Adventuring north was proving to be a most beneficial decision for Sylvia. Each time she did so, in one forest or the next, she would run into the most interesting of wolves and be granted entertainment for the day... or night, depending on the flavor of wolf. While she mostly stuck around the battlefield, still hoping Valkyrie would finally show up in the middle of some great battle that Sylvia could jump in and assist on. After all, finding Valk had been her main goal when traveling to these lands, but that didn't mean the russet woman had to put her life on hold now did it? Recalling one of her first trips to the northern forests, Sylvia set out to find the red woods, where the trees expanded in their girth far greater than any other she had seen. It took her but half a days travel, but that was alright. After visiting with Drifa, she now knew the steps to building herself a fire, if something were to keep her in the forest overnight. 

Once the woman arrived, she found herself the largest tree at the heart of the forest, and decided to investigate it further. Just how old must the bark be to grow to such lengths?  She couldn't help but wonder. Long legs would quickly work to travel about the length of the trunk, counting her strides as she did so. When she got past twenty strides, her pace slowed, and her head turned upward as curiosity began to build within her. A normal tree was an excellent home for the small forest critters,  but with trunks like these.. she wondered if perhaps this type of vegetation would be just big enough to even house a creature like herself. "A tree... house." She mumbled to herself with a grin. Violet eyes gazed out with a vast imagination, thinking of how she would carve out her own spiraling staircase around the trunk, or even dig out the center of the tree for a den high up in the canopy. It was an intriguing idea, but how on earth would one accomplish such a feat? Curiously, Sylvia would stand up on her hind legs to dig into the bark, attempting to see just how thick the bark was and how easily it could be done.

"Sylvia"

Saying Kai was restless was an understatement. He'd been staying much closer to Winterfell's lands than he would've liked though, for his sake, he'd decided for now to play along with Acere's game. Simply fleeing would be too easy.. or would it? The talk of an upcoming raid was relatively interesting to Kai, despite his lack of experience when it came to fighting. Maybe sinking his fangs into something other than prey would help him feel alive again. He'd never been one for being weighed down by negativity but it was hard not to be influenced by all that had happened the last year or so. Something, anything, needed to change. A faint grimace was visible on his features as he wove between the redwood trees, temporarily lost in his thoughts. The scent of a stranger aroused his interest though, and almost instinctively he redirected his course to see if he could find something a bit more lively to entertain him. It didn't really matter what, at this point - anything would do. Sniffing hard at the cool air, he continued on, plodding through the forest until the silhouette of someone appeared in his field of vision. His large tusked head swung in her direction, taking in her scent as he trailed after it, noting even from a distance that she was doing something quite unusual. "Interesting tactic," he drawled as he moved closer, his silver eyes flashing with faint amusement. "Not the way I'd try to conquer a tree but it's something, I suppose."

The sound of her nails dragging across the rich bark must've been loud enough to conceal the males approach, because Sylvia did not realize she was no longer alone until his voice graced her ears. A grin pulled at the corners of her lips the moment she realized another male had entered her company. Just what the doctor ordered, she thought to herself amusingly. Slowly she would turn to look over her shoulder, a playful grin still on her face with one eye brow cocked above her violet orbs. "And I suppose a big burly man like yourself concurs trees often, hm?" She would hum, her amusement evident in her voice. As she scanned him from head to toe, she realized what a specimen this creature was, a true catch in deed. The ash grey male stood over her form, causing her head to be tilted ever so slightly up. However it was the deep red hues panted across his face and hind limbs that caught her attention. A color just beyond an earthly tone, beautiful and rare as if was, highlighted his facial features wonderfully, including the most fascinating aspect of the male; tusks.

Sylvia had witnessed her fair share of oddities in these lands, to the point where a wolf with elongated teeth wasn't startling her. But indeed it was a first for her, and the added characteristic caused her interest to peak, forcing the russet woman to climb down from the tree to face him fully. She took a slow step forward, cocking her head to the side as she flashed the man a coy smile. "Tell me, tree master, how would you go about carving your way through a tree this... massive." She drawled, nodding her head to the redwood beside her. In truth, she had hoped his answered involved something to do with those tusks. Sylvia so desperately wanted to see the man using them in action.

"Sylvia"

His heart had been much lighter, once. He wondered sometimes if he'd moved too far away from the path of the Jarvela but he wasn't the type to spend too long living in the past, let alone worrying about the future. The tides of time would carry him wherever they chose, he supposed - he was merely along for the ride. Best not invest too much thought - or time - into anything, Kai. See where that's gotten you? His thoughts were followed by a low snort, easily mistaken as a direct reaction to Sylvia's words. "Don't you dare presume what I'm capable of," he warned her, though his voice was far from threatening, harboring that same lazy drawl as before. His deep tones were touched faintly with amusement that didn't quite surface completely, though. "Perhaps I'll catch you off guard, if you're not careful." As if tree climbing was in his arsenal of skills. Far from it. He was visibly built for strength rather than speed or dexterity - the blood of the far north ran strong in his veins, despite where he'd been born.

He returned the visible appreciation unabashedly. Though the female was considerably smaller than him, and easily half his age, she was still attractive. Her presence hadn't immediately rubbed him the wrong way, either, which was a rarity these days. Her clear sense of humor was a sign that she might entertain him for a short while, if nothing else. "Hell if I know," he admitted finally, grinning faintly as she spun around toward him. "Though I'd refrain from trying to topple it if I were you. Some people think those things have souls," Kai spoke casually, trying to pry a reaction from her, knowing fully well it'd take more than one wolf to take down a tree of that size. Kai was just... deeply bored and restless, he was painfully aware of that - and he wanted some kind of emotion to ignite within him, as lately so little seemed to be capable of doing so.

His reaction was not at all what Sylvia had expect, for usually her playful banter was met with open arms, however this male seemed more cool to the touch than she originally bargained him to be. A little disappointing perhaps, but the chocolate woman was never one to back down from a challenge. She simply shrugged in response, her grin slipping from her lips slightly. "Who knows, perhaps it would be a nice surprise, no?" Fighting or bedding, this male seemed like a good time regardless. It would seem lovers were in short supplies in the lands of Boreas in comparison to her homeland, instead wolves seemed eager to spar or battle wild beasts, as if their pent up energy could only be released by violence and not passion. Sylvia would pay little mind to it, being a woman of warrior descents anyway. Though perhaps she was unaware of native drama? Some large scale spitfire that was causing so much unrest? A war could very well be on the horizon and she would be complete blind to it if she did not find her cousin's band of raiders soon.

She made a small tsk sound with his next answer, bummed to not have found a wolf with similar vision as herself, but his insight into the wood intrigued her. "And are you one of those wolves, do you think the trees have souls?" She had learned her lesson not to verbally assume such traits, but only a wolf who believed such things would be so verbal about it, in her opinion. Sighing as she sat back on haunches, she peered up at the towering trees with longing violet eyes. "Just as well, I'd probably fall out of whatever home I'd build for myself up there anyway." Her golden vision of a home above the canopy becoming tainted with black ink as she envisioned her own... quickly approaching death. She shuddered at the thought, focusing her attention rather on the males strange scent. Her brows narrowed at him, "You carry a scent not entirely your own, is there a pack nearby I should know about?" Sylvia was eager to join her cousins hoard, but to be caught trespassing could lead her captured, a slave, or even worse.

"Sylvia"

It was hard to truly shake the agitation from his mind. Kai felt alarmingly like a fruit that had slowly began to rot, its sweetness slowly turning sour - though her reactions seemed to slow him from turning too quickly. "Perhaps," the tusked giant sighed, perhaps a bit too wistfully for his own taste. He wondered, briefly, what an existence would be if he could in fact conquer trees - in any sense of the word. Physically toppling trees didn't sound appealing to him, but scaling them? Could any wolf even climb these redwoods? Slowly he tipped his head skyward, examining the lowest hanging branches for a moment. The freedom of such a life was appealing, but he truly believed he belonged on solid ground - even swimming had never been terribly appealing to him, and the sea certainly didn't elicit pleasant thoughts for him either.

"Of course trees have souls," he replied, just as lazily. There was conviction in his beliefs, but the beauty of his own spirituality was that it didn't matter to him whether or not anyone else bought into it. Like he gave a damn what anyone thought about much of anything, let alone what was going on inside his head. Briefly his silver stare fell to her, curious as she too gazed high into the treetops. "Half the fun of climbing is the fear of falling, don't you think?" Okay, maybe he was a bluffing a bit there. That sort of overwhelming thrill was something he sure longed for lately.. but while he could be a daredevil when he wanted to be, he knew better than to jump blindly into grave danger. He valued his life far too much for that.

"There's a pack to the east of here. Why do you care?" Kai raised a brow, curious but still far from combative. It didn't matter if she wanted to cause them trouble. He was merely a temporary visitor there, as far as he was concerned.. one who was still grappling with what to do about his current predicament. Thus far it was keeping him vaguely entertained though he wondered still of Akna had been right when he'd sought out her advice. "Name's Kai, by the way, since a woman of so many questions will surely ask that one eventually," his tone lightened slightly as he, too, lowered himself to his hindquarters and let his front paws stretch out beneath him.