Post by Pavane on Jun 8, 2012 19:26:00 GMT -5
Kachina - female cougar
Rockfall - male wolf
---Gradual Incline---
How many days has it been since she ran into that bird? At the moment Kachina has lost track, she is settled upon a bit of the incline peering around her, a ear twitching forwrad and back slightly as she stays mostly pressed against the boulder. No one can see her here! Though even she knows this won't last for long, she needs to go hunting after all. With a flick of her tail she shifts to her paws, giving herself a shake and a faint sigh escapes her.
There's been no sign of the bird since then - at least, none with any certainty. Shapes overhead that might be any hunting hawk, any eagle-eyed watcher. Never close enough for Kachina to distinguish. If Angard is a threat, hunger is one even more implacable. It gnaws at Kachina's belly, drives her to the hunt. Are not cougars mighty hunters? Here is the world before her. Other creatures have walked this ground, and left behind the traces of their scent. She has but to sniff...
There's a smell in the air. A rank musk, an unwashed body gone fetid. Perhaps a change in the wind brought it.
Kachina makes her way downwards from the boulders, the rocks, the dirt and low bushes slowly moving along. Her paws pressing lightly and her tail faintly twitches while she takes in a few sniffs of the passing air an her ears perk forward while her gaze drifts over the area. There is a pause, ears perking forward and she licks across her maw, is that a hare? She pauses as she moves forward once more an the new strong scent does indeed catch her attention. Her gaze flicks one way and then another an she turns moving for what she thinks is away from the sudden stinking rank of scent of something she doesn't seem to eager to deal with.
Or perhaps that scent was here all along; as Kachina turns away from it, she only finds herself following the trail instead. It seems without direction; without a coming from or a going to, overlaid on the ground by many passages. It is simply here. Everywhere. How did she miss it before? It should have been obvious when she came here. Obvious even while she rested by the boulder. It fills her nose with stench.
Kachina lets out a faint cough at the stench that has filled her nose, yes how could she have missed /this/? Her gaze flicks one way then another, ears lowering as she continues on the trail. Tail curling close to her as she finds herself moving further and further away from the boulder she was using as some type of cover. Her mind ticks over everything that has been happening lately, perhaps this is another trick? Well.. it is a thought..
A trick it may be. Subtle... it is not. The rank musk continues to fill the air, strong and permeating. It is as though Kachina walks into the den of this creature; this musk-beast, this half-rotted thing. The trail ahead curves around a squat, lumpy boulder, the base of it surrounded by dead weeds choking out the struggling spring grass.
Kachina pulls her head back slightly, ears perking and a clear uneasy look crosses her face while she moves along slowly getting closer towards where the large lumpy boulder is. Her gaze flicks about as she pauses and a faint chuff escapes her while she sniffs out again. She shakes her head a moment with a faint murmur escaping her before she presses onwards and and thus moving closer towards the lumpy boulder in the process.
The boulder... sits there. As Kachina approaches closer, she catches a glimpse of something elsy, lying in the weeds at its base. Something pale and white against the blotchy gray of the rock and the faded brownish yellow of the weeds. The scent continues to permeate the air, but it doesn't seem to come from the object.. whatever it is.
Kachina presses onwards towards the boulder, well its just a boulder! Though something else catches her attention and she hums faintly before shifting towards the items within the grasses. A forepaw lifting to poke and push at it before pulling it forward so she can give is a closer inspection.
The dry grasses rustle. Brushushushushush, as Kachina pushes them aside. The object caught within resists a moment before falling free to rattle against the rocks. A skull. A deer's skull, bleached bone stark around the empty eyeholes and the bleak muzzle leading to the nostrils and the flat-toothed jaw. Empty eyeholes stare at the cougar.
Kachina shifts and pushes the grasses about, an then the skull which makes her pause. Fear creeps across her down her spine and makes her tail fizzle out a moment. She rememebers the skull, and she is rather sure it is the same from her past.. Or it could just be a random skull here causing her all type of grief? Knowing her luck most likely! Her jaws tenses, anger seen and she slams her paw down upon the side of the skull and attempt to send it flying towards the boulder.
Rockfall slowly, cautiously, and with some alarm, lopes up the incline from the River Fork to the east. The wolf's hackles are raised, but for those able to distinguish such, his expression is more fearful than aggressive. He freezes at the sound of a humming cougar and swallows. He meanders to a spot where he can safely observe but keep a healthy distance between himself and the cougar. He jumps as the cougress suddenly flings a bleached deer skull and utters a brief but unintentional yalp from fear.
The skull goes flying with Kachina's strike, smashing against the rock. It breaks, the muzzle cracking into pieces, and ricochets off across the ground to spin around and settle... once more facing Kachina. Once more staring at her with empty, vacant eye sockets. Watching her, as the rank musk only she can smell fills the air, overpowering (for her) any trace of other scents.
Kachina doesn't catch sight of the wolf, or even smell it at this point in time as her attention is fully on the skull that is in some pieces at the moment. Her gaze flicks one way then another, a gasping cough escaping her at the sudden overpowering smell that hits her in the face and causes her to shift back upon her haunches.
Rockfall tilts his head oddly at the cougress, slunked back a bit especially after his unintentional fear-invoked yipe that, fortunately, has not yet caused him to get noticed. He breathes slowly, still tense, but relaxes ever so slightly as it becomes apparent the cougress is not marching toward the pack border, nor even stealthing.
The smell, the smell and still no sight. No sign of the creature who left it. Her eyes might as well be blind. She might as well be in a hole in the ground, stuck behind a barrier while the rancid musk of the creature that lay just past it drifts past the sticks and boulders that blocked her way. She can't see the source of that smell. The deer's skull is only bone. Only dry, brittle bone, staring at her without sight, with its scent worn away by the seasons - and yet still there is that cursed smell!
Kachina shifts about on her paws, moving this way and then, she cougs out in a gagging sort as she works on moving away from the boulder and the jagged pieces of skull to try and escape the overpowerful smell.
Rockfall finally speaks up, though not perhaps thinking wisely on it. "Are you okay? What are you doing?" the wolf asks, remaining a fair distance away but still easily within conversation range.
The skull does not pursue Kachina. How could it? It's only a skull. Only dry bone, left after the life was gone to some hunter, or disease, or harsh winter. That's all. Just an empty-eyed skull. A watcher. As the cougar turns away, it seems the scent fades fom her nose. The many scattered scent-trails of might have been draw together. They coalesce, no longer haunting her nostrils, and instead... ah, but there's a voice. The wolf speaks.
Kachina takes in several deep breaths once she is away from that awful scent, another hacking honking cough soon escapes her before she is able to breath with ease it would seem. She looks around speechless for the moment, for who could she talk too? Though there is a pause, ears perking, a voice? Her gaze flicks around and she blinks before looking towards the wolf. "What..? Yes.. I'm fine.." She is just PEACHIE!
Rockfall's ears flatten a bit in alarm at the coughing. Fine, alright ... he tries to size her up, peering for signs of disease which he does not find, but ... the coughing, as though the air were bad ... but as he cannot smell what she could, he only smells /her./ In any event, the lone wolf is no match for a cougar probably twice both his bulk and agility. Not sure what else to say, he settles on an introduction. "I am Rockfall, member of the Cerulean wolf pack," he says. "Are you ... are you one of the Amaranth clan?" he asks, a completely blind guess.
Ah, if Kachina were only looking - but she's not. To Rockfall's gaze, as to that of other observers, nothing at all happens. A broken deer-skull sits upon the ground. The scent invading Kachina's nose... retreats. Not entirely, no. There's still a trace of it, somewhere nearby... but it's fading, as though beaten away by wind and rain. It grows more distant, less harsh in intensity if no more pleasant.
Kachina lets her gaze flick back to the area behind her, she swallows once more and takes in a few shakey breaths as if checking for ther scent, which yes she still catches but not like it once was. A faint breath escapes her and she soon turns her attention back to the wolf. "Who..?" Is questioned with an unsure tone as she watches the wolf as he wondering if she knows him. "I've met wolves before.. But not you." The Cerulean? Her tail lashes whiskers twitching and then something dawns on her the only reason she knows that word is beacuse of one wolf Anoki. "You know Anoki then?" She never met his pack, only him, he mentioned it a couple of times but during that time there was more important things to worry about not where one comes from. "I suppose I'm with the clan.." To some degree. That is why she is on the quest right?..suuurreee.
Rockfall bobs his head. "Anoki and I are cousins and packmates." He gazes farther up the incline, toward the switchbacking path toward the Pristine lake. "Is Amaranth claiming territory this far?" he asks. He seems fully oblivious to the stench harranguing the cougress. "You've met other wolves, but no Cerulean aside from my cousin?" he inquires, finding that odd.
If the reduced scent has a place, it is behind Kachina; in that spot where the deer skull lay. Still lies; white bone against the dirt and stone. The rough brown and black of stone; the ragged-edged pieces of rock, the patterns they almost seem to make. At a glance, there is nothing there. Nothing to hide that skull from view. Just bone, and ragged brown-black behind. Ragged, musky brown-black behind.
Kachina glances behind her as if searching for something perhaps, a faint sigh escapes her and she soon looks around and back towards the wolf eyeing it a few moments infact. "I know Anoki.. An I know of Ute pack." She says with a faint tone escaping her. "An no, the clan is not looking for new lands.."
Rockfall is yet gradually relaxed, but still nervous and uncertain. "Are you looking for something? Are you ... looking for Anoki, perhaps?" he asks, tilting his head in that confused-wolf expression.
The skull rises. A face it once held; a face it makes once more, but not that of a deer. Oh, no. This is no deer, this ragged, musky, brown-black thing that lurches to its clawed feet. The pointed muzzle holds teeth far sharper, and the eyes stare forward through the side-facing sockets of the deer-skull it wears like a second face. Thick, shaggy fur marks the outlines of this creature now; this spectral creature, seeing out of a dead creature's eyes and seen only by those who see the dead. By those who have what is called, by some... a gift.
Kachina tail lashes a few times, ears lowering as her gaze snaps from one way then another as if expecting something to jump out at her. "I've not seen Aoki for some time now.." This said with a soft tone. How long had it been since that time she was in the hole? An it still haunts her, most likely always well to some degree. "Where is Anoki?.. Is he near by?" Perhaps she could ask him some questions about her so called 'gift'. There is a pause, a chill suddenly runs across her spine and her eyes widen. They are not alone.. Her gaze turns and she shifts slowly, a forepaw lifted and she takes in a shakey breath as she sees the spectral thing. "..not again.." Is murmured out.
Rockfall raises his head and tilts it from one side to another. "He is ... not far ... but napping, I believe. What ... did that skull just -move-?" he asks, shaking himself. "I must be seeing things. Do you ... do you also know my sister, Gitchiwaakwe?"
Oh, yes, again. The ragged black-brown musky shape takes a step forward. Another. The wolverine approaches, a skull crushed by a falling tree replaced by one of a broken deer. Onatah growls, but the sound is ragged. Broken jaws, crushed lungs, these things do not mend so easily, not for a creature so caught in the moment of death, so held by the promise of life eternal that the eternal rest of death cannot grasp her. She comes now, as she did before, beneath the guidance of a dead deer. "Lihhhhhfe."
Kachina swallows as she shifts slowly moving backwards a few steps, oh no.. The wolverine?.. Of all ghosts. She whimpers out faintly a few times and shifts backwards more, and then more.. An then she turns and is running darting past Rockfall and into the brush without a glance back. She rounds the bend and could possible win the cougar races at this rate. Also anything that Rockfall said? Ya that doesn't get answered or even thought of again!
Rockfall saw the skull move, but did not see, hear nor smell the wolverine. As the cougar bolts toward him, he mistakes the charge as an attack! But rather than cunningly or keenly put himself into a defensive posture, the wolf, never having been so close to a powerful, lithe feline, squats and quivers. When the end doesn't happen ... when the cougar runs /past/ him instead of into him and ripping his head off and all the other things wolves hear cougars like to do to wolves doesn't happen, he lifts his head. "Huh?" He turns his head back to look behind him, at where the cougress had bolted, then snaps his head forward to see whatever might have been behind the cougress that he couldn't see when she was standing there ... nope, he can't see anything there. Just a dusty old deer skull!
Onatah doesn't chase Kachina. She doesn't need to. Wherever the cougar runs... the wolverine can find her. Eyes in the sky. Ghosts walk the earth. Nothing is over. Nothing. Far overhead, an eagle screams.
Rockfall - male wolf
---Gradual Incline---
How many days has it been since she ran into that bird? At the moment Kachina has lost track, she is settled upon a bit of the incline peering around her, a ear twitching forwrad and back slightly as she stays mostly pressed against the boulder. No one can see her here! Though even she knows this won't last for long, she needs to go hunting after all. With a flick of her tail she shifts to her paws, giving herself a shake and a faint sigh escapes her.
There's been no sign of the bird since then - at least, none with any certainty. Shapes overhead that might be any hunting hawk, any eagle-eyed watcher. Never close enough for Kachina to distinguish. If Angard is a threat, hunger is one even more implacable. It gnaws at Kachina's belly, drives her to the hunt. Are not cougars mighty hunters? Here is the world before her. Other creatures have walked this ground, and left behind the traces of their scent. She has but to sniff...
There's a smell in the air. A rank musk, an unwashed body gone fetid. Perhaps a change in the wind brought it.
Kachina makes her way downwards from the boulders, the rocks, the dirt and low bushes slowly moving along. Her paws pressing lightly and her tail faintly twitches while she takes in a few sniffs of the passing air an her ears perk forward while her gaze drifts over the area. There is a pause, ears perking forward and she licks across her maw, is that a hare? She pauses as she moves forward once more an the new strong scent does indeed catch her attention. Her gaze flicks one way and then another an she turns moving for what she thinks is away from the sudden stinking rank of scent of something she doesn't seem to eager to deal with.
Or perhaps that scent was here all along; as Kachina turns away from it, she only finds herself following the trail instead. It seems without direction; without a coming from or a going to, overlaid on the ground by many passages. It is simply here. Everywhere. How did she miss it before? It should have been obvious when she came here. Obvious even while she rested by the boulder. It fills her nose with stench.
Kachina lets out a faint cough at the stench that has filled her nose, yes how could she have missed /this/? Her gaze flicks one way then another, ears lowering as she continues on the trail. Tail curling close to her as she finds herself moving further and further away from the boulder she was using as some type of cover. Her mind ticks over everything that has been happening lately, perhaps this is another trick? Well.. it is a thought..
A trick it may be. Subtle... it is not. The rank musk continues to fill the air, strong and permeating. It is as though Kachina walks into the den of this creature; this musk-beast, this half-rotted thing. The trail ahead curves around a squat, lumpy boulder, the base of it surrounded by dead weeds choking out the struggling spring grass.
Kachina pulls her head back slightly, ears perking and a clear uneasy look crosses her face while she moves along slowly getting closer towards where the large lumpy boulder is. Her gaze flicks about as she pauses and a faint chuff escapes her while she sniffs out again. She shakes her head a moment with a faint murmur escaping her before she presses onwards and and thus moving closer towards the lumpy boulder in the process.
The boulder... sits there. As Kachina approaches closer, she catches a glimpse of something elsy, lying in the weeds at its base. Something pale and white against the blotchy gray of the rock and the faded brownish yellow of the weeds. The scent continues to permeate the air, but it doesn't seem to come from the object.. whatever it is.
Kachina presses onwards towards the boulder, well its just a boulder! Though something else catches her attention and she hums faintly before shifting towards the items within the grasses. A forepaw lifting to poke and push at it before pulling it forward so she can give is a closer inspection.
The dry grasses rustle. Brushushushushush, as Kachina pushes them aside. The object caught within resists a moment before falling free to rattle against the rocks. A skull. A deer's skull, bleached bone stark around the empty eyeholes and the bleak muzzle leading to the nostrils and the flat-toothed jaw. Empty eyeholes stare at the cougar.
Kachina shifts and pushes the grasses about, an then the skull which makes her pause. Fear creeps across her down her spine and makes her tail fizzle out a moment. She rememebers the skull, and she is rather sure it is the same from her past.. Or it could just be a random skull here causing her all type of grief? Knowing her luck most likely! Her jaws tenses, anger seen and she slams her paw down upon the side of the skull and attempt to send it flying towards the boulder.
Rockfall slowly, cautiously, and with some alarm, lopes up the incline from the River Fork to the east. The wolf's hackles are raised, but for those able to distinguish such, his expression is more fearful than aggressive. He freezes at the sound of a humming cougar and swallows. He meanders to a spot where he can safely observe but keep a healthy distance between himself and the cougar. He jumps as the cougress suddenly flings a bleached deer skull and utters a brief but unintentional yalp from fear.
The skull goes flying with Kachina's strike, smashing against the rock. It breaks, the muzzle cracking into pieces, and ricochets off across the ground to spin around and settle... once more facing Kachina. Once more staring at her with empty, vacant eye sockets. Watching her, as the rank musk only she can smell fills the air, overpowering (for her) any trace of other scents.
Kachina doesn't catch sight of the wolf, or even smell it at this point in time as her attention is fully on the skull that is in some pieces at the moment. Her gaze flicks one way then another, a gasping cough escaping her at the sudden overpowering smell that hits her in the face and causes her to shift back upon her haunches.
Rockfall tilts his head oddly at the cougress, slunked back a bit especially after his unintentional fear-invoked yipe that, fortunately, has not yet caused him to get noticed. He breathes slowly, still tense, but relaxes ever so slightly as it becomes apparent the cougress is not marching toward the pack border, nor even stealthing.
The smell, the smell and still no sight. No sign of the creature who left it. Her eyes might as well be blind. She might as well be in a hole in the ground, stuck behind a barrier while the rancid musk of the creature that lay just past it drifts past the sticks and boulders that blocked her way. She can't see the source of that smell. The deer's skull is only bone. Only dry, brittle bone, staring at her without sight, with its scent worn away by the seasons - and yet still there is that cursed smell!
Kachina shifts about on her paws, moving this way and then, she cougs out in a gagging sort as she works on moving away from the boulder and the jagged pieces of skull to try and escape the overpowerful smell.
Rockfall finally speaks up, though not perhaps thinking wisely on it. "Are you okay? What are you doing?" the wolf asks, remaining a fair distance away but still easily within conversation range.
The skull does not pursue Kachina. How could it? It's only a skull. Only dry bone, left after the life was gone to some hunter, or disease, or harsh winter. That's all. Just an empty-eyed skull. A watcher. As the cougar turns away, it seems the scent fades fom her nose. The many scattered scent-trails of might have been draw together. They coalesce, no longer haunting her nostrils, and instead... ah, but there's a voice. The wolf speaks.
Kachina takes in several deep breaths once she is away from that awful scent, another hacking honking cough soon escapes her before she is able to breath with ease it would seem. She looks around speechless for the moment, for who could she talk too? Though there is a pause, ears perking, a voice? Her gaze flicks around and she blinks before looking towards the wolf. "What..? Yes.. I'm fine.." She is just PEACHIE!
Rockfall's ears flatten a bit in alarm at the coughing. Fine, alright ... he tries to size her up, peering for signs of disease which he does not find, but ... the coughing, as though the air were bad ... but as he cannot smell what she could, he only smells /her./ In any event, the lone wolf is no match for a cougar probably twice both his bulk and agility. Not sure what else to say, he settles on an introduction. "I am Rockfall, member of the Cerulean wolf pack," he says. "Are you ... are you one of the Amaranth clan?" he asks, a completely blind guess.
Ah, if Kachina were only looking - but she's not. To Rockfall's gaze, as to that of other observers, nothing at all happens. A broken deer-skull sits upon the ground. The scent invading Kachina's nose... retreats. Not entirely, no. There's still a trace of it, somewhere nearby... but it's fading, as though beaten away by wind and rain. It grows more distant, less harsh in intensity if no more pleasant.
Kachina lets her gaze flick back to the area behind her, she swallows once more and takes in a few shakey breaths as if checking for ther scent, which yes she still catches but not like it once was. A faint breath escapes her and she soon turns her attention back to the wolf. "Who..?" Is questioned with an unsure tone as she watches the wolf as he wondering if she knows him. "I've met wolves before.. But not you." The Cerulean? Her tail lashes whiskers twitching and then something dawns on her the only reason she knows that word is beacuse of one wolf Anoki. "You know Anoki then?" She never met his pack, only him, he mentioned it a couple of times but during that time there was more important things to worry about not where one comes from. "I suppose I'm with the clan.." To some degree. That is why she is on the quest right?..suuurreee.
Rockfall bobs his head. "Anoki and I are cousins and packmates." He gazes farther up the incline, toward the switchbacking path toward the Pristine lake. "Is Amaranth claiming territory this far?" he asks. He seems fully oblivious to the stench harranguing the cougress. "You've met other wolves, but no Cerulean aside from my cousin?" he inquires, finding that odd.
If the reduced scent has a place, it is behind Kachina; in that spot where the deer skull lay. Still lies; white bone against the dirt and stone. The rough brown and black of stone; the ragged-edged pieces of rock, the patterns they almost seem to make. At a glance, there is nothing there. Nothing to hide that skull from view. Just bone, and ragged brown-black behind. Ragged, musky brown-black behind.
Kachina glances behind her as if searching for something perhaps, a faint sigh escapes her and she soon looks around and back towards the wolf eyeing it a few moments infact. "I know Anoki.. An I know of Ute pack." She says with a faint tone escaping her. "An no, the clan is not looking for new lands.."
Rockfall is yet gradually relaxed, but still nervous and uncertain. "Are you looking for something? Are you ... looking for Anoki, perhaps?" he asks, tilting his head in that confused-wolf expression.
The skull rises. A face it once held; a face it makes once more, but not that of a deer. Oh, no. This is no deer, this ragged, musky, brown-black thing that lurches to its clawed feet. The pointed muzzle holds teeth far sharper, and the eyes stare forward through the side-facing sockets of the deer-skull it wears like a second face. Thick, shaggy fur marks the outlines of this creature now; this spectral creature, seeing out of a dead creature's eyes and seen only by those who see the dead. By those who have what is called, by some... a gift.
Kachina tail lashes a few times, ears lowering as her gaze snaps from one way then another as if expecting something to jump out at her. "I've not seen Aoki for some time now.." This said with a soft tone. How long had it been since that time she was in the hole? An it still haunts her, most likely always well to some degree. "Where is Anoki?.. Is he near by?" Perhaps she could ask him some questions about her so called 'gift'. There is a pause, a chill suddenly runs across her spine and her eyes widen. They are not alone.. Her gaze turns and she shifts slowly, a forepaw lifted and she takes in a shakey breath as she sees the spectral thing. "..not again.." Is murmured out.
Rockfall raises his head and tilts it from one side to another. "He is ... not far ... but napping, I believe. What ... did that skull just -move-?" he asks, shaking himself. "I must be seeing things. Do you ... do you also know my sister, Gitchiwaakwe?"
Oh, yes, again. The ragged black-brown musky shape takes a step forward. Another. The wolverine approaches, a skull crushed by a falling tree replaced by one of a broken deer. Onatah growls, but the sound is ragged. Broken jaws, crushed lungs, these things do not mend so easily, not for a creature so caught in the moment of death, so held by the promise of life eternal that the eternal rest of death cannot grasp her. She comes now, as she did before, beneath the guidance of a dead deer. "Lihhhhhfe."
Kachina swallows as she shifts slowly moving backwards a few steps, oh no.. The wolverine?.. Of all ghosts. She whimpers out faintly a few times and shifts backwards more, and then more.. An then she turns and is running darting past Rockfall and into the brush without a glance back. She rounds the bend and could possible win the cougar races at this rate. Also anything that Rockfall said? Ya that doesn't get answered or even thought of again!
Rockfall saw the skull move, but did not see, hear nor smell the wolverine. As the cougar bolts toward him, he mistakes the charge as an attack! But rather than cunningly or keenly put himself into a defensive posture, the wolf, never having been so close to a powerful, lithe feline, squats and quivers. When the end doesn't happen ... when the cougar runs /past/ him instead of into him and ripping his head off and all the other things wolves hear cougars like to do to wolves doesn't happen, he lifts his head. "Huh?" He turns his head back to look behind him, at where the cougress had bolted, then snaps his head forward to see whatever might have been behind the cougress that he couldn't see when she was standing there ... nope, he can't see anything there. Just a dusty old deer skull!
Onatah doesn't chase Kachina. She doesn't need to. Wherever the cougar runs... the wolverine can find her. Eyes in the sky. Ghosts walk the earth. Nothing is over. Nothing. Far overhead, an eagle screams.