it was getting colder, the blizzard was picking up and whipping around her fur. The female hunkered down, her head lowering as she pressed it against her chest. The freezing cold, the winter, the desire for the world to end through frost. That was what Chill was, the desire for the end through the cold. She even remembered the antics of her mother, in this dark moment. We do not submit to lesser wolves. And lesser wolves are wolves that aren't a solid color, lesser wolves are those that are deformed, lesser wolves are wolves we step upon. Mother was always a wise woman, it got her far in her life, and her teachings passed on to her children, or lack of children for that matter. Her claws slowly itched into the ground as she laid in the middle of the pass, the wind whipped and howled through the channel as she looked toward the exit. She would leave when the snow storm died down a bit, and not until then. Instead she would go onward to lick at her forelegs to keep them warm as the snow started to cover her. Speech,

Aros was at home among all things uncomfortable. In fact, his trial had taken place in a storm much like this one. It seemed a strange, circuitous twist of fate that he should be in the very same situation on it's anniversary. A year ago today, as best as he could figure, he had been sent away from home during a monstrous storm. His father's words still rang in his ears. Bring back a mate worthy of our bloodline or don't come back at all! Aros scoffed into the breeze, bracing his broad shoulders against the howling winds. He had been born and bred and trained for just such days as these, and to force his way through them gave him a fierce, certain pride. He had yet to meet a match for his endurance. So lost was he in his thoughts that he did not notice the young fae before him. He nearly stumbled over top of her, before he noticed the vague bump protruding from the snow. Her coat was a white to match, making it all the more difficult. He grimace, noting her diminutive stature before anything else. "You there!" he called out. "Have you no sense, laying about in the middle of a path? If you've come here to die, do it in a more convenient location." He did not break his stride as he grumbled, but his voice became guff as he had to alter his path to walk around her. The nerve of some people, he thought, passing the snow laden fae without a second glance. "Speech," Thoughts,

"When does a slave get to speak to his mistress? I don't believe I addressed you pup." Her voice cut through the snow as she continued to rest but finally climbed to her paws. Her body stretched out as she watched him walk past, her tailed swished above her haunches as she chuckled before looking up the mountain. Her eyes flickered to his retreating back as she walked quietly after him, shifting her weight so that her paws would make less noise as she walked up behind him. "Plus my bloodline just doesn't die." Chill echoed the thoughts her mother implanted into her head, she wasn't sure she liked this male, therefore he didn't deserve a glorious death by her paws. Instead she would follow him, and wait. Speech,

Aros froze mid-step as the cutting words of the lump in the snow reached him. His ears flicked in anger but he held in a snarl, knowing better than to provoke what he had not observed. He turned slowly, just in time to see the small wolf rise from the snow. While her stature was smaller than his, both in height and weight, she had the eyes of a killer. He had seen them many times, and had become adept at picking them out, even among shadows and deception. The noble line of Ysgarion, a slave? The idea of imprisonment by anyone, let alone this runt of a fae, made his fur itch with anger. He looked at her with sharp, narrowed eyes, assessing her as he had been taught. Her blood did not seem so strong to him, and even the finest could not boast of immortality. His voice was low and deep and rumbled akin to stone on stone when he spoke. "A prudent wolf might mind their words before they spoke them," he murmured, baritone cutting through the biting wind. "Especially when they do not know precisely whom they speak them to." It was unlike him to poke and prod at wolves he hardly knew, but the delay of his trek and a gnawing hunger had put him in a foul temper. If this young wolf was to be the unfortunate vessel upon which he vented, a part of him would be sorry. A small part, but a part nonetheless. "Speech," Thoughts,

Chill was keeping her composure as she made her way closer to him, her tail swaying behind herself as she allowed the smile to touch her eyes. This though was sadistic, she felt the need to play with this male, take him, and to break him, he would be her project for the day, and this should be fun. She watched the way his ears flicked back. Emotions make you weak, and the inability to control them even weaker. Her mothers voice echoed in her head as she nodded, her vocal cords moved as she hummed, purposely closing her eyes and ignoring him. Poke the male, make him angry, it would take the purpose and sharpness out of his attacks and give her more room to do what she wished. He was big, and she enjoyed that, she would love making a fool of him, allowing him to berserk at her, making his attacks sloppy while she used her nimbler frame to dodge and dance around him. Her humming got louder and then trailed off. "Are you done speaking now slave? Crawl over the ground and grovel for me, roll on your back so I can stand over you." She kept lashing venomous words at him, closing the distance between her and him, but something in the distance caught her attention as she turn and trotted toward a small outcrop in the rocks. Pink. Berries. The shaking berries she also saw in the west, they where here too? Perfect. She opened mouth and collected a few and then rubbed her nose against her chest, and then rubbed her chest against the outcrop, making it appear as she didn't care anything for him and thought itching herself was more important. Speech,

Aros turned slowly to face the small female as she once again called him a slave. The shock of the matter had worn off now, and he reexamined the female with a new, colder eye. Would this get out of hand? He was in no mood to fight, not today. He looked up just in time to see the female beside a shaking bush, fiddling amongst it's branches. Flashes of color caught his eye, the fruit of the hardy mountain plant. Had she taken something? He couldn't be sure, but his suspicion was alight. In his home land the Ingreid Clan was known for herbal warfare, but he did not know that tactic was so far spread. Beneath the calm mask of a stolid face, he was calculating. She was smaller, aye, but clearly intelligent. She would have studied, and could probably fight quite well, to still be alive with such a sharp tongue in her mouth. Her steps were assured, balanced, but so were his own. Once his father had set a pack of pups upon him an his brothers to train them in fighting smaller, quicker opponents. He knew his basics, and he had grown stronger from then on, but he would be lying to say he was in perfect fighting form. He did not know enough about this female to determine advantage, but he still hoped it would not come to that. "You silly, angry little creature," he mused quietly. "What has happened that you think yourself so above others? You are nothing special, and neither am I. We are but mortal sacks of flesh and one day we will die, no matter what our forefathers have told us." An image of his own stern, vicious father flashed behind his eyes. He sighed and went on. "Leave me alone, wench. I want nothing to do with you. Go pester someone else." But he did not turn to walk away. He would not turn his back to one such as her. "Speech," Thoughts,