The light, but steady rain that drizzled down around her didn’t haunt her adventures. Deciding to come back to Boreas after all this time had been a weird choice for the adventure prone woman, but she had been feeling a little nostalgic and this seemed like it would be the only cure. There was still some distance to go till she got back to the mangroves that she had been raised in, but she wasn’t one to hurry. The lands between here and there were interesting enough so why not enjoy them? Her crimson and white spotted coat was soaked through, but the mild temperatures kept it from being uncomfortable.

The wide, shallow basin she had come across was mostly empty, just a small pool toward the center and a few random puddles around showing that the mostly flat area could fill up to be some sort of lake at all. For the most part it was just mud from where the soft dirt had mixed with rain that had been falling for most of the day. A curious, pale paw poked at the squishy surface and it left an imprint of her paw pads behind. She stepped out onto the empty lake bed, noticing how her paws slipped and slid on the mud. With a grin she started to side around on the slick surface, skating messily back and forth around the muddy ground till her paws and most of the lower halves of her legs were coated in it. Normally she wouldn’t be one to get purposefully dirty like this, but... why not? No one was around, she was bored, and the rain would wash it off anyway!

That Sea is just a Gambler at Heart

He'd had the good luck to find a dying Dall Sheep. It had some sort of infection but that didn't bother an opportunistic predator like a wolf. Dómari had been swift to move in and finish the animal off. Now that he had the sheep he was intent on skinning it and tanning the hide. Though as he started to work his jaws around the sheep's neck it started to rain. Aww crap. Dómari seized the sheep and moved to a part of the lake where there was a rockier area and over hang that offered some shelter. He had to admit it was pretty the way the lake bed seemed to reflect the sky but it was terrible timing. He was hoping the lake would be the perfect place to dry some meat, go figure it would rain in the desert at just the moment he needed everything to be dry.

Dómari settled down to continue working on the sheep. He cut the flesh around the left wrist and peeled the hide back up the arm and over the left shoulder. Once he had it there he started digging into the meat. He wanted to see how the sheep's shoulder blade compared to that of the deer for scraping the hide. Especially since he didn't have the scraper with him. Dómari swallowed some of the meat off the shoulder as he went. As he sat there chewing the flesh down he spied a woman sliding across the mud. "Wow, that looks like fun, albeit messy fun."

The two-toned woman had been so caught up in her silly game that she hadn't noticed the wolf that had taken up residence in one of the near by rocky outcroppings. She giggled as she slid to a stop near one of the boulders that sat toward the edge of the lake, leaning against it to stop herself from sliding further. The rain was already beginning to slow, the desert rains being the quick flashes of weather events that they were, but that didn't mean that the ground around her wasn't still extremely slick and muddy. Deciding that she had enough of her fun for now, she carefully made her way over to the more solid ground around the edge of the shallow lake bed, shaking off her paws as she went. They were still obviously muddy and Elise decided that she would just have to find a stream or river to wash up in once the rain had officially passed.

She trotted over to the rocks she had seen before with the plan to wait out the weather there, but that's when she spotted the gray man with his mouth bloodied by the kill he seemed to be enjoying. "Oh!" she exclaimed with surprise, "I'm sorry! I didn't see you here!" She glanced back out toward the lake, briefly looking to see if there was another outcropping or something else she could shelter in, but she didn't immediately see one. She looked to the stranger again, her ears flicking back uncertainly. "Do you mind if I sit here with you for a bit?" That's when it occurred to her that this makeshift shelter looked directly out over the lake she had just been playing in and it reminded her how ridiculous she currently looked with her legs covered in mud. Her cheeked warmed with an embarrassed blush and she added, "Youuuuu probably saw me out there... huh?"

That Sea is just a Gambler at Heart

Dómari worked through the meat that covered the shoulder blade. Enjoying his snack as he went. He licked his lips and looked up at the woman as she looking at him in uncertainty. He nodded. "Sure, come on in. You're welcome to a snack to if you want. I just need to finish with the hide and get this shoulder blade out of here." He worked down until he found the joint. Steeling himself he pulled sharply, popping it loose… well sort of. He quickly reached down and finished working some of the ligaments free before he set the scapula aside.

He chuckled. "Yea I did, don't be embarrassed though. There's nothing wrong with having a bit of fun now and then. Do you live around here?" With the scapula set aside he finished the side of the ram he'd been skinning. So that was half done that was good. He finished working the leg free that he pulled the scapula from and set that aside to act as a snack if the woman wanted it.

It didn’t really matter how much he insisted she shouldn’t be embarrassed, it still lingered on her mind all the same. It had been one thing when she had thought that she had been alone, but now knowing that he had been watching the whole time... it made her feel silly and childish. She was an adult now! She shouldn’t be doing things like that any more... right? She huffed and settled down a few feet from him and his kill, watching him work curiously just to get her mind off the situation.

”Not exactly,” she replied to his question of if she lived around here. When he offered her a bit of the prey she took it gratefully, nibbling on the snack thoughtfully. ”I don’t guess I don’t really live anywhere in particular right now. I used to live around the mangroves over toward the other side of Boreas when I was little, but I haven’t been in Boreas for a long time... Until now, obviously. I haven’t really decided where I want to live yet.” She wasn’t exactly sure why she was telling him all of these things, but it felt like easy enough conversation and he had been nice enough to share his food with her so he seemed alright.

”I’m Elise, by the way. What’s your name?”

That Sea is just a Gambler at Heart

Dómari seized the ram and coiled his legs beneath him, shifting his weight to give him some leverage as he flipped the animal over away from the girl. Once the animal was flipped he began removing the hide from the other side. He worked swiftly, fangs working through flesh. He was anxious to get done and chat a bit more but he supposed it was unwise to linger too long in one place with a fresh kill. He was likely to attract unwanted attention. Once he was finished he set the hide aside, fur side down and licked the blood off his face.

"I'm Dómari. It's nice to meet you Elise. I'm from a pack just south of here. I haven't been to too many other territories or I'd try to make a suggestion but I'd say the west and south have much milder winters." He moved back over to the scapula and began running his tongue along it, nibbling bits of meat here and there. He wanted to use it as a scraper and thus he needed to get the rest of the flesh off of it.

She hummed thoughtfully when he mentioned that he lived in a pack near here. There was vague memories in the back of her mind of her father telling her about a pack that some of their more extended family led that was around this area so maybe that was the one he was talking about. Maybe that was a stretch, but Boreas wasn't as big as it seemed. If the stories from her childhood were to be believed she had quite a bit of family out there - or at least a lot of wolves that carried the Adravendi name. She knew not all Adravendi wolves directly shared blood with her, but did that really matter? She wasn't entirely sure. At this point she kind of just missed seeing wolves that she could call family.

"That's true, the west and south definitely have that going for them," she commented with a smile. For a while she just watched him work while she ate the meat that he had generously offered to her. She had never seen someone put so much work into taking apart a kill like this so it was curious to her at the very least. Eventually her blue eyes shifted back out to the world around her, looking across the muddy terrain. It was such an odd area, but weren't most places in Boreas? There was always some kind of quirk to the areas she had visited that kept them from being boring, featureless places.

The curiosity got the better of her and she finally looked back to Domari to ask, "Say, what's the name of the pack you live in? I've never lived in a pack, but I was thinking about maybe giving it a try. My father ran a pack before I was born so there must be something to it." Her father had been pretty old when she had been born, but he liked to tell them all kinds of stories from his life and that pack had been a very big part of his life. She kind of wished she had been around to experience it instead of just hearing about it in stories.

That Sea is just a Gambler at Heart

Dómari continued to gnaw thoughtfully on the scapula, eyes gazing out at the lake as the rain began to slow. It was falling very gently now and the birds were starting to sing happily. He hadn't even realized there were birds around here. He was glad that the rain was slowing. He'd need to start moving his kill pretty soon and he didn't want to get overly wet in the process.

His ears perked up at Elise's question. "I live in Valhalla. Were located in the Vericona Plains and Druid's Moor just south of here. You're certainly welcome to visit if you like! There's also Lirim which is, I think, north of here. Those are the only two packs I'm currently familiar with but there are definitely more. I recommend pack life, especially when winter comes. It makes it easier to stay warm and fed."

Valhalla, hm? And Lirim... She tucked the names away in her memory for later. They seemed vaguely familiar, but it had been a long time since she had heard those stories from her father and she hadn't been paying that close of attention back then anyway. She had to assume that if he was this nice then the pack he belonged to had to be nice as well, but maybe that was too broad of a thing to be making assumptions about. He was right, living in a pack was sure to make getting though winter much easier. It was probably something she should be thinking about sooner rather than later. Winter was going to be here before she knew it.

"I might take you up on that offer to visit," she said with a smile, her tail wagging gently against the ground. She wasn't sure what she should be considering when it came to picking a pack, but having nice, welcoming wolves did certainly entice her a bit. She glanced out over Traveler's Lake again, seeing that the weather was beginning to take a more favorable turn. The rain was lightening up and by now it was barely a drizzle. She definitely wanted to find some water to wash off her legs before the mud dried too much and if the way the clouds had dissipated was to be believed then the rain would probably be gone very soon. Elise got to her paws and gave Domari another smile. "Thanks for letting me sit with you! I better get going, I guess. I've been trying to make it over to the mangroves in the east, but I keep getting side tracked." She gave him a guilty grin and chuckled before starting to walk out into the open again. "It was nice meeting you!"