The white boy furrowed a worried brow as the little girl fell over, an apologetic frown turning down the corners of his mouth. Poor little thing; he hadn’t meant to scare anyone. For a moment, he just watched her, waiting for an answer, feeling worse and worse as she stayed cringed on her side on the ground.

Did she think he was going to hurt her? Hardly. For all his intentions of becoming an Aquila, Noel knew he didn’t have a mean bone in his body. Protective, maybe, but he wasn’t about to hurt a harmless little girl. And pick her up? Yeah, that was a confrontation he would rather avoid. Parents didn’t usually take kindly to another wolf carrying their child around.

He notice how careful the little girl seemed as she opened a chocolate flecked, violet eye and peered at him from where she lay on the ground. She was still as she answered that her mother was out, obviously cautious for his reaction.

What was she so scared of?

Did he really make that bad of a first impression?

He wasn’t sure what to say, how to make it better. He stayed quiet for a long moment, just looking her over and taking in her markings. They were remarkably similar, both with a white base and gray markings. But the little girl was young and all that silvery frosting still had a great deal of time to change and shift.

At a year old, Noel’s markings were beginning to gain definition. A thin, dusty charcoal streak etched a jagged line from the back of his skull, down the center of his top line, thinning until it ended in a wispy little trail just between his hips. The edges of the line were imperfect and feathered out here and there, a few stray flecks of gray spitting out here and there. The same faded charcoal which once blotted his muzzle and face with awkward uncertainty had, by this time, condensed solely to his snout. It was darker around his nose, almost matching the shiny pitch, and started to fade about halfway up and dissipating between his eyes and into his pristine white cheeks. His chin was dusted a pale silver gray, fading quickly into the fur of his neck which warred between the cottony texture of a puppy's coat and the sleek silk of what he would be as an adult. Match it all up with his brilliant amber eyes, the right iris split half and half between the same amber and a frosty, ice-blue hue, and Noel was turning out to be a rather good-looking boy... or so much as his mother told him.

The small girl seemed to relax at last, righting herself and fixing him with innocent violet eyes. Her sweet little voice struck him dumbfounded for a moment. She wasn’t wrong, not entirely at least.

”That’s not- I’m not-”

He tried to argue, but her logic was actually rather sound. Simple as it was, she was technically right. And, seeing as he was on the list to be an Aquila, he figured she was safe enough with him so long as they stayed within Spirane. Hopefully that logic would work on an adult too...

Noel was caught off-guard once again as the little girl slid up to him and he shied away slightly as she licked the air in front of his face. He didn’t know what to do with this sort of interaction. The closest he had come to another pup was a random encounter with that Iromar boy, Istas, back when he was living in Glorall. Even then, that had been a short and awkward thing. Ravenwing... they had seen each other in passing but hadn’t really had a chance to get to know one another before his step-brother’s life was taken by a bear. So this... this was quite new.

The dusty silver girl introduced herself as “Cafell” before wiggling up closer and sniffing him, her cold little nose making the skin under his fur grow hot with embarrassment. He leaned away, squinting against the odd feeling of her little nose on his fur. Other than Rhoedias, nobody else had touched him since... well, since he could remember. This was certainly awkward.

The boy straightened up, ears perked forward as Cafell bounced away and turned to face him. When she pounded the ground in a playful gesture, Noel lowered in defensive instinct, his legs bent and adolescent muscles flexed and ready for action. Unlike that of the little girl, Noel’s tail remained still and straight out behind him. He looked a tense mess at first, his body softening only when she asked him who he was.

”I’m, uh,” he started, voice beginning to break with a bit of nerves that he swallowed down. He wanted this to go well. He needed this to go well. ”I’m Noel.” There, not so bad.

So, what now? No clue. He remained frozen in that low, defensive bow, mismatched eyes studying the little girl curiously for a hint. Sad, really, that he was learning how to act normal from a puppy.

soul and sky are magnetizing