There had been tell of a death in the far lands where his brother and sister had ventured. It was not as though Oplontis knew his sister well – she had left the main pack with their half-brother fairly soon after his birth. What he did know was that she had, his mother seemed to say, been the most like him and his father of all of her children. He understands words much like how his father and sister did, barely and sparsely. He understands body and expression far better.
He pads quietly and attentively for that purpose. He is aware of words like “different” and “fight” and they had been used often when Pompeii had visited home before her presumed passing. There were violent sorts in this corner of the world and his hackles had not lowered since he crept into Moladion earlier that morning. He is swift and surefooted, built and moving like a natural born wanderer. He is even more suited than his sister had been. He is even more prepared than she had been to be on her own and seeking to survive in this turbulent place. He does not want possession, does not know loyalty beyond the natural bonds he had recently forsaken in his home pack, does not comprehend war or so many of the emotional faults of these civilized wolves.
Head low, hackles high, feet on a steady thump, thump, thump until he reaches forest and a peaceful quiet soothes across his poll and down his spine.
Ivory mother-of-pearl eyes peer out from the shade of the summer-thick canopy and across a miniature clearing with a surrounding thicket that could house pockets for temporary dens and scattered hidey holes for prey with protection from ambush provided in the lovely brambles. He shudders, scenting recently upturned soil where a badger had made its home and the droppings of a warren buried further into the woodland. He knows that there is deep-earth rotated to the top and he might have wondered at how soil from deep within the ground became topsoil if it were not such a superfluous thought.
Instead he pivots towards a sound, nose twitching and hackles rising once again.
A YOUNG BROTHER OF POMPEII AND HAWTHORNE
the wild man
six - no imprint - no pack - no mate
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