some peace of mind

She was still feeling sufficiently cowed by her brush with Azure, so she tried to bite back a noise of disappointment when the scent of another Armada wolf tickled her nose. Was someone else coming to berate her? That would be just the thing, huh? But her eyes rested on a reddish wolf wearing a hulking polar bear skin. Mak didn't know her name off of the top of her head, but she knew she was well-travelled and shared the same rank as her mother. You gave me a fright, pale one. Makara tilted her head to the side, unaware of how spotting her in the distance might be a bit spooky. She flipped her goggles up to get a better look at Keahi - down here on the forest floor, hardly any light penetrated. It was dim enough - and spring was over, so the worst of her allergies were through - that she could focus without her eyes watering too badly.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to frighten anyone," she said, her voice hesitant. Mak always felt like she was walking on egg shells with most of her pack members, the weight of some collective disappointment like a millstone around her neck. The forest around them seemed to dampen all sound. If she listened hard enough, she could catch the faintest trill of birdsong but it seemed as if it came from miles above. Each trunk was easily two or three times her size from nose to tail tip. "Ah! I lost count," she grumbled. Perhaps measuring the steps around the trunk was not a very useful metric, but it would have made her feel a shade better to accomplish something. "My name's Makara. You're Armada too, yeah?" she said, shifting from paw to paw. Any second now she'd be reprimanded for not making better use of her time, not bettering the pack, not doing anything useful at all...

Explored a new land 2/3