Picking her way down the icy mountainside had been an arduous ordeal. In the sliver of unclaimed land which bordered both native kingdoms, Ida bulldozed through the deep snowfall and pushed against the frigid winds, grumbling and huffing to herself all the while as her bushy fur froze into haggard clumps. She should have sheltered beneath the cliffsides earlier to avoid the oncoming storm, but for once in her life she'd found it impossible to lay still and slumber; it was as if something were pulling her paws forwards and crawling beneath her pelt. She felt itchy, and the only thing which could scratch her found itself as sharpened ice digging into her hide as she stomped through the haze of white.
She just had to keep moving.
It almost felt as if she were hungry. Hungry for what however, Ida had no clue. Trees began to dot the landscape around her as she trudged forwards, ears pinned and grimace bared as she worked her mandibles irritably. Their thick trunks and naked branches broke the whipping wind and allowed some respite from the storm, but snow still settled heavy on her backside and clung to her frozen paws. She cursed and spat beneath her breath, pausing only to shake her pelt and clear the newest snowfall from her hide when the burden grew too heavy.
Through the winter haze, the great dog spotted something strange. The copious snow blanketing the earth petered into slushy puddles, and the ground beneath her paws in certain spots felt strangely warm--familiarly so. She remembered the hot springs further north, and she broke into a run. She'd hated those things before, but in the midst of such a storm, Ida could not picture anything more beautiful.
She squinted against a fresh blast of sleet as she broke the treeline, and there before her stood the largest geyser she'd yet seen. The storm still raged around her, but the damp earth and stone felt hot beneath her paws as she dragged herself forward and slumped several yards from the water. The geyser's steam shot upwards and momentarily scattered the wind, and for the first in a long, long time, Ida felt warm. She groaned in relief, practically throwing herself onto the ground and rolling to absorb as much heat as she could. Deep down she could still feel that persistent itch, but the urge to keep moving was outweighed by the exhaustion that crashed upon her now that she found herself safe and warm against the storm. Ida sprawled out on her belly and fell asleep in plain view, her underside warmed and back thick enough with fur and fat and chitin to brace against the remaining wind.
Cold was like a sharp stone that stuck between the paw-pads. It bit and stung, sometimes sharply and sometimes like a dull ache that seeped into the bones. Sometimes it could be ignored and other times it was unbearable. No matter how many times it came, Caedwyn disliked it all the same. He was born in a jungle full of mist and rain and a warm humidity that hung in the air all year. In the winter months, the air was cool and fresh, but never cold. And in the summer it had a sweltering heat that stuck to the body like a thick cloak that smothered with a heavy weight. But it was what Caedwyn had grown up in. He enjoyed it. He even yearned for it sometimes. It wasn't until he left his jungle homeland on a mission that he'd tasted his first truly 'cold' winter. He'd travelled from the jungle to the high bluffs and spent a year spying on an enemy pack. It had been many years ago now since that first snowy winter, but each year he was reminded how he didn't like the cold back then and he didn't like it now either.
Somehow he had let Enya convince him to make their homeland in territories that suffered from drastic temperature fluctuations in the winter. But he wasn't going to tell her how much this displeased him. He'd simply grumble under his breath about the "damn cold" or this or that, then wander back in his den. However, his duties would not allow him to simply hunker down in his den for four months while the season passed. So begrudgingly, he had set out on his patrols of the western borders.
Today a thought had occurred to him while patrolling. He was rather pleased with the idea, in fact. He could simply skirt over to the geysers for a bit, enjoy the warm air and hot water for awhile, and then head on back to his den later for the night. So here he was, basking on the warm rocks as the hot water and steam shot into the air. It was luxurious.
At least, it was until something - or someone - disturbed him. He kept feeling a nagging presence. Was it footsteps? or maybe the sounds of breathing? He didn't want to get up from his spot on the rocks yet. That would mean he'd need to head back and actually do work out in the cold. He let out a displeased sigh as he got up and moved around the other side of the hot pool of water he'd been resting at. He'd only gotten a few paces when his eyes caught sight of a creature sleeping on the rocks. Was this the presence he'd been detecting? They seemed rather unbothered, sleeping out in the open that way. Perhaps the green shell on their back served as some sort of armor?
Caedwyn moved a bit closer, moving carefully along the rocks to avoid disturbing the other. It was simply too good of an opportunity and he hadn't had any fun in quite awhile now. His eyes found a place where the rocks made a ledge close to the sleeping creature and he crept closer until he had an advantageous position on the ledge. "My my, what do we have here?" he said with a sly tone in his voice.
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Stealth Roll
Success: Caedwyn is able to sneak up the ledge to find an advantageous (probably threateningly close) position without being heard
Fail: Feel free to hear him before he can get all the way up the ledge
Character Diceroll 1: Success Diceroll must be above 500 to be successful.
0 was added for Stealth.
522 was added for Level 3.
0 was added for A. No Enchantment.
0 was added for A. No Buff / Penalty.
Her dreams were dark, but not empty. Slowly, as her exhaustion petered and energy returned to spent limbs, her nap became a losing battle. Even in her sleep she could not escape the unrelenting itch, paws beginning to twitch and muzzle curling as steam roiled around her in sluggish, heavy clouds. She needed to be moving--she needed to be hunting--but where? And what? Her subconscious told her nothing, only feeding the strange anxieties so that they would rear ready and ferocious by the time she woke again. A deep growl reverberated through her heavy chest, though it ended not with her waking, but instead with a loud, snotty snore.
It seemed even the supernatural was unable to rouse the great dog, but Tsillah was a wily one, and her messenger certainly could. Slowly, a low voice slipped through the haze of dreaming, and one pale eye cracked to see a face nearly pressed against her own. It took several seconds for the blurry image to strike the right part of Ida's brain, and once it did, she nearly flew out of her skin.
"HOUH FUCK!" Ida yelped, jerking backwards and scrabbling against the damp stone with uncoordinated, floppy limbs. A string of slobber still hung from her bared fangs as she reared her head back, nearly tumbling over herself as she snapped her mandibles and rapidly blinked the sleep from her eyes. The hazy shape of eyes and teeth found their place among a river of red and brown fur, and slowly Ida's vision cleared enough to fully take in sight of the strange wolf who'd woken her. She sat there, hind limbs still splayed across the stone and head raised in a clumsy half-propped crouch as her freshly woken brain struggled to catch up to her body.
"Goddamnit," she finally huffed, tattered ears heating as she pinned them back against her skull. "Gunna give me 'uh fuckin' heart attack, yuh dick!"
She gave a quick shake of her shaggy coat, smothering the embarrassment of her fright as she fixed the male with a indignant glower. She could feel a warm dampness clinging to her mane from the steam, and she gave a harsh puff from her nostrils to chase off a cloud of the vapors. She curled her blunted claws into the stone, relieved at least to feel that the sturdiness of her legs had returned with sleep. In fact, perhaps due to her sudden awakening, Ida felt surprisingly alert and energized. Alert, energized, and aware of the nagging, annoying anxiety still tickling at the back of her mind.
"You own this place 'er somethin'?" Ida finally asked, beady eyes angrily flicking between the strange male crouched above her and the bubbling geysers. The one plus she found was at least she was tall enough to nearly match his gaze, despite the height advantage he still currently had. He certainly looked a lot smaller than she'd initially thought, was he looking for a squabble? She gave another clack of her mandibles, but made no move to attack the stranger despite her clear annoyance.
