A cove of bright blue water. Along the shoreline, the tides have carved the rocks into inlets and pools where the tide catches. There are many caverns and rock formations to explore here. The tide can rise quickly, flooding many of the areas without warning. An excellent place for gathering shells or hunting crustaceans.
A set of pawprints trailed almost lazily down the coast, pooling and filling with water as the tide tugged the waves in and out, wiping them away and erasing the presence of the tiger currently chasing its quarry across the beach. Saira's whisker's slapped lightly against her muzzle in the wind as she galloped, careful not to enter a full-on sprint which would exhaust her too quickly to enjoy. Initially she had just been surveying the area a bit more, choosing to begin looking into the territories bordering the area she had claimed as her home-range when she saw the wide expanse of glittering water. Even from the sky, she knew it was nothing edible but Saira had never seen so much water in one place, completely unrestricted or blocked out by any form of trees and the sand beneath her paws was warm and enjoyable. She had been debating making an attempt at fishing, or utilizing the wide expanse of warmth beneath her when a tiny crab - a strange one she hadn't seen before with one much more massive claw - came skuddling by and the tigeress had happily decided to pass on her entertainment to chasing it instead.
She swatted tauntingly at the rapidly fleeing creature, corralling it away from the water without giving it time to try burrowing like the ones in the river used to until she started getting tired. The striped beast promptly dropped into a crouch, emerald green eyes following the fleeing creature's jerky movements a decent distance before she exploded into a pounce. She landed just above the crustation, her massive paws on either side of it and released an intimidating roar.
The crab appeared to topple over in place.
"Hah!" Saira burst out with amusement, tail swinging slowly as she stared down, once paw raised at her unfortunate target in the center of the beach.
Pawprints carried the gray-blue she wolf along the coast of the cove, each paw slapping the wet, firm sand with a sharp sound. She'd heard from some wolf who claimed to be a pirate that there could be treasure found washed up on beaches. Elcid doubted it. If there was treasure so easily found, then why weren't there a dozen other wolves and creatures lined up combing the beaches with her? In fact, as Elcid looked up from the tide line to the sands, she didn't see anybody out here. She should have listened to her gut that told her the wolf was lying. The pirate seemed a bit too eager to share the fact with her, after all.
The problem was, Elcid was already out here. She figured even if the pirate wolf had lied to her, she could at least make the most out of the trip. She would search anyways, chasing the tide waters as they retreated back to the ocean and quickly dancing back away from the tides as they returned to grab her and pull the sand from beneath her feet. It was a non-stop game that became un-fun quite quickly for the she-wolf. Elcid was never the strong, hearty type of wolf. The gods made sure of it when they blessed her parents with her creation. No, any sort of hard physical activity left Elcid panting and out of breath which forced her to take long breaks to recover. This game had her sour in attitude, or maybe it was the lying pirate wolf that had her sour. She really wasn't sure, and didn't care to figure it out.
When she stopped to rest for a break, she watched as the tiny white seabirds mimicked her movements (or she theirs?) with the tides as they searched for something in the sands. When one plucked something out of the sands with its beak, she leaned forward to try and get a better view. It was impossible, due both to the size of the tiny object and the several other seabirds suddenly swarming the victorious one. Squawking and flapping ensued and Elcid lost interest in the object. If birds were fighting over it, it couldn't be a treasure valuable to her.
Until the very bird that had grabbed the object flew overtop of her as it fled from the others. One was right behind it and reached out a beak to pull at the lead's tailfeathers. It squawked in response and the object in its beak came falling down, landing prim and proper in the sand at Elcid's front paws, a perfect opalescent sphere nestled inside a perfect divot. Elcid's eyes sparkled and a large smile came to her face as she gasped at the pearl. It was the most beautiful stone she'd ever seen! Elcid carefully picked the stone up with her magic and held it close to her ear. A soft, high pitched hum rang from it - the hum of natural energy. "Oh!" she squealed after carefully tucking the pearl into the small bag she wore on a string around her neck. "She was right!" There really was amazing treasure if you looked hard enough.
This tiny pebble was all Elcid needed to find the motivation inside her to keep searching. She sprung up from her rest and was chasing the tides once more, trotting her way quickly along the beach, around a bend, past the rocks that had hidden the tigress from her before, and right smack into the side of the massive predator. Her eyes had been locked onto the ground beneath her nose, not looking up and at where she was going. "What the heck?" Elcid stepped backwards from the impact and looked up, her gaze moving from ground to orange and black striped mass. It took her a second to realize what she was looking at, and a second longer for her to realize what she was looking at. Elcid did the only thing her mind could come up with - she froze in place like a statue.
Saira observed the shaky legged creature that seemed to do the crustacean version of stumbling over its own feet, clearly disoriented from receiving a roar like that from a point-blank range. She tilted her head curiously, ear flicking dismissively at the raucous sound of sea-birds fighting over something while she weighed her options - the tiger had eaten crabs before but they had looked different from the massive clawed creature in front of her. She had always found sea-food to be something of a delicacy, something she wouldn't mind nibbling on as a treat but could this be like the time she'd tried a strange looking gater and found that it was rancid? She was still weighing her options - leaning towards taking a risk and trying this new sea-food - when something slammed firmly into her left flank.
She turned her head non-plussed, glancing down at the creature now staring wide-eyed at her. The tiger had barely budged from the impact, not even offering the poor wolf the politeness of feigning stepping back or even rocking. She hadn't even grunted, merely turning her head like she'd been tapped on the shoulder. Oh, it was a wolf - interesting, those seemed more common in this new territory. In her old home, the packs had taken careful caution to avoid her mother - and by association, Saira - so it was only a recent development to begin seeing them so close.
"Careful now," the tiger chuffed, placing a massive paw on the crab trying to subtly sneak away while the predator's attention was redirected. "Don't wanna go tumbling into the sea, do you?"
