Dance, my little puppets,

Aut/1.1/02  

     Näkki’s dramatic return… was not no more dramatic than “here she was.” No shadows clung or fled her, no thunder announce her pawsteps, no haze parted for her - She only sauntered with a lazy swaying gait to the border. She watched the landscape before her morph into the soggy lowland of the swamp. When the stench of decaying flesh tinted the air, she halted with her thick claws just a mere millimeter outside of the official border. She raised her dull, pink eyes to look into the mists, that refused to reveal the depths beyond.

     She, however, didn’t need her eyes to know her home sweet home. Näkki could imagine the pools of black water and the paths which she would follow to eliminate any sort of work on her part for trekking. But she had been gone a long time… Andras might like to officially review her before she would be accepted without question across the border. In her debate, she detected the approach of another - just the brief form of his silhouette. He appeared a black hole in the the white fog over the swap. Her eye’s sharpened and the light of the moon glinted off them, turning them silver for only a moment before the movement of her eyes caused the illumination to dissipate.

     His scent… well, needless to say, he was the smell of rank flesh she had thought was drifting this far away from Andras’ Death Garden. A zombie, maybe? She watched him appear from the mists further on with wide, alert eyes. Her skin crawled at the feel of madness the moved around him. It seemed to waver the reality around him with the souls of those he’d murdered. So… not a zombie - a serial killer. Näkki admired him for a brief time. He was the picture of the wolf who’d tormented her dreams and the wolf she feared was around the corner waiting for her when she a young pup back in Hell. How was it that she had overcome her fear of a psychopath?

     A small grin pulled at the edges of her lips. Maybe her imaginary friend had come to join her in this life. Her eyes became wide again with disbelief when she was allowed to see through the fog, for a moment, a purely white wolf who had snuck there without her notice. Wraith?! She thought, her heart thudding with something close to joy at the thought of being haunted for a night by two wolves who were manifestations of her horrible dreams. But her eye’s quickly narrowed at the male. Not Wraith. She could hardly tell if Wraith were male or female, and this was clearly masculine. He had a different aroma and far too much presence. His bearing was so proud that Näkki thought he might be the reason why Wriath lacked life so completely: somehow, in the womb, he’d stolen a piece of Wraith’s soul. It was Vainglory, then, for Istas would never have approached the bloody furred male, nor do so calmly. Nakki was intrigued by his confidence. She’d finally gotten to see the last of the three whelps of Paldor and Ruvindra. Every one of them was entirely different and completely unbalanced. She wondered how might she play with that?

     Her question warranted a bit of investigation, as did the wolf straight from the darkness of her mind. She teetered along the edge of Iromar, her pads soft and silent against the marsh as she approached the hole in the mist. As she edged into the space of the two males, she observed first the dark one’s stature. He was shorter than her, but outweighed her. Hell if she knew how they physically matched then. They were probably pretty evenly matched in their natural talents. Then, Näkki turned an eye to Vainglory as she strode pass silently. Her teeth glinted in the moonlight as she recognized a kin of her best skill: Endurance. It was regretful that he was that putrid white. He would have been an excellent companion otherwise. She then turned her attention back to her first target - the shorter male.

     Näkki slunk toward him and when she was beside him, she reached out a paw to press against his shoulder. Her ears were erect, and she watched for even the slightest movement of his conditioned muscles. Näkki’s head was tilted to one side with her eyes soft and she retained the small grin that she had obtained before from observing him.

Näkki