The strange new lands Théa had entered had proven to be quite interesting so far. She’d seen earthen formations she’s never come across before and explored them thoroughly, her salmon nose sniffing out each nook and cranny until her curiosity had been sated. Her explorations had taken her to her newest interesting area: a little clearing, surrounded by sweet smelling maple trees and littered with budding berry bushes. Her mink, Bijou, was having a hayday winding her way through the various bushes, gathering berries and shoving them in her face. Occasionally, she brought some to her and Minou, her lynx, who happily accepted them to munch on.

After a while, the woman thought of a better idea. She squished some strawberries on a nearby rock, then added just a touch of water. Dabbing her paw in it, she began to draw shapes and markings on Minou with a bright grin, and her lynx drew some back. After a while, they were both covered head to toe in bright red markings that smelled quite powerfully of strawberry. ”We look quite wonderful, I think,” she commented, licking some of the red from her paw. Delicious.

Italics mean she's speaking French

A gentle flap of wings was silent to the world below as the darkened barn owl soared above. Once the sickness had dissipated as if it had never been a thing, Gilgamesh's world had turned upside down. His eyes were opened to how lonely his existence was. How could he carry on being so alone? The barn owl had been his first step toward a new beginning. Finding the poor thing injured on one leg, Gil had secretly nursed it back to health. No one could know of his soft side. No one. So they wandered, exploring the lands he called home and headed south where the spring weather decided to stay chillier than the north. Lost in thought, his eyes were drawn upward when his owl let out a quiet hoot to alert him someone was nearby. Pausing, Gil lifted his head slightly as his ears turned to listen. A giggle and a strong scent of strawberries draw him toward the maple grove not far ahead. With light footing, Gil moves closer to the berry bushes and peers through, ensuring he doesn't get poked by any thorns. What he sees draws a smile to his lips. A wolf covered head to toe in a mess of strawberry goo with what he could only assume were her companions helping in the fun. His insides tug in two directions. The old Gilgamesh would've wanted to terrorize, to bully, to try to scare her. The new Gilgamesh thought maybe he could make a friend. "Quite the fun you're having," his deep baritone rumbles from the shadows as he steps from his non-discreet hiding spot. He holds himself in a leisurely stance with his tail low and ears relaxed as he listens to Erish land in a tree behind him.

Bijou chittered, alerting her to the upcoming presence of another, and Théa gave a lazy grin, applying another bit of paint to Minou. She said nothing to their onlooker, knowing that her companions were already keeping a close eye on them, and also because she didn’t have any particular fear of the other presence. Most logical wolves would have immediately gotten defensive, but the palmy she-wolf had no such qualms. If they attacked, they attacked, if they didn’t, well all the better.

Eventually, the wolf made their way out of their hiding spot, a deep, baritone voice rumbling out, telling her she looked like she was having a good time. It was then that Théa looked over her shoulder, her sunbeam eyes, underlined with pinkish red paint, crinkled as she smiled. “Zer is always room for anozer,” she invited, her accent thick as she lifted a red dripping paw and motioned in welcome.

She was small but when her chin turned over her shoulder to look toward him, he was caught off guard by her rosy-gold stare. It was unusual for him to meet another with eyes similar to his. Pausing with one paw raised in midstep, he hesitated. Even her smile was sweet like the strawberry goop lining her fur. Unsure of what he was going to get himself into, Gil's ears turned as her heavily accented voice invited him closer. "And perhaps, what may you be doing?" He asks curiously, his body suddenly unfreezing and approaching closer. His own yellowed gaze darts between her and her two companions, one who is similarly dressed up in the red strawberry mess. The overwhelming sweet scent makes his nose quiver, but he doesn't stop walking closer. Once he is a foot or so away, he sits and tilts his head gently to the side.

The man seemed to gain a little confidence as she opened herself up to him, offering a relaxed posture and open disposition. He ventured forward, asked her what she was up to, though from the flickering of his eyes to and fro and the wiggle of his nose at the overpowering scent of sickly sweet strawberry, she felt it was pretty obvious and he knew it, too. The woman picked up a small glob of the homemade paint at the tips of her small paws, not even asking permission before she smeared some on the white of his neck in a ‘v’ formation, the color bright against the paleness of the fur. “I suppose you can call
eet...mm, ‘ow you say…’arts and crafts’, she replied with an impish grin and a pleased flutter of her tail.

She sat back and looked at her work on him, her own head tilting, eyes roaming over her body before she gave a small shake of her head. “I do not zink zat zis is zee color for you, perhaps...mmm..violet,” she said, her eyes finally lifting to search his for his opinion.

Italics means she's speaking French

Stepping close enough to be within reach, Gil sits down to watch the girl with mild interest. Her relaxed disposition made him all the more curious. Why would one such as herself not be afraid of strangers? Before he could utter a word, he watched as she dipped a paw into the bright right mixture and smeared it across his chest. The bright red V across his pale chest made him look down in surprise. No one had ever reached out to touch him without permission before. At a loss of words, he looks back up to her as she describes her activity as "arts and crafts." Not the kind of arts and crafts he'd done before. Making pottery and painting a hide, yes. Painting yourself? No, but he wasn't opposed to it now. This was his new life. One of being open to new things and not being such a grump. Gil watches as she states that red is not quite his color. What did she mean by that? Looking back down to his chest, he examines the smear before looking back to her. He had no idea what color would look good on him. "Violet? As in purple? Maybe?" His words hold some confusion, but he doesn't tell her to stop.

Thankfully, the golden-eyed man didn’t react negatively to her slathering him in strawberry paint. It seemed she had found a suitable partner for her mischievous deeds, this thought only causing her smile to widen. He did, however, seem a little surprised at her actions, along with a heaping mix of curiosity. She always liked the look of curiosity on the faces of wolves, she thought it made them look more enticing, not that the handsome mottled male needed any help in that department. He was quite the looker, though it didn’t take much for Théa to appreciate the appearance of another. She was a lover of all, no matter their appearance, gender preference, or no preferences at all. Everyone was a being with their own stories and that was attractive enough to her.

Her called it purple and she nodded her head vigorously. ”Ah, oui purple. English has so many words,” the woman replied, her words coming out almost as a sigh at the end. Taking his question as permission, she ventured over to a grape vine and pulled off several berries before wandering back over. She popped one in her mouth, pressing another against his lips and waiting for him to take it, before setting the rest on a clean rock. She smashed them into a fine pulp with her white toed paws, added a little water to make it more liquidy, then looked back at the male with a tilted head. A hum came from her lips as she decided where she wanted to place it, before deciding to place a few swipes of color under his bright golden eyes. ”C’est magnifique,” she complimented, proud of her work.

The interaction with the pale-coated female was interesting enough to keep his thoughts at bay. A welcomed distraction from how dreary life had been as of late, Gil let out a friendly smile. Her thickly accented voice, in truth, was hard to understand at times, but he would get by with gentle nods and his own gruff hums of agreement. "What language is that of yours?" He asked curiously as he watched her pull away toward a grapevine. She worked as if she had done this a hundred times before and he wondered how often she painted other wolves. Slightly distracted by his own thoughts, he was surprised when she held a grape to his lips. Widening his eyes for a moment, he took it gingerly and ate it in one chew. The sweet juice of the grape coated his throat and he wondered why he hadn't thought to eat those before. Humming quietly under his breath, he sat still as she made her concoction of paint. His tail wagged gently as she came back over. Gil's eyes followed as her paw dipped into the purple goo and spread it under his eyes. As she exclaimed in French, he could only imagine that it meant something good. Widening his smile, he let out a quiet chuckle. "I do hope that meant good," he commented as he noticed her proud expression.