Hopeless places

Indecision was understandable Arusi had said, but that didn't provide much comfort when Ignatius felt like he was once again letting someone else down with his own shortcomings. In this instance it was his inability to make a choice. Not surprising, he never much cared for being the one to call the shots, although he always managed to end up in that position anyway. Perhaps he was better for it but that didn't really help him now when he was still in need of time to heal in more ways than he was keen to admit and despite that found himself charged with the care of a child he had only met the day her father died. The thought of Souzan had his eyes stinging with tears that he stoically held back but the emotion remained on his face. He'd eventually settled on heading back more southwest in the hopes that based on what he gathered from Cen and his own foggy memory there might still be a pack there.

Ignatius had ventured ahead to scope things out and get a little breather from Arusi's constant fussing. The gelada was a good friend but also exhausting. He'd been trying not to wander too far but an odd smell had caught his attention. It smelled like burning rock. With the largely uninteresting trek thus far providing mostly distant hills and rocky soil broken up with sparse dead grass, he couldn't help himself when he saw a small animal down a slight slope ahead of him moving towards what looked like some kind of cavern. Trotting after it, he decided it was some sort of fox as it was very much smaller than most wolves and the tail seemed long and bushy. It was only just evening and the sun was still trying to hold itself above the horizon for a while longer so he was quite certain what he saw wasn't just a trick of his mind.

He probably shouldn't be too surprised that there were non-wolves with odd traits, he just wasn't as used to seeing them here. The fox, which otherwise might have been pretty normal, sported subtle accents of violet that seemed to pulse lightly with a luminescence not unlike Ignatius'. It was quite striking and appealing to the eye. And speaking of eyes, as he edged closer and finally caught the animal's attention when it caught his scent and turned to face him with wide eyes, he noted that they were a unique gradient of violet and gold.

"What do you want?" Snapped the startled vulpine with a sneer. Not too friendly, was she?

Halting a few body lengths away Ignatius canted his head. Giving the fierce little fox a soft smile, he chuckled. "Who said I want anything? Maybe I'm just here for a family reunion," quipped the fiery wolf, glancing from his own faintly glowing fur back to hers. The response seemed to calm the startled fox a bit, some her her ruffled fur smoothing back down a bit as she looked him over and scoffed, "Bit big n ugly to be one of my kin."

"Distant cousin maybe," Ignatius mused, glancing past her to the cavern that smelled strongly of fire and sulfur. The fox didn't follow his gaze but did raise a brow and ask, "What do you have to do with this place?" Ig simply shrugged in response and got a scowl in return, "Go home then, wolf."

Ignatius was going to tell her he didn't really have one right now and ask her what gave her the right to tell him to leave but she'd already gone loping off into the cavern before he could get any of the words out and then he was alone again unsure of what to do. What was all that about? For a few moments he just had to sit and process what he'd just experienced, not sure if he should actually leave and return to trying to get his previous thoughts in order so that he could finally start moving his life forward - whatever that meant - and get Cendrillion to a place where she could be safe and grow up, although her diminutive size for her age was starting to have him thinking that maybe she wasn't really going to do a ton in the actual growing department... Or, what was he thinking again? He couldn't stop wondering what the fox was doing after it disappeared. It was such an odd experience. Eventually curiosity got the better of him and he made his was towards the cavern with some trepidation.

The temptation to turn around and leave was overwhelming from the moment he started to approach, only briefly overridden by curiosity as he came to see a faint light inside. The entrance was wider even than the mines they'd stayed in for a time, so he was a little more comfortable than he'd been before. There was hesitance in every movement as he slowly edged his way down the dark path into what felt more and more like the depths of hell as the temperature increased with every foot of elevation he lost. Oddly enough, he found small, glowing mushrooms struggling to establish themselves in crevice's between rocks. It didn't seem like a hospitable place for them but he wasn't too surprised given how odd things seemed to just sort of happen here every now and then. When he came to where the entrance opened up into a wide room he stopped to look around, amazed at the rock pillars dripping curtains of lava into a flowing river of molten rock. It was beautiful, you know, in a 'this looks like a terrible place to die' kind of way.

A flash of movement across the way down the uneven path caught his eye and he could have sworn he saw some black fur but then it was gone and nothing but the dripping lava was around to keep him company. Ignatius tried to pretend he didn't see any funny moving lights either out over the lava. It was just bubbles of the stuff popping and sending drops flying, that was it. Right?