kindred spirits

Having lived most of her life in hot, arid climates like deserts and plains, Maude wasn’t really used to the ice and cold of the North. She was used to the burn of the midday sun on her back and the sting of hot rocks underfoot, not the bitter nip of icy winds and snow, or how her throat and nose ached just trying to breathe the frigid air.

However, after having spent a good few days here, she’d liked to think she was getting used to it. No one had forced her to come this way, but she was a survivalist first and foremost, and felt deep pride towards that aspect of her life: traveling around to all sorts of places, putting her skills to the test, and triumphing in the face of the harsh wilderness. That being said, she simply wouldn’t allow herself to cowardly turn back at the sight of a new, unfamiliar environment, but instead would insist on pushing forward and adapting, no matter what it takes. Such a lifestyle kept her tough and capable, and may or may not have been a remnant of her travel-weary childhood, where her father had forced her to do the same thing.

Now, she’d learned to block out the cold in the same way she’d learned to block out the sun: ignoring it by keeping her mind on other things and taking shelter wherever possible and necessary. As such, she currently found herself lounging beside one of the few pines that dotted this area, using its broad trunk to block out as much of the wind as it could. As for keeping herself distracted, her sights were currently set on a small cluster of porcupines in the near distance; likely a mother and her children, seeing how the animals were usually solitary. She watched them waddle around and occasionally disappear from sight altogether (must be a den over there), and pondered whether or not she should continue to relax and just enjoy the morning or try to catch one of the rodents and risk getting a face full of quills. For now, she merely waited, amber eyes narrowed in thought, ear occasionally twitching to the sounds around her so as to stay alert.