It had been a long time since the two friends had first run into each other. Both had changed in their lives. They almost looked at each other as if they were strangers, but there was still a smile on their lips and a friendly greeting in the wags of their tails. Together they padded along the trails of the common lands, their voices low in hushed whispers, speaking of secrets and of life. Both had come to find their souls and they shared with each other the connections they had forged. Their curiosities getting the better of them. Quiet laughter issued from their lips as they had finally found someone, even so distant a someone, to relate to. It was not until their conversation turned to a more serious topic that their voices hushed once more. Quiet and low, they whispered of the changing world and what had happened to bring their lives crashing down on them.

Pressed together the calico colored guard and the snow-white witch moved through the fire charred terrain of the fields. One set of mismatched eyes looking to the horizon while those of forest green peered out at trails they followed.

I do not know how I can help. Inanna said softly to her friend. Glorall has remained...quiet…in other pack dealings for as long as I have been alive. It was not as though Inanna had spent a great amount of time within the beach pack anyway. Since her family’s voices had grown quiet she had become her own creature, living and becoming the storm that had adopted her.

Pine shifted anxiously beside her. All of her training had been just that. Training. Though she had risen to the status of Elite Guard, she had been young and she had been playful. Some would have said she had been foolish. Now it was time to put that training and ‘play’ into reality. She had stepped into a game Aranck was playing; only now they both knew the game involved lives. The fallen life of Aithne and the lost lives of Aster.

You must be able to do something. The smaller of the two hushed. You are still a pack wolf.

Inanna eyed her doubtfully before opening her mouth. She was about to speak when both women’s attention snapped to the distance. The fresh scent of a new wolf was nearby. With the tumult that gripped their lives neither were willing to let the stranger get the better of them. For the first time in their lives their roles switched. Inanna smiled with a friendly wag of her tail. Pine ducted her head and eyed their surroundings suspiciously. Of the two of them, she was the one being hunted.