed her pale muzzle; she wished she could dine with them, their tastes were exquisite.
Her smile disappeared when a sound interrupted her reverie, her ear twitching to confront the noise before turning her head and catching sight of the mottled wolf that she knew as Tharin. She cocked her head, wondering what he was doing… was he chewing on a rock? He’s positively gone mad! But as she took a few steps towards him she noticed a twitching leg coming from the rock, and quickly surmised that he had caught himself one of those sea dwellers.
“Careful, that thing can pinch your nose clean off,” she said as she pranced over to him and knelt down beside him. “And you’re going to chip a fang if you eat it like that.” She dropped the shell and held her hands up as though she wanted to help but didn’t really know what to do, not wanting to get a finger caught between a crab claw or Tharin’s teeth.
Tharin dropped the strange creature as a voice reached him. Titania! His tail swished lightly, lower than he normally held it, ears laid back gently. He turned to see the young alpha, expecting her to be moving towards him. The sight he beheld instead was a strange one. His alpha had been replaced by a two legger. She had the same coloration, and the same cheerful light step, but that was definitely not the wolf he'd been expecting. Sniffing the air Tharin quietly nodded to himself, hoping that the slight raising of his hackles had gone unnoticed, smoothed down rapidly with recognition. So she was a luperci as well. He wondered how many of the pack members were.
Titania gracefully dropped down, closer to his height now if still larger. It was a strange position for him, knowing that she should be smaller than he was. It made his mind buzz, trying to reconcile the two images into one that made sense. He glanced down to the broken creature, still without a clue of how to get to the meat. One leg still twitched slightly, but he was fairly certain it was dead now. I'm not too sure how to get at the meat. It's hard to eat, not very good. Tharin felt a bit foolish explaining this to her, knowing that she probably had a better idea about it than him, as he hadn't lived by the ocean before.
The note of surprise registered by her pack member went unnoticed by Titania, distracted as she was by the absurdity of what he was doing. The shore of Cercatori d’Arte was far different than that here in New Dawn, but she still apparently had more beach going experience than the wolf. Either way, it was a bold and brave (or stupid?) thing to take on a creature with such large claws.
“I thought you’d gone mad and started eating rocks,” she told him with a chuckle. Her eyes turned to the pink shellfish that now lay lifelessly on the sand, and she cocked her head in a surprisingly wolfish look, despite being in her Optime form. “I’m told they’re called crabs, and I think it’s safe to assume by your demonstration that they’re not part of our regular diet.” But she knew other creatures were known to eat them. The humans had, she knew from the stories her mother told her when she was a pup, and some Luperci had adopted those methods too.
Well, she wasn’t about to pop this thing into a boiler and cook herself up some shellfish, but it did raise the interesting question of what it tasted like. “I’ve never even caught one of these things before… not that I ever tried…” she muttered, then raised back up to her full height and peered around the beach. Espying whatever it was she was looking for, she moved away a few paces down the beach and grabbed a large rock. When she returned, she held it tightly in her fist.
“Stand back,” she advised Tharin carefully and then slammed the rock down on the width of the sea creature’s back. There was a cracking sound, but the shell hadn’t broken fully. She tried again, this time aiming for the spot that was already opened and weakened by the wolf’s teeth, and the shell gave way to shards. She tossed the rock aside and looked at the mess they had made. “Well, dig in.” She offered, then realized Tharin didn’t have any hands.
Crouching at first, she sat on the sand and began to pick away the pieces of the shell, exposing the meat inside. “That’s weird… it doesn’t have any bones…” she noticed as she picked, not realizing that the shell she had destroyed was this animal’s version of bone.
Finally, with the shell picked away, she licked salty fluid (it didn’t look like blood to her) off of her finger as she again laughingly instructed Tharin, “Okay guinea pig, you try it first.”
Tharin chuckled at the words, looking down at the shattered creature. I suppose it does look rather like one. He hadn't thought of that, just seeing it crawling around and deciding to discover if it was good to eat. Crabs. An odd word. It fit. Why any creature would have two claws coming out of one side and none out of the other was strange for him to think about, settling on the fact that the crab had to be a very ridiculous creature. He smiled crookedly, knowing that it wasn't. It was hard to grab, hard to crack open, and Tharin didn't have a clue how to get at the meat inside.
Titania stood up again, sending Tharin back a few steps, head craning up. She scanned the beach for who knew what, breaking into a run and heading down the shore. Confused he cocked his head, watching her move away. What was she doing? The luperci returned after a moment, rock in hand. Tharin retreated a short distance on her command, waiting to see what she would do. The rock was slammed down, the shell completely shattered. Stepping over he sniffed at it, still unable to access it. Pieces of shell were picked away by Titania, leaving him to be the one to test it out. Carefully he grabbed a piece, swallowing it down. That was very odd. Kinda slimy, salty, fishy all rolled together. Not something he really cared for.
Looking at his expression alone she could tell that the wolf didn’t like it. There was no way they ever could have broken into that beast without the use of Titania’s hands, so obviously it wasn’t something they were naturally meant to eat anyway. Probably just best to leave it alone. Still, Titania wanted to know for herself, and since Tharin didn’t keel over dead from some poison (not that she had been expecting that to happen, nor would she have let him eat it if she did), she plucked a piece of the meat from the mess and dropped it down her gullet.
It was very fishy but with a different texture. More rubbery meat, she thought, and not quite so bad as Tharin’s expression hinted. “It would do in a pinch,” she said. And after all, meat was meat. If something ever happened to cause a shortage of prey in New Dawn – moon forbid! – they could get by on the sea until the woods were replenished. It was a comforting thought.
She grabbed one of the larger, spindly legs and tore it from the creature. Picking and poking at it for a minute, she gnawed lightly on the open end and sucked some of the muscle out from the inside. This might actually grow on her quite nicely. “Actually, I think I like it. Doesn’t quite cut it over a nice deer haunch, but I’ve come across worse.”
She sat down in the sand, still lightly sucking at the crab leg for the bits of meat that she could get out of it. “I wonder if any of the rest of it could be used for anything else.” The thought met a dead end when she realized she couldn’t really fathom a use for it.
The wolfess sat in silence for a moment, letting the sounds of the sea and the screeching gulls fill the void for a while. After a short, peaceful moment, she began drawing shapes in the sand with the tapered end of the crab leg.
“So Tharin,” she asked idly. “You’re not a Luperci, right? What’s your story? Where did you come from?”
Tharin backed a short distance away from the strange creature, letting the alpha have what she wanted. He didn't care for it, and while it wasn't dangerous in any way, he wasn't going to be eating it again unless he had to. She could have the rest. He watched her pick up a piece with her super long toes, and swallowing it down. Disgust didn't follow though, just a bit of thoughtfulness. He nodded his head, agreeing with that. If food was desperately needed Tharin was sure he could figure out how to crack the crabs open to feed the pack with if necessary. Watching her take a leg and chew on it Tharin stared, wondering what could possibly be so good about it. Tharin could swallow one of those legs down, and it would hardly be a mouthful.
He was surprised that Titania liked it, but assumed it was much like one liking whale, despite how rare that was, more often than not the carcass long since frozen when found. He had to agree that deer was better, though caribou was his own personal favorite. When Titania wondered at what else it could be used for Tharin stared at her with disbelief. They'd already eaten it. What else could it possibly be used for? They couldn't live in it, though perhaps a leg could be used to entertain a pup, and it wouldn't strengthen the pack. There was no other need it could fulfill. Lying down he watched his strange alpha begin dragging the leg through the sand, making marks on it.
Asked about his past Tharin tensed slightly. There was nothing really to hide. He just didn't want to talk about it, as if keeping it secret kept it from becoming real. He had to though. His leader had asked for it. No I'm not. I came from a place where two leggers were myth. We didn't have the variety you have here, mostly flat with long winters, further north. I was a hunter in the pack. Prey got scarce, and I was sent out to find hunting grounds for the pack with Akira. I failed though. We found land, but a bear attacked, and Akira got sick from a wound she received. She died.
