Welcome to Canis Major

a wolf and animal rpg (role-playing game)

Canis is a writing community for play-by-post (forum-based), freeform roleplay set in a fictional dream world in the intrusion fantasy genre. Most characters on Canis are wolves; many play elements are focused around wolves and canids, but the world makes room for a large variety of other animal characters such as dogs, horses, cats, bears, deer, and many, many more.

Our community is focused on flexibility, creativity, and collaboration. That boils down to a few important features:

  • There is no set activity requirement to write
  • The setting and plot are member-created and staff-supported
  • The game is continuously improved to increase fun and decrease stress

Learn more in our Rulebook!

P
to be like you


Morning
#1
P
11-17-2022, 10:25 PM
Tiberii was a clever girl with her mind set on seeing Father.

So it'd go that the early morning she found large Father prints in the snow, snaking a sneaky trail from the den to the nearest border, the Darkling followed after, tediously placing her small paws within each print as she followed along; taking herself quite seriously. By the time she had found him, the sun was high, and forward Tiberii marched; becoming Father's littlest shadow.

"Dad!" she hollered, hoping her voice caught him when her legs were so little, it would be hard trying to keep up at this pace. "Daaad! I've been lookin' all over for ya' and ya' know Aries, Aries she din't let me see ya'! Was stupid! Thas all! Ya' always wanna see me, I don't get why she kept at it!"

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#2
11-17-2022, 10:57 PM
^^

Whatever God's that may exist were clearly seeking to punish him. This was why he was relatively certain that they didn't exist because if they did, he thought that they were solely around to torture. Tiberii's young voice carried behind him and he felt his stomach lurch; no, no no. No.

Despite his immediate feeling of panic, he couldnt help the sprinkle of amusement and pride at the way her words carried in a more tolerable version of his own accent. It was endearing and it was funny and she was a complete little shit with balls bigger than some grown ups.

"Tiberii," the titan grunted as he kept moving, unable to turn to her as he rigidly kept his face forward and away from her. "Aries ain't stupid," he told her, "she been takin' real good care o'yer. Be nice." fuck, it hurt him to not look at her. Her face that was so similar to the one he wore as a child.

He missed her. He missed her siblings. Fuck Vera. He was going to kill her, this he has promised. ^^

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#3
11-18-2022, 12:10 AM
Tiberii wasn't getting any younger, every day she grew, and every day she learned more of the world... of the adults around her and their alien ways and emotions and so she knew something was wrong in his voice but that was not before she noticed how differently he met her. Often, he'd stop and embrace the Darkling with his scarred muzzle, large enough to topple her over (it's why she's so steady on her paws now), and yet. Now? He moved along, not once did he even hesitate as though he'd come greet her. It squeezed at her heart, made her little lip quiver.

Only for a moment. Tiberii met upset with frustration, growling out a sharp and crackling rrrrrr as she stomped ahead. "I ain't gon' be! She's stupid! Always saying you're too busy or restin' but that don't mean nothin', ya' always want me 'round no matter what," she said, fierce enough to say how much she believed it even if the scene would lead any outsider to think he was trying to shake her. "Don't ya? Ya' want me 'round? Like we're patrollin' right now!"

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#4
11-19-2022, 08:48 AM
^^

He knew what this was. He knew that it was life reminding him that he wasn't allowed to get too comfortable, too happy because it could all be taken from him without so much as a struggle. No matter his plight, his fight, his determination -- life could still destroy him. It could take away everything he had worked for, everyone he had come to love and what was he to do about it? For a man so strong, he was truly powerless in the grand scheme of it all. Tiberius knew he had gotten too sure of himself, too happy, too comfortable; he had started to believe that he was worthy of the life he had forged. Of the people in it. This was lifes way of reminding him that he was not.

Tiberius couldn't even look at his children. His daughters. Not without the possibility of becoming the very opposite of what he desired to be. He would need to do better, he knew. He would need to slip back down to the level that life knew he was at but how could he when he had a Pack to run, to ensure the safety and happiness of? He was no longer the boy but the man; how could he return to that level? He thought of Olive, of Kuhn, of faces of his past and he grimaced as he heard Tiberii's frustration.

The titan couldn't help the small snarl of warning at the girl when she continued to call @Aries stupid, his own heart tugging at the way she clearly wanted to be around him. If only she knew. "I's givin' yer one last warnin', girl. Yer call Aries stupid an' yer goin' righ' ta yer bed an' yer stayin' there fer tha day," the Chieftain warned her, voice a low tone but stern. She had to learn that she couldn't talk about others like that, especially not the ones who had done nothing but care for her. He understood the frustration, understood that as a child she knew no better but she would learn to be nice to her Packmates.

He sighed as he rolled his eyes to the sky, "'course I wan' yer 'round, darlin'. Wit' yer mama gone, I's jus' been doin' an awful lot tha' keeps m'busy." He informed her casually, striding forward though he knew she would follow. "She's been doin' as I've asked, yer 'ear?" He wasn't going to let Aries take the blame for his decisions just because to the girls, she was the one enforcing it. ^^

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#5
11-19-2022, 05:22 PM
Something was wrong. Tiberii knew this now more than ever and it made her posture sag, ears slicked back to where one would presume she had none, little tufted tail dropping and finding its way between her legs, tucked to her belly as his snarl caught her off guard—it wouldn't be the first time Father corrected her but it would be the first time Tiberii didn't understand why she was the target. It made the darkling feel a bit like he hated her... a true devotee to the shadow above, she wouldn't turn away and stalk off sullen, hunt down one of her sisters and tell of the transgressions that took place today, instead, she would slink after him uncharacteristically quiet. Even if he hated her, she would follow, unable to think of any reason why he should... and no reason why he wouldn't.

But feelings were things she didn't entirely understand, not as they were developing and fleshing themselves out with age, and the sadness knotting in her heart at the things she thought bled into this: Tiberii shook her body out, limbs all over as she mimicked the posture she often saw Father have with his tail high and his face fierce as ever, and she'd curl her muzzle to bare teeth, growl in her throat.

"Do it then!" hollered Tiberii, blinking up at him like she held enough force in her body to knock him down. "Send me 'way!" His confirmation that he had been the one to tell Aries to keep her and her sisters away... oh, it upset her! It made her throat hold that growl longer, squeaky as it was. "Ya've been doin' it all this time, 'pparently! Won't even say why, none ya' do an' I'm sick o' it... Ya' just say yer busy but ya' ain't ever told me 'way before, not even after Mama left! Yer just don't want me 'round no more." Her talk was jumbled, not incoherent but telling of her child's mindset, unable to make it entirely concise so she said every thought as it came, but even as she growled purposefully for emphasis, it'd be hard to miss how upset she truly sounded.

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#6
11-19-2022, 05:48 PM
^^

He couldn't blame her. It wasn't fair to try and really, he wasn't, because the only one to blame was him. The titan was being selfish in his plight to ensure that his daughters didn't see him because he didn't want them to see him as a monster but someone who was comfort and safety and here it was, his choice hurting the very ones he was trying to protect. He had came to a stop, head bowed as he glanced out of his periphery to watch her as she puffed herself up ready to explode. And explode she did, making Tiberius' own anger bubble at the surface.

It wasn't fair to expect her to understand his actions were in attempts to protect her when he wasn't forthcoming about it but also that she was just a child who knew no better. The titan's shoulders twitched as he grew taut, understanding she was upset but yet she was a child, she would know what they wanted her to know and nothing more. "Yer will know wha' we want yer ta know an' only when we want yer ta know it, Tiberii. My job as yer Pa an' as Chieftain is ta make sure yer protected an' well, even if yer don't like m'decisions," the titan told her, voice rough against his throat. He watched her still, trying to rein in his anger -- just and unjust as it wasn't her he was annoyed at.

He just wanted to protect her, damnit.

"Yer gitta do a lotta things yer ain't like when yer an adult, Tiberii, a lesson I's tryin' ta make sure yer don't gotta learn jus' yet," he snapped as he felt the way his heart squeezed painfully in his chest. He had missed her and her siblings, missed them so much he thought he might suffocate a time or two but fucking hell, he just... he might finally break if he saw fear in her eyes of the beast that he had been forced to be.

"Tiberii..." he croaked as his shoulders sagged, knowing that he had to. He had to, she deserved as much -- his job as her father wasn't only to protect her but to put her first. His selfish desire to keep her image of him light was just that, selfish. He would take her disgust so long as she felt listened to and kept in the know. He steeled himself as he slowly turned and exposed his flesh, dry and flesh blood clinging to the wound that stretched across half his face, engulfing the other scars that used to sit there. "I love yer, darlin'. I... Papa's been 'urt, alrigh'? Yer an' yer sisters couldn't see m'like this, it ain't nice fer yer ta see."

Tiberius would shoulder his pain and her rejection, so long as she felt cherished. ^^

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#7
11-19-2022, 07:07 PM
When he came to a stop, her wide stride slowed but not without her stomping once and then twice before finally conceding to his side, dark brows furrowed up tight as she kept her eyes narrowed to slits. Hurt would spill from her with the ire she bled and spat, uncertainty claiming her and stealing her like some reinforcement to this souring feeling. Tiberii didn't know how to stew in the upset, wasn't taught how she should hold the sadness and nurse it slow, never growing palatable but bearable—no, she took it all in stride, bit the largest chunks away and swallowed each down despite how it twisted, curled, and squeezed her heart so that she swore it'd burst or worse; never release that feeling.

It was so stupid! Oh! Tiberii had always thought herself privy to the world's secrets, even more specially so, Father's. Yet here he spoke to her like she could have been some stranger on the border, purposefully tossed out of the known, in that moment she knew he could have scruffed her fiercely and shoved her back to make the journey to the den all alone and it wouldn't have hurt as much as that othering felt. "Well I really don't! I hate yer decisions! 'm yers ain't I? Don't I get to know things—ain't like knowin' stuff's dang'rous!" And not knowing hurt. Not knowing why he hated her and wanted her gone when until now she had believed him to be the only one to always desire her following after. Tiberii flinched only a little at his snapping tone, recovery quick as she jutted forward on unsteady limbs, nose high to the sky to stare him down. "Yer makin' me learn now! I don't like this but ya' keep wantin' it all this way an' I just don't,
all's I want's ya' and ya' don't want me!"

Because nothing else made sense to the darkling. Why else would he act so oddly?

Tiberii didn't move, an unwavering little force; it'd look stubborn to anyone looking in but the truth would be that she was, at her core, a daughter wanting her father to change his mind because she so desperately wanted to be with him.

Father spoke then, calling her name that she attentively listened to, little ears twitching, and at once he revealed what she hadn't even thought he'd be hiding. He'd always been scarred, so much so that wolves who weren't looked a little alien to her; some of his face looked all chewed up, bit itchy, too, but Tiberii didn't so much as twitch her nose in response. There wasn't a lick of fear or hesitation as she moved on closer, head tilting to the side at his words. "Why ain't it nice? It's ya," she said to him simply, earnest confusion as she wordlessly relented in the form of plopping her butt on the ground and saying, "Why ya' 'urt?" And then, a little more serious, demanding even. "Lemme see, close!"

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#8
11-20-2022, 10:25 PM
^^

He was doing best to not let his daughters become emotionally stunted as he was, wanting them to be able to understand and digest different emotions as easily as their mother managed yet he knew in that regard he was failing. He didn't set a very good example, something he was acutely aware of but he had been trying his hardest to do better since @Olive and @Kuhn came into his life. It was... slow going and it pained him to think that Tiberii might be walking in his pawprints, all because of him.

The girl had no idea just how dangerous knowledge could truly be and he knew it was because she was but that, a girl, young and naive to the world that she was born into but there would come a day where she would know. A day where she would understand that sometimes, it was better to not be in the know. "Then yer gonna 'ate me again in tha future, girl, 'cause there's gonna be times in tha future tha' yer don't git wha' yer wan' an' yer gonna 'ave ta deal wit' it," Tiberius told her thinly, shaking his head. Only he would have so many of his qualities past down in a daughter, ones that were coming to challenge him. He didn't want her to hate him but he knew that there would come a time or two where he would have to take it, so that he could make the best decision possible as a father and a chieftain. It was part of his burden to bear.

"'Course I's wan' yer bu' it ain't always wha' yer wan', Tiberii," he told her, his voice laden with tiredness. He hated that he was making her feel the way she was but he had done it and all he could do was try and get her to understand and try and... do better, somehow. "Trus' m'darlin', been missin' yer somethin' fierce," it was unlikely that she would believe him because kids didn't know words, they knew actions. So what if you said it? To a kid, they needed to see it and he was doing a piss poor job at showing it. She didn't care for his words, displaying stubborn behaviour in a place of hurt and it was from him, the man who was meant to be her protector.

He knew being a parent wasn't going to be easy, it was another thing that he hadn't known fuck all about and having had no parents to learn from growing up, Tiberius was coming from a place of darkness. His best wasn't good enough and he was navigating fatherhood in the goddamn dark. Blindly. He wished that @Olive was here, she had a better understanding of the world but then he wasn't going to make her a single parent when he was here, either. He needed to deal with this and learn, just the same.

Tiberius had tried to steele himself against the incoming hurt and rejection, only it didn't come. She blinked up at him with those eyes that mirrored his own, words on her tongue and he blinked. It's him. Yeah, yeah he supposed -- he supposed that all she had never known was him with some scarring in the first place. Her confusion was innocent as she dropped her rump to the ground and kept looking at him, asking after his hurt and then following it with a demand. The titan snorted, finding himself not surprised by her demanding attitude. He was surprised she was taking it so well, though, and he knew that a large part of it was his own mind forging some reaction that wasn't what he was facing now.

"Git inta a scrap wit' someone I used ta know," he found himself telling her some version of the truth as he sighed, still not desiring for her to see it up close but he was still shell shocked enough that he did as she bade, lowering himself to his belly and angling his face to her. "Been needin' ta rest from it, see. Bit bigger than m'usual scars," Tiberius told her quietly, watching her carefully as she would inspect him. He waited, breath stuck in his throat. Was he about to face the rejection here?^^

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#9
11-28-2022, 08:57 PM
That was the thing the young darkling blinking up at her father, eyes touched by what one could only presume was the sapling stages of tears that would not ever break; perhaps it was a child's naivety that made anger fluster instead of sadness or maybe, through and through, bits of her father had wound so tightly within her that they shared something beyond looks, beyond even blood—for they shared this innate... slowness where emotions were concerned, and it was in this way that they crashed as one, a mirror to one another.

Maybe, even, in a way...

...Tiberius was staring at a younger him...

...And Tiberii was staring at what would one day be an older her.

"But I don't wanna hate ya'!" Tiberii hollered it though this was, understandably, not very loud in the grand scheme of things where she was small still yet and he stood as tall and as vast as the mountains around them. Her little ears pinned back, in some mixture of submission and fright that all knotted up in her throat to make her feel as though she might burst into a million little pieces. "I don't wanna 'ave to deal w' it either! Why ya' makin' it so hard! Stop makin' s'all so hard!"


It was a child's plea through and through; entirely unable to handle the proposition that things would not be so delivered to her as she felt they had so often been. It felt like hate because she had never seen him treat her sisters so similarly.

What had she done wrong?

The young darkling would not be able to ponder on it for long; for the better, maybe as he spoke to her and she sulked in response, little shoulders hunched over and her gaze flitting between narrowing at the ground and then at him. It was so confusing the way he spoke, how he loved her but he would do what would make her hate him again; a promise that quirked her intrigue and deepened her uncertainty of all this. But if there was one thing that Tiberii was more loyally than she was herself—it was the daughter of her father, looking to him in a light some looked at their ancestors or the subject of great stories and tall tales. "Ya' ain't been showin' it," she said to him, her ire still wound tightly around her tone though it was clearer now that she was simmering from the boil, spilling back and away from the heart which spurred her to begin with. All in true child's fashion. Any emotion could be a sunburst of a reaction and it would feel something fiercer than anything else she felt in her life and then it would taper out, leaving her cool and only a bit seething as she muddled about with dubiety. Tiberii would snort a little, puffing a small breath that misted on the air before her muzzle, pawing gently at the snow she had kicked up in her flurry of fury; smacking her small jaws, and her voice went uncharacteristically quiet, as if trying to embody some of Mother's calm demeanor, but more than that, some of Mother's wit and contemplation. "Why's ya' not then?"


Tiberii would come to be more confused as he displayed his injuries, offering a sharp huff. The young darkling would not note how it appeared so clearly that he was waiting for something comparable to the slap of a paw to the back of his head, instead, she would take to him in a light no differently than she had when she was so young she had the mobility of a fawn with vertigo and the mind so delicate the snow could have disturbed it if allowed, all innocence and curiosity as she neared.

At once, Tiberii would rise to her paws and clear the slim distance between them once he abided her request. Mhm, she hummed as she stumbled close, sniffing at his nose and his muzzle and the unmarred side of his face (as if for comparison) before Tiberii paid careful and close attention to his wounds. She didn't know anything about herbs and how those treated any sort of hurt but she reckoned this was right... of course, she would need the second opinion of @Olive who she hoped now would return and sooner than soon; nobody else should take care of Father except for Mother... unless that nobody was Kuhn and then Tiberii would allow it. "Bet ya' got 'em good, too," she would tell him, not ever doubting her father's strength or his grit, of course, he probably bit them so bad they just fell with the shock! Tiberii would then ever so carefully lift one large paw (though small compared to Father's head) and rest it near the wound, knowing good and well not to touch it or else it would hurt or get all dirty, but she sought to comfort him, and so it would lay ever gently, providing a careful pap pap pap as though that was medicine enough. "Ya' coulda been restin' w' us or me at least! I'da been all quiet, for real," Tiberii reasoned like this was some court and she was resting a very good case.

But as quickly as she showed Father this care, relenting in her ferocity only a moment to stretch and lay one caring lick to his forehead all as both her parents had always given her and her siblings, Tiberii lurched up, tufted tail swaying out and her little hackles raising as she did so—mimicking that of a startled black cat. "Ya' gotta get yer rest!" she said to him, all very serious of course; having seen herself as his little right hand man since her sister and Mother's departure, Tiberii would take it upon herself to ensure he was well and okay. Quickly, she ran around him, stumbling only a little, and grabbed at his tail; the sheer volume of black fur enough to make her cheek round as she tugged furiously at him. "'m gettin' ya' back to the den, I'll make sure ya' rest and get good and well."


Of course, this meant she would perform baby's first doctor's visit followed by a nap atop Father's shoulders, and she would not be deterred! She and @Aurelia would patrol the border later all on their own, they made great time last time, too.

He would be proud once he knew.

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#10
01-11-2023, 11:16 AM
^^

Tiberius realises that he's forgotten himself. He remembers that he has laid upon her and her sisters the reality that he doesn't know what a good parent is. He hadn't had one as a child and he had been forced to grow up too soon and it was obvious now, now that he was trying to protect them but making things worse whilst he was doing it. He wasn't afforded the understanding, warmth and unconditional love that Tiberii had been shown thus far and he had taken it away suddenly and without deeper thought. She lashes out and he's to blame and he will shoulder it because it's what he did but Tiberius' heart quakes in his chest as he reminds himself he doesn't want to be to Tiberii what Wenda was to him.

It hurts him further than the way he had been seeking to protect her because he loved her (and protect himself, really) had been making her think otherwise. Making her think that he did not love her. The broken child in him cries, it weeps and it screams and it curses Wenda's name. He was doing his best and he didn't know what he was doing and it was -- it was perhaps the hardest thing he was learning. How to be a parent. He had nothing to go off of other than the way he brought up Lana when he had been a child too and look where that had landed them! Lana was gone and he was here and whatever bond that they had forged was long since broken.

He can't help but snort and then sigh, thinking that he really should have expected it. He hadn't, though, his mind and heart blinded by the thought of being rejected by his daughter that it hadn't allowed him to see her for who she was. Vera had won this fight but the one before he'd be considered the winner and the next one... well, the next one would be their last. One would die and he would do everything that he could to ensure that it wasn't him. She surprises him by lifting a paw and touching his flesh that was not torn and missing, petting it lightly in her own version of comfort and he thinks that's he's been stupid.

Stupid and blinded.

"Coulda been," he agrees, but doesn't tell her that he had done what he did because he had been scared. For now she saw him as some force that couldn't be reckoned with and he was selfish enough that he didn't want to change that until the world did it for him. She licks his head like he and Olive would always do to them and he felt the warmth blossom upon his skin at the affection but then she's changing it up and she's turned serious, puffed up and looking as if she were some type of War Sergeant. Tiberii is on the move and snagging at his tail, beckoning him with her without so much of a please. It was a demand and one that he would allow. 

Tiberius relented. 

"Alrigh'," Tiberius muses as he follows her, thinking that no matter what his enemies or the outside world thought of him, his heart was on the mend and he was the luckiest father in all of the worlds. ^^

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