Because we can

Chaos had been passing a pleasant time hunting smaller game along the mountain paths. With his owls to help him it wasn't difficult to find good meals even when winter snow made the Maw treacherous, but now that it was spring it was even easier. The mountain goats that made the mountains their home had kidded - they were difficult to get to but the owls were able to herd them or even knock them down if they were careful not to brush too close to the walls of the mountains, so he'd managed a few pretty hefty meals already this season.

But now a far greater temptation pulled his attention away from the possibility of a meal, in the form of a rough call from a ways down his mountain. He'd not heard the howl before in particular, but he'd recognize that voice after the blissful night they'd spent together at the end of autumn. He eagerly turned away from his hunt and loped down the path that led the fastest towards where the call had come from. He was aware of his companions' amusement as they winged away elsewhere to give him privacy - and likely to take the opportunity for a private moment of their own. They'd been talking wistfully about starting a family of their own, and though owls didn't actually start setting up their nests until autumn and didn't start laying until just after the winter solstice, he didn't doubt they'd want to get some "practice" in. Well, let them be amused, and let them have their fun.

Curvetting up to the entrance of a cave he thought vaguely might have belonged to one of his or Ivory Ridge's old pack members, he grinned invitingly at the small form framed in rock. "If it isn't Leto Aeris. Did you miss me that much?"