// In his travels, Reaper has discovered that many different biomes existed within the continent he came to, and he wondered what the southern lands held. So far he had come across a swamp that was more or less lifeless, and now he moved west, hoping to find a suitable place to begin his plans. It was in this westerly travel that he found himself in a rather harsh steppe. Dunes of golden sand stretched as far as his reptilian eyes could see, and Reaper was unsure if he should even attempt to navigate the obviously treacherous landscape before him. Of course, it wasn't fear that stopped him, rather he didn't have anything to carry water or food with. Perhaps, a few snakes or lizards made their home in the stubborn sands and he could always strip and chew bits of cacti to get water. On the edge of the dunes, Reaper made his camp, finding a rare jackrabbit to eat and a small watering hole that could only be described as a pitiful puddle to get him started. He waited for nightfall, knowing better than to brave the desert in the middle of the day. Once the stars were out, he took a moment to study them and the position of the dunes within sight, then moved across the silvery landscape on the ridges of the dunes to keep track of his path. The desert hare would keep him for a few days, but he would need water. Maybe he could find it before he died of dehydration or sun sickness.

OOC: For Nav points!

Reaper speaks, Your words, Walk, Think, Salem talks,

ART & HTML BY BIRD

The golden touched goddess had made her home in a small oasis in the west. The child she had taken in was told to keep up. She would not accept being tired as an answer as to why he couldn't. The faster they moved the sooner they would get there is what she had told him. There would be plenty of time for rest when they got there in the morning. For now she kept the north star to her right and her pace a light trot. With nightfall the sands still remained hot but less so than during the day. And with a cooler wind from the north the heat of the desert was a little less so and it was an odd thing to her.

She rounded the top of a dune easily and then stopped to peer back for the child, only to begin moving again. She'd seen the Male on an opposite ridge but he was of little interest to the goddess. "تعال يا طفل ، لدينا الكثير لتغطيته." The Arabic tongue was native to the Egyptian woman though she knew the boy would likely not know it yet. For his benefit she spoke with her heavily accented english. "Come child, we've much ground to cover still." he would learn one day to speak the language of the desert fluently. For now though she stuck to teaching him by speaking what she wanted then translating for him. She took a moment to glance to the northern star her bearings much better than that of the Male likely. She was raised in a desert, so therefore she knew the best ways to survive and how to stay straight. Her pace picked up once more and to the Male she may very well appear a mirage, but she was real enough. The best part of a desert, scents tended to blow away with the next sandstorm. She would be a ghost to any that came looking for the boy. For his mother to have been slaughtered meant something was likely after the boy. The Male was otherwise ignored by the woman.

// There was a dark shape on the ridge of a dune that was on the opposite side from him, followed by a smaller shape, both appeared to be wolves. While he had been navigating by stars and the shifting sands of the desert to go his own way, the fact that the smaller wolf seemed to be a pup being dragged through the desert, Reaper found an odd curiosity about him. Moving in their direction, he followed them. Holding his hare in his jaws, he stayed silent, following the pair and watching them from a distance. Reaper wasn't sure what it was that made him want to tail the pair, but it was strange to see a wolf dragging a pup through the thick of the desert in the middle of the night. He kept his distance, not wanting to really frighten them, after all it was much easier to travel the silvery sands of this place when you had a guide.

Reaper speaks, Your words, Walk, Think, Salem talks,

ART & HTML BY BIRD

Rai had fallen into a sick silence since the brutal death of his mother, and the ending of life as he knew it. The beauty that had taken him in, with her blue-grey eyes and strange mannerisms was a mystery to him. She spoke occasionally in a tongue that held no meaning to him, but the quickly spoken words rolled like jewels from her tawny lips. Travelling by night was unusual to him, and the harsh, hot sands beneath his paws left grit in every crevasse until he wondered if his paws would rub raw and bloody. He didn’t speak, even when his stride took on an uneven gait, forcing his smaller body to keep up with the woman who sheltered, fed, and owned him.

She reached the top of yet another dune before he did, and her sharp eyes glanced back to him, and he met her gaze, unabashed, and perhaps a little vaguely. His tongue was beginning to feel like grit, and his unused vocal cords thirsted from the long walk, and the heat that swayed up towards him from the shifting sands.

There it was again, that strange, exotic tongue that seemed to roll with greater ease from her maw then the language he knew. It had taken him time to understand that she often followed these announcements with words in his tongue, her heavy accent had confused him, but the more he heard her speak it, the more he understood the words beneath. He gave no reply to her urging, but obediently picked up his flagging pace.

He refused to give in to the urge to hang his head low, lifting it higher in defiance to his aching limbs. It was through this action that he saw the shape of a stranger, standing casually and observantly on a ridge not too far from their own. He almost stilled at the darker colors he saw in this wolf first, memories of another, cruler side plagued him, and the scent of blood suddenly filled his nose and mouth. The waking memory did not last long, blown apart by the clear, whiter markings that hugged the lower half of this wolf’s body. He was not the terror that plagued this wolfs waking and sleeping worlds. He turned his head from the stranger without hesitation, his stride lengthening to cover the gap between himself and his savior.