summer breeze kissing chapped chubby children's cheeks - his eyes glinting the waves of grass before him. distant lumps of the earth, memorials murmuring secrets beneath that go beyond his head. odd formations - something he'd ask about perhaps. something he'd ask his father about, his mother, his uncle. no more.

his lip caught on an upper canine as he came to a stop and felt the brush tickling his underbelly. a murmur in his solicitude before his elongated nose and arched, awkward teen body began to snake through the high grass after some sort of movement. a childish chase after a hare he was nowhere near to touch and soon it came to be the truth as he skipped to a halt with a deep shagged breath in defeat.

He explores the neighboring areas because if he doesn’t, he might drink himself to death. Boredom at the beach where everyone was always drunk, more bored than himself, or brawling. There was joy in living the life of a Pirate and then there was disappointment. As he aged and saw for his own eyes that this life was not all that it was cracked up to be, he yearned for more. Something inside of him craved to go out and see the world for himself. There had to be more to life than being a drunk Pirate, right?   Scald wasn’t so sure as his quiet but curious nature took him out to the knolls that day. While he sometimes preferred the dim and dingy areas such as the crypt or spooky forest, it felt refreshing to be out in the open. Above him, the sun dazzled and warmed the earth, warmed his pelt, warmed everything around him. Summer had arrived and quickly. One moment he was fighting off the frigid temperatures of winter and the next he was panting and wishing for its quickly return. Not only that, he often saw animals scurrying across his path. Life was abundant out here. Flowers, trees, tall grass, mice, deer, hares. One caught his eye. The long eared, big pawed, buck toothed critter rushed across his path in a hurry to get away from something. No, someone. Stopping his own large paws as his shadowy grey face turned to look, he finally laid eyes on the someone who had been chasing the hare. Scald’s nose twitched as his ears turned forward and the hair and quills along his spine raised ever so slightly. The stranger was perhaps around his age and dark in color as well, maybe even more slender than his own frame. Apprehensive but also curious, Scald takes a few steps toward the boy, scents the air one more time and lets his tail lift slightly over his haunches. There is no pack scent on this one. That is not unusual. He has come across many loners so far. Pack life wasn’t for everyone. Being a Pirate himself, he was not taught to be anti-social. Rather, everyone was your friend when you were a Pirate. Or an enemy. There really was a grey area there. After a few moments of silence from him as he listened to the chatter of birds and scurry mice through the grass, Scald lets a smile cross his muzzle. “Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” he calls out coyly as he takes a few more steps. Standing tall because he was a tall albeit lanky teen and continues to keep his gaze on the boy. “You out here alone?” Scald asks as his head lilts ever so slightly to the side. Intimidating? Not intentionally. Friendly? Eh, he could work on that part. Maybe he was more like his father than he wished to believe. S C A L D

irked - not that he was hungry. just a display of failure as he watched and listened to the scurrying of the creature dart for some sort of cover. if only it had thought - in that moment - to simply stand still and make the man depend on his nose. while not smart for the rodent, smart for the lanky teenager as he shifted his weight in contemplation. tail angled just above the whispering blades, jaw parted ever so slightly as he observed and recognized where he was now after his encounter.

someone else.

his lips smacked close - a slight clicking noise of teeth coming together, straining, grinding for a moment as he watched a boy similar in age to him approach. oily black raising on his spine, up through his neck and the softer greys inbetween his ears rose almost as a mirror of the rest of them. he hadnt seen someone that spoke similar words in ages, if only he could hear the whispers of the true wiccan language. he missed the ushers of his mother in the morning - the dried lavender and the desert plants embedded within her. she was that smell - not the other way around.

His nose tipped down just for a moment as the boy began to speak - respect, eagerness to size up and understand. his chapped boylips and unruly hair moved only only for a moment before speaking. "just me, and yoou?" extra syllables, coated tongue. desert descent on his tongue. boyish - waiting to find familiar tones and words of his elders. Persian dayboy

There is a palpable tension between them. He can feel it as the other boy regards him. Slight movements of the face, eyelids closing and opening, lips moving. Scald stays in place, only a mere few feet away. He is also looking the other boy over. Two different colored eyes latched on, unmoving, waiting with baited breath. Would there be aggression? His hackles start to raise a hair more. His breath hitches until the stranger speaks only four words. Was he really questioning if it was just the two of them? Scald’s face tilts back to the other side as his ears move back. He finally allows himself to glance around. Grass, wildflowers, sparsely placed trees, flittering birds, an occasional dragonfly. From what he could see, smell, and sense, yes indeed it was just the two of them. It is only seconds later that he looks back at the boy. “Why yes, it is just me and you,” he answers as his expression shifts into a more placid and docile appearance. Shifting his weight so he rests it on one hip, he allows his hackles and quills to smooth out. “What brings you out here?” Scald asks, hoping that maybe the boy just needs some enticing to come out of his shell. S C A L D

"and the birds and the bees.." a soft hum, watching as the multi-colored eye young boy relaxed and seemed at home within the fields that he stood in. his very own eyes - tracing down the white patch atop his tones and across the multi dimensional shades across his face. tone crossed with the ands and the cursed whispers of his mother. immigrant, slick back hair and dirt under his cheek-bone.

what was he doing here?

a flicker of the ears, first back, side wards, forwards in all a mere second as if embarrassed, lost. he didn't have a good answer, but he didn't necessarily need one. or want one - really. "enjoying my travels, its very green." he stated, eyes searching for the answer to the same question as ears finally settled, body relaxed for a moment as he looked beyond his shoulder at the roaring green hillscape within and beyond them. liquored and salted with his ancestry - chapped lips and sand in his hair. "i'm kurus"

While Scald preferred the grainy beach and dripping cavern of back home, he could see why others would enjoy the rolling fields. The prey was bountiful, fat from grazing, and there was plenty of shade and places to hide from the warm summer heat. He wondered then if this boy was from around here. Were the knolls his home or did he hail from somewhere else? The accented tone the boy spoke with was very different than anything he had ever heard someone speak with. His face nods in a simple agreement. Yes, it was very green here. One of the few places he knew of in Boreas to be so green. Similar to Emerald Valley or that other place he had been to. “Green is only one color you can find in these lands,” Scald adds, unsure why he says it. Maybe to make conversation. He wasn’t sure. An ear does flicker in the other boy’s direction when he is introduced. Kurus. Interesting. “Kurus,” Scald tries it on his tongue but his rugged accent sounds nothing like how Kurus says it. “I am Scald,” he finally replies back after a moment of rolling the boy’s name around in his head. “Where’re ya from, Kurus?” Scald asks as he shifts on his paws until he finds a more comfortable standing position. S C A L D