Bhaire had never seen anything quite like this. He had heard whispers of a barren, sandy land full of strange, prickly plants and flowers, and was on his way to see it for himself when he nearly fell and broke his neck. Much scrabbling and a fair bit of luck kept him upright when little else could have. The earth seemed to have split apart, as if some great singular claw had raked across the surface. It was a steep drop, perhaps a dozen body lengths to the sandy floor below. Spurs of rock jutted out in certain places, littered the floor in others, and across the way from where he stood something even stranger showed through the rock. Ears perking, curiosity flaring, Bhaire took off down the line of the ravine, searching for a way down. It was some time before he found a path he could travel safely (read:passably) to the bottom. The sand beneath his feet was soft and cool, as the sun rarely touched this patch of ground. He weaved between boulders and slag until he came to the same point he had viewed from above. It was still out of reach, but the design was unmistakable. A skull, larger than any he had ever seen, poked out from the rock. He had never seen it's like before, but it reminded him loosely of a bird's. he thought to himself with a grin. If only he could get closer... He sat an pondered, wondering what he aught to do. It seemed to wrong to just leave it here where no one was like to notice it. So he sat, and wondered.

He wasn't particularly sure what had drawn him away from Valhalla's territory. Perhaps it was a subconscious need to say goodbye to the western section of Alacritis before Valhalla went off on their move to the islands. Or maybe he just had an itch to explore. Either way, he found himself wandering away from his pack, if only briefly. He was winding through the trees, enjoying the snow draped nature around him, when he just so happened to catch a whiff of another wolf's scent. A brute by the smell of it, and not a pack wolf. The scent luckily drew Cael's gaze down to the ground and the druid came to an abrupt halt. Only a foot or two in front of them the ground split apart into a giant chasm. He blinked with surprise and turned his head to the right and left. It stretched in both directions for as far as he could see. He picked up on the scent he had noticed before and his brows pulled together. But that couldn't be right... If his nose wasn't deciving him, the scent was coming from the ravine. He carefully padded closer to the edge and peered down into the hole, his eyes widening with surprise. There was a wolf down there! "Hello? Are you alright?" he called down to the stranger, his irish accented voice echoing off the ravine's walls. Speech Thought Companion Others

The sudden voice above him gave Bhaire a small fright. He had been so absorbed in the rock face he did not realize he had company. Further, the wind did not carry scents to him down within the surface of the earth. Bhaire turned to looked upwards, trying to find it's source. The voice was male, but it struck Bhaire as strange in lilt, rolling over sounds and letters in ways he had not heard before. It sounded friendly enough, and even for a moment reminded him of the kindly abbot that had led his nomad pack before the flood. Bhaire landed his gaze upon a figure back lit by the sun, white fur glowing in the light. Bhaire smiled and bobbed his head in greeting. "Hello to you as well!" he said. "I'm quite alright, but thank you for asking. I'm down here on purpose. There's a queer sort of skull lodged in the rock face. Have you ever seen it's likeness?" He gestured to the skull with his forepaw. The kind brute struck him as a friendly sort, and if he was half as curious as Bhaire, perhaps he'd come across the knowledge already. Bhaire smiled, and awaited a response.

The brute's voice bounced up the stone walls back up to him and Cael breathed a sigh of relief even though he was still confused as to why a wolf would want to be at the bottom of the ravine. He was very glad the stranger was alright though and was even happier that the wolf in question seemed friendly. At the earthen-hued wolf's question Cael peered down the edge of the wall, searching till his two-toned gaze landed on the skull that he spoke of. Cael's brows pulled together with thought as he looked it over, curious as to its origin now as well. "Hmm... No, I can't say that I have. Although, my father once told me that there was creatures a long time ago that are now extinct. Perhaps it is one of those?" It was a long shot, but he liked to think at least some of the stories his adoptive father told him when he was a pup were true. Shrugging, Cael turned his attention back to his new acquaintance, saying, "Why don't you come back up here and we'll talk some more?" It would be much easier to talk without shouting down a ravine after all. Speech Thought Companion Others

Bhaire returned his gaze to the skull with a new sense of wonder. An extinct animal? He had once come across a large fang, one his old alpha had called a tusk, that had come from an extinct animal. The porcelain male's words set his mind speeding down an entirely new path of thought. "I do believe you're right!" There appeared to be no way to get a closer look, and he was certainly incapable of removing the skull from the rock face. "And right again, it's colder down here. I'll be up in just a moment." Bhaire turned the way he had come and began scrambling back over boulders. It was considerably harder fighting gravity and on more than one occasion Bhaire's paws scrabbled against the loose stones on the pathway back up. When he finally made his way back up, he was panting. Despite his aching muscles and scraped pads, a smile remained plastered on his face. He trotted his way back along the edge of the ravine until he spotted the white male once more. "Hello! More formally this time, of course. My name is Bhaire." After all, one couldn't have a proper meeting with so much distance between them. The stranger's bi-colored eyes caught Bhaire's attention as well. The only other wolf he had ever seen with two-tone optics had been a soothsayer, and he wondered briefly if this male was one as well.