Knowing that she knew the rules, the girls parents had given her a little more leeway to hunt for her treasures. Bowen ate this freedom up eagerly and began to explore further almost instantly. She knew that her mother's jackals weren't far behind and that gave her a sense of safety, no matter no far away from the den she went. If anything happened, she knew that they would fetch her mothers. A scent on the wind brought the girls head rising. Green eyes scanned the area. Those weren't pack scents. The pups had been told of the border, but she'd never been to it. Now that she knew where it was, she was interested. Her treasure hunt temporarily forgotten, the caramel cream girl padded forward, her little pink nose working to work out the different scents that had marked the border. She smelled her mother. She smelled Askan and Dunkan. Directly on the other side though, she smelled foreign wolves. Why did they need borders to begin with? Couldn't they all be nice to one another? After a time, the novelty of the border waned. Releasing a soft little sound of disappointment, Bowen turned and started to move back towards home. The world had different plans though. As she stepped down, a long thorn stabbed straight into her front right paw. The young pup yelped, instinct making her shake the paw immediately. The thorn was lodged in deep, but the blood began to flow. Bowen had never been injured before. The stinging pain in her paw and the confusion of the whole situation filled the girls wide viridian eyes with tears. She sat down and she cried. Wouldn't someone help her? "Bowen"

Jigsaw's quest to find every flower in the universe that matched Recluse' pale eyes was a long one, and he thought for sure he'd emptied the Nook of every matching color in the week he'd been collecting. Continuing south the skinny boy wandered with his eyes roaming the grasses for more of the same pale shade, not even noticing the border approaching or the new scents that should have flooded his senses as he neared. His attention was only pulled from his search at the sound of another's pain, and immediately the healer-in-training was in motion slapping his small paws across the ground as he ran to her. Without regard for the border that separated them, Jigsaw approached her. It was time for some real-deal healing, and she was to be his second patient ever. "Hi there, I'm Jigsaw. What's your name?" He introduced softly, with the practiced tone he'd learned to help soothe an injured wolf. "Can I help you? I'm in training to be the worlds' best healer, I promise you're in good paws." "Speech" "Thinking" "You."

Though she had wished for help, she didn't think it would actually come. Through her soft cries and the tears in her eyes, she heard and saw the approach of another. She didn't know this boy and her first instinct was to curl her tail up against her belly and tuck her ears against her skull. His soothing tones and the insistence that he was a healer however calmed her a bit. Still sniffling, she replied in kind. "I'm B-Bowen." She sniffled again, extending her dainty little paw. A big thorn still stuck out of the pad. It would need to be pulled out before any healing happened. She couldn't bring herself to pull it out though. Just the thought of it made her feel a little queasy. Hopefully Jigsaw could pull it out for her. She knew it was going to hurt though. "I stepped on a thorn," she stated the obvious, but saying it aloud helped somewhat, though she couldn't explain why. Giant, emerald eyes swam with tears as she fought not to look at her injured paw. Instead, she focused on the earthen-hued boy before her. Where had he come from? She hoped that he wouldn't get in trouble for being on Hallowed ground. "Bowen"

Thankfully his little patient didn't seem too combative, though Jigsaw could tell he scared her on approach. She held out her paw to him and he inspected it carefully from a distance, knowing it needed to be yanked out before anything else could be done. He shouldered off his bag, letting it fall to the ground and hefted it towards her slightly. "There are a lot of pretty flowers in here, you should pick one. A gift from me to you." Jigsaw gave her a soft smile, stepping forward slowly until he was within range of her paw. The boy waited until she'd be distracted - whether just glancing at the bag or reaching in to grab one of the colorful flowers - and then aimed to close his jaws around the thorn and give it a sharp yank. "Speech" "Thinking" "You."

Properly distracted by the offer of pretty things, Bowen nosed into the bag that the boy had pushed towards her. She had barely noticed what he was doing and the thorn came out without a hitch. It was the fact that it was gone and she hadn't noticed that forced a sound from the girl. Emerald eyes went wide as she stared down at her now empty paw. "Wow, i didn't even feel it! You're really good at this!" Behind the girl, her little caramel and cream tail wagged furiously. Who was this guy? He had swooped in out of nowhere and had saved her. There was no way she would have been able to walk all the way back to her den on three paws. Feeling a little bashful, the girl lowered her lashes. "Thank you." "Bowen"

Jigsaw's expression lit up in a bright smile as she praised him, his tail lashing through the air with excitement. He was good at this, wasn't he? Worlds best healer, here I come. "You're really good at being a patient." He praised in return, remembering the last wolf he treated and how she disagreed with his treatment plan. "You really can have a flower, too." Jigsaw eyed the injured paw, wondering if there was more he needed to do to ensure it would heal properly. Nobody had taught him how to bandage yet, and though it was such a tiny wound he had no idea if it should be covered or not to prevent dirt from wedging in there when she walked. "Make sure you show it to an adult, 'kay? Just to make sure it's all better." There, he could provide the emergency medicine and her normal healer could do the follow ups. "Speech" "Thinking" "You."

Bowen wiggled her paw. It was still trickling a bit of blood, but it felt a lot better with the thorn out of there. The boy said that she was a good patient and the cinnamon girl smiled. Jigsaw told he that she could have a flower and Bowen chose a pretty yellow one that she tucked behind her ear. She's seen momma do that once or twice, so she thought it was a good idea. The boy advised her to show an adult as soon as possible and Bowen nodded in agreement. "I will. I'll show my momma as soon as I can." Momma was the one for healing booboos. Mom was the one for protection. Now that the thorn was out, she imagined that the boy would go back to his own territory and she would stay in hers. The small child's tail wagged as she stood. "Thank you again, Jigsaw. You're the best healer I've ever met!" Lifting her paw, she waved, smiled and began limping her way back towards home. "Bowen"

Jigsaw was pleased beyond belief with each new word she spoke and was feeling like a true healer at last. Recluse was going to be so dang proud of him, he only wondered how many more thorns he'd need to pull out of paws before she gave him the senior healer rank he deserved. "Thanks!!" He nodded as she agreed to show her momma, but then his smile faded as she smiled, waved, and turned away. Without the veil of patient-doctor professionalism he faded back into shyness, unable to ask her to stay and play with him and suddenly very aware of the fact that he was over the border. He frowned at her departing form and tried to tell himself to remember later to ask his dad if he could visit the cinnamon girl again - to check on her wound, of course. Though being unable to bring himself to interrupt her as she left, he merely stood up himself, grabbed his bag, and headed back towards the border with his tail hanging listlessly behind him. -exit?- "Speech" "Thinking" "You."