That Midnight Hour

OOC: Open, but special shout out to @Zagreus

Days passed, blending possibly into weeks. Time was of little consequence to Keyni. At least, not in this foreign new world. She knew nobody (except possibly for the youth she met back on the Tundra). She was attached to no one and had no land to lay claim to. No pack to look out for, or to be backed by. In every sense of the word, she was unbound. Free.

Still. Time would eventually catch up to her. Force her to act. If she was not only to survive, but thrive here, she must make headway. Find others. Forge relationships. Possibly friendships or alliances. Her chest heaved with the motion of a sigh, pushing the air out into the cooled dark of night. Going it alone really was a drag. Always in the back of her mind now, was the white child. Mute she may be, but she was someone.

She had pursued the distant mountains as intended. Inching away from the flat, seemingly lifeless Tundra. But not too far, yet. She could easily turn back around and make the journey, should she desire it. Here, on the split of the two regions, she had options. A positive check mark in her book. Pads roughened from days travel on hard surfaces, the soft scraping against stone came to a stop. The Tundrian stilled, perched on the very rim of the bowl like mountains that now descended down into the night cloaked little haven waiting below, for her. Hovering, she sniffed carefully. Searching for signs of life, before deciding to proceed.
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can be ignored/skipped,,,, or further interacted with :3c

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terhi's world tilted and twirled through the times.

she roused in the dark, uncertain of whether she was nearer to when she had slumbered or to when she should rise. the stars that dotted the skies did not help determine this. the moon too slim and hidden for her to gauge that either. so she hiked, on lean limbs and wispy fur a waving banner like a ghost from sheets.

only to discover someone hovered on the rim of of their vale. she stared at them with her sunrise eyes, chin jutted up as her tear trails framed the sharpness of her. despite such strong angles there was no harshness to her hawkish gaze.

curiosity, wonder, and admiration.

this one did not belong.

the palantír knew this not to be pale dragoness or saber tooth. yet this stranger stood as if they belonged, perched upon stone like gargoyle to castle.

soft sounds thrummed in the depth of her throat. she had good feeling about this one. even if she did not approach further yet.

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aaa sorry i couldn't resist since i'm trying to still work out inarius a bit

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These were strange lands, so very foreign to him. He was used to cold stone beneath blinding light, but here, day and night were segmented and swaying. The sun rose and set, the stars pinwheeled above him—he had yet to see the full breadth of the moon and how he wondered of it! It was not that he had never seen such things before—Inarius had seen all these things, granted at a lofty distance—but the change in perspective had been eye opening.

This must have been the Garden of Eden, he thought.

And here was he, once caved to temptation, a man thrown in with the likes of all these women who tended to it. At least in this place, veiled in its mists and mountainous juts; of forests lush and still holding fast to their summer greens. The various sights would fascinate him for some time still, but a different scent on the wind drew him in. Not just one, but two, and it was the stranger at the brim that he laid eyes on first.

Even in pale illumination, the pale tones of her coat seemed to shine. Perhaps not as brilliant as his host, but his gaze was drawn to the dark marks beneath her eyes. She did not wear the scents he had come to associate with Frostchant, and the blackhanded Inarius could not help but draw himself up nearer to her.

Guarded, but wondering. He was every bit of a soldier in stance.

“It’s enchanting, isn’t it?”

Softly spoken, hush against the ambience; he did not wish to alarm her and yet he felt a sense of duty to be there to survey her own intent near to the doorstep of their haven. His tail flipped idly at his hocks, garnet gaze holding her until he tore it away to peer through misty curtains where gabled gardens seemed to lie untouched and unburdened by their presence.
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She breathed in again. Slowly, deeply. What met her nose was an unexpected collection of scents. All belonging to other wolves. Instinctually, as if an automatic response, she backpedaled two steps. Just as one of them, most likely, appeared before her, down past the rim. The Tundrian knew well of the traditions of borders and outsiders. She was not about to be rude.

The two females stared at each other, as if in a silent match. In many earthen tones with flaming eyes, she was striking. From her Keyni sensed no hostility. Perhaps invitation? Poised but calm, the tip of her tail began the first wiggles of wag, in a show of her own peaceful nature. But, before she could do more, or even open her mouth to speak, someone else entirely made themselves known.

Drawing up not far from her side, was a man of ash and silver. Equally calm and peaceful in demeanor as she had been. Her façade was momentarily broken by his sudden appearance, so close. Her jade eyes widened only a fraction as she turned to peer at him. Just as quickly as the break had come, and it was gone again, her features smoothing back into their untroubled expression. It wasn't often that others were able to rattle her, and when they did, she was swift to recover. "It is." She replied finally. "The night seems to have a way of bringing out an ethereal sense. At least, it has for me." Her eyes flicked down to the first wolf, her words shared between both parties. No smile came to her lips, but her eyes were warm.
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just a cameo, if u need her yell for her as usual

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[narrow width=800]it was.

she puts the sugarplum and the saber promptly from her mind; the langorous presence of both only seemed to discomfit her, and have her fur abristle with impatience and her own impertinence of which she had first beheld the pair with. it was good, then, that on her stiff, stalking way that the sight of palantír was what soothed the errant crescenting of her ivory mantle; that the windswept acted sentinel, and that she had seen the retreat of the grey gyptian and has strode near enough to this loose throng to hear the end of an inquiry, fragments of an answer.

she passes the farseer with a reverential murmur to draw up alongside the cloudspurned inarius. looks over this wanderer who terhi favors, searching for something she cannot name; and though aėrith's eyes are distant and pearlmade and without their once-softness, they are not unkind.

... yes.

this one she liked.

a throaty, chirring note of decided approval hummed deep from somewhere between her heart and lungs. knew now that she held no claim over those who wandered, would never and yet could not resist the parting of pale lips:  "tuuli opastaa sinua,"  — wind guide youordained the sotaherra in that tundrian tongue, before entrusting her being seen to by the blackhand — whom she parted with a solid rub along his ashen ribs.

she would not be far gone, should any of them three need her.[/narrow]

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Out from where he looked, he saw the mists draw her up from nothing. Like a wisp from hallowed ground she emerged, if only to briefly confer with the farseer lingering still. Inarius drew his gaze away and back to the stranger astride him; he knew they were being watched, but he was far from unfamiliar with the dangers that came with the unknown.

“Some say this is the hour of mischief,” he rejoined gently. Footfalls distracted him now, a foreign tongue off the lips of the fleetfooted mistkeeper left him with questions that could not be answered—she was off just as fast she came with her parting touch. He watched her go, only to round that gaze distantly on the farseer before ultimately drawing it and his attention back to the traveler.

“But I will say that this place has enchantments about it. Mischief is not something we find often at our land so far.”
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"The hour of Mischief, you say?" She repeated, more to herself than to anyone else. A soft shake of her head followed. "That it may be, but mischief is hardly what I am in pursuit of tonight." Stopped then, by the brief audience of a wispy, colorless woman. She seemed edgy, but accepting of the Tundrian stranger's presence all the same. Words uttered for her in a foreign tongue not of her own, but one that Keyni innately understood despite never spoken before.

She swallowed once, jade eyes following her retreating form. Partly wishing her back but not willing to withhold her from going on her way. "Your land here...it is beautiful." She said, both for Inarius and Riannon to hear. "All of it...here and the realm beyond, is strange to me. Unlike the world I once knew before..." She trailed, hoping that here, she would be offered insight.
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[narrow width=800]mischief  —  something that could not be found through pursual, but had seemed the very thing that had gathered them all in its reaching, great hand and flung them throughout this realm like so many golden coins. as if it had taken a gamble, and bid on how well they came to work these lands around them. ...and even with a name and claim, was this land theirs? as much as aėrith wished that she could stake said claim more strongly, more surely to the very roots of these silver mountains, she knew that she could no more force the hand that she'd been given than it'd first brought her to this hollow in the first place.

perhaps in what would be the first  ( and only )  time that she'd reveal her own misplacement:  "i woke on the southern shores, and my eyes opened to the stars of summer,"  speaking only once inarius had dealt his exchange of words with the greymane before she returned to them both; her eyes bright and hard and glinting.  "in wherever i ... had once been, i could have told you each and every one in that sky. but, here  –  here, i must learn all over again. name them,"  even though they have since turned away in the colder seasons; when they shied from any eyes that were shameless, searching, and ran to find the warmth of the sun.

but if you knew your stars, you could find your way home;
even if was not at all the home you'd last made in your heart.

"they guided me here. here, to this cloudrest, where i know that no matter the world, the cold thrives within me. where the harvest is not kindly, nor the hunt easy, but it is good. we are few, but ...we are the nords of frostchant  –  and we earn our lives each night and every day."[/narrow]

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The pale woman did indeed, turn back to her, while the mist furred male, Inarius, was silent. She spoke again, this time in the common tongue, although Keyni had found a kind of appreciation for the tundrian verse. It struck a chord of familiarity within her. Taking two slow steps closer, her plush tail waved loosely just above her waist before falling at her heels. A signal of her peaceful nature, that she meant no offense by intruding so closely on this claim.

"I too, woke here, several weeks ago. Not by these mountains, but out in the expanse of the Tundra." Jade stone eyes darted to the side, while she settled into momentary, brief contemplation. Her soft brow furrowed. "All I can remember was...feeling strangely dizzy. Then nothing. It was as if I passed out. Nothing...no one is familiar here. But I am still holding on to hope that will change."
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