[000]

As he continued to trek north, the weather becoming steadily harsher as the sun grew weaker, Ahote again found himself yearning for familiar sights and warmer climates.

The wind curled tight against the bony treetops, and as the forest gave way to pale grass, the currents snapped off the branches with tremendous force.
At that moment the sun blazed on the horizon, just over the faded heads of faraway mountain ranges, and what little heat the burning disk shed was stripped away the second he stepped out from the sheltering trunks.

Clouds of vaguely warm breath were blown back as a frosty mist into his eyes, and the man pulled tighter the makeshift buckskin cloak he'd been hanging onto since late autumn.
Against the roar of the wind, he couldn't even hear the muffled clatter of the small objects beneath it.
Only the rattle of the bow and instrument slung across his back, now sounding as distant as the mountains appeared to be.

He didn't linger long on the edge of the woods: north he had chosen, and so north he did head.

While the sun dipped further behind the western mountains he continued marching across the grasslands, until eventually he came across a lone grove.
By that time his ears were burning and his nose was well stuffed, and his roiling stomach growing easily louder at the pause he gave.

Ahote peered between the columns of creaking oaks and bristling pines, scanning for whispers of shadows.
He walked slowly leeward until the snarling air was better blocked by the trees, straining his ears for signs of life.

After a while of finding nothing he was unwilling to take the bitter cold any longer, and so he ducked under the shelter of the needle-strewn leaves.
He snapped off a few branches as he came in, pulling strands of dry grass from open pockets in the sparse canopy and peeling papery bark from the odd aspen or birch.
Then he tucked himself away against the hefty, windblown trunks of old conifers that had grown clustered together against the elements.

Scraping out a shallow depression with a rock he pulled from his waist, he dropped the stems and twigs and sparked them to life with a piece of flint clashed against the stone.
It took a few tries, and when at last the air flared with an orange glow, Ahote sighed at the rush of heat that washed across his skin.

He warmed himself by the fire for a few minutes before retreating back into another part of the grove, keeping his footsteps within the shadows that slowly stretched away from the setting sun.
He gathered more fuel as he moved about, aiming for enough to last him through the night, and as he stepped across the dusty soil he kept an eye out for edibles.
His rations had been falling disastrously thin ever since he'd started traveling into unfamiliar territory.

[Livid (RP)]

Livid had been half asleep when she had picked up the scent. A scent that took her back to the day she had first encountered death in the North.

She had been out on a routine patrol with her brother, mother and some of the older sentinels. They had heard reports from a neighbouring pack, reports of strange creatures that they had never seen before inhabiting the cold North, even though it appeared their anatomy could not withstand the cold. Thus, they used the skins of whatever they could lay their hands - and they had hands, not paws - on. Bears, snow leopards, maybe even wolves. Naturally, the elders of her pack had sent a small team to investigate these visitors. They had assumed they would be harmless, too new to the harsh wasteland to really pose a threat. It was only when they drew too close to a cluster of threadbare tents that the small party of wolves realised their error.

It only took one well-aimed spear for them to take the hint and flee, but it also took just this one spear to end the life of one of their party. That night, five of them had set out and only four returned. Liv lost neither her brother or mother, but a cluster of pups had lost a father. 

Now, the scent had returned, jogging her memory and causing her to feel quite ill. There was one of those... things in Gemini. At the border.

With a snarl, Livid ran there without hesitation. Of course, she did not know how many there were. She had a feeling they mostly roamed in packs, just like wolves. But she was a Ranger, there was no room for doubt in her profession. When she finally reached the border, Livid breathed in. There was something shambling about before her. Something on two legs rather than four. Let's get ready to rumble. Growling, the wolf rushed forwards. She was probably being irrational - after all, there was only one - but there was a scent of fire in the air... there could be more around. She would attempt to knock the human over from behind, to let it know that she meant business and that it had encroached on her territory. If she missed, she would spin around and begin to circle, growling warningly.

Just what business did one of you have on Gemini's territory?

[000]

There didn't seem to be as much plant variety up in the north.
They were fewer, hardier; many went completely dormant in the winter, and those that flowered or fruited only did so during specific seasons.

Ahote couldn't find anything that looked even remotely like food in the little grove, just more fuel to throw on the fire.
He was ready to resolve that he'd be going hungry that night, and started gathering a few additional bits of grass and wood, stuff that he might be able to weave into a trap for the stray hare or rabbit, set it all up once the dawn rays came.
Near as he could tell, the northern winters left little room for anything but hunting.

As he pulled a twiggy tree from the ground, a growl had him spinning on his heels.
He barely managed to sidestep the beast that threw itself at him, dropping all of his materials as he rolled out of the way.
His hand immediately slipped under his cloak, pulling a hunting knife from its fur sheath and brandishing it in front of him.

Dusty eyes scanned the shadows, noting the position of a wolf as it skidded through the leaf litter, then began to circle him, eyes locked, snarls spilling from its throat.
He would have been thankful that there was only one of them, if he was in any way confident in his ability to defend himself against a wild beast; he simply wasn't built to tussle on the ground, not unless he could get that final jab in first.

Ahote watched the wolf closely, muscles tense, looking for an opening as much as he was sure the wolf was itself.
He'd been caught right in the middle of a small clearing too: no vaulting up a tree this time, not without getting a nasty bite once his back was turned.
Die of mauling or die of infection?

The skinny man swallowed as a thought came to him.
It was a shot in the dark, but if he could avoid a fight, then all the better for it.

"¿Hablas también?"

[Gaven]

“Oh, this is good.”

Gemini’s illustrious Lorekeeper leaned on his polearm (which was becoming little more than a walking stick as of late) as he watched the dramatic battle unfold in front of him. Tonight he wore the wooden wolf mask which concealed his face, but the amusement was apparent in his lackadaisical posture and the laughter in his voice. A human judging by his stature and most certainly the reason the Lorekeeper didn’t jump to his defense. Little did Gaven know how quickly this situation could turn against him if he didn’t make his intentions clear to the wolf. Would the wolf know that he himself belonged in Gemini? He supposed he would find out shortly.

“Be careful of that thing he has in his hand,” Gaven warned the wolf in a casual tone. “Might not seem like much but it cuts sharper and deeper than teeth. I think you’ve sufficiently terrified him at any rate. I doubt he can Speak, so good luck with whatever this is. I was hoping you’d knock him on his ass. Give him the good old Gemini welcome!”

The fellow obviously knew…some sort of language, just not one Gaven understood. Gaven opened his mouth again but this time the words were more than the snarling tongue of the wolves. Constructing language like this felt strange to him after such a long time immersed talking to animals, but it seemed both the wolf and the man needed his special skill. He opted for a common trade tongue from where he originated from:

“Do you speak anything else, human? Do you understand me?”

[Livid (RP)]

The human's roll was clumsy, desperate but it did the job and Livid's paws only landed on the ground. She turned and saw that it had drawn a sharp instrument from its clothing. The Ranger knew that this was a kind of weapon, a substitute for fang and claw. Now this was getting interesting. Livid did not fancy getting cut open - that blade looked quite lethal - so she opted for trying to scare off the human instead. She growled and paced, like a caged animal. Her tail was erect to make her stance clear, her ice blue eyes narrowed.

Get the fuck out of here.

Then, the scent of a fellow packmember reached her nostrils. She turned, expecting a wolf, only to discover a being that seemed physically similar to her opponent, except with larger ears and a wolf scent. Livid snapped at him warningly, suspicion clouding reason as her mind immediately told her that the human had a friend. It was only when the two-legged being spoke that she stopped in her tracks and realised the scent - her pack's scent - was coming off him in waves. So, first she had stumbled upon a wolf with a fish tail, a tiger and now this? Gemini never ceased to amaze. 

“Be careful of that thing he has in his hand. Might not seem like much but it cuts sharper and deeper than teeth. I think you’ve sufficiently terrified him at any rate. I doubt he can Speak, so good luck with whatever this is. I was hoping you’d knock him on his ass. Give him the good old Gemini welcome!”

Livid kept one eye on the trespasser as she spoke to Gaven. "I'm sorry, I didn't catch your scent," she explained coolly. "He's lit a fire, so it's hard to pick anything else up and I figured he had a buddy somewhere. I'm Livid, by the way. A Ranger."

The other human spoke in a language that Livid could not understand and, judging by Gaven's own hesitation, neither did he. This was the first time Livid had ever encountered such a language barrier and she had no patience for it. She only growled again while Gaven made an attempt at communication. Livid could not decipher what he was saying - having never encountered humans before - but she kept a close eye on the stranger. 

"He needs to state his business," the Ranger informed Gaven. "Or else it is assumed he's trespassing. If it can be established that he means no harm and can be of use to us, Gemini will provide."

[000]

The wolf stopped circling and instead began to pace, tail up, still growling.
With a route behind him now clear, he started to step back, trying to slowly inch his way towards the safety of a tree.

What the heck was it doing?
Waiting for him to toss it a scrap of food?
Pack members to arrive?
He couldn't be blocking something, could he...?

Much as these thoughts tempted him to, Ahote kept his eyes focused on the canine.

At least until another growl caught his attention, his gaze snapping towards the shadows behind the wolf.
He caught the shape of another man standing just off from the scene, bearing a wooden mask and leaning on some sort of pole, guttural growls rolling off his tongue.

Well, what the hell.
He watched the snap of the wolf towards the stranger, its gaze now torn between the two of them.

Ahote's muscles twitched--not yet...the time was not yet ripe.

Then--a voice.
An actual human voice.

He paused, recognition flashing across his face, his gaze briefly lifting back to the other human.

"Yes," he said, eyeing the wolf again, which didn't quite seem to know what to do.
It seemed to him as though it'd been displaying some odd behavior for a wild beast...perhaps....
"Your lobo?"

[Gaven]

Gaven raised his hand, palm out, when the wolf spun and snapped. This reaction became a regular occurrence of his life here and he was only surprised she didn’t take it further. He would defend himself but didn’t think the bodily harm the two could pass back and forth would make it worth it when their superiors questioned why they beat each other up at the borders. Gaven’s lip twitched under the mask; he remembered that border skirmishes were a common thing in Gemini, so maybe they wouldn’t ask why the Lorekeeper and the Ranger had been pummeling each other. It was expected. Luckily it never came to that. After a moment she relaxed the slightest, enough to talk to him.

“Apology accepted, Livid,” Gaven graciously offered. “I am Gaven, your Lorekeeper, and handy interpreter. At times.”

This very instance was a time when his mastery of languages came useful, but only due to a stroke of luck. The human understood him. Sort of. Gaven found part of his reply as nonsensical as the first thing that he said, but there was enough understanding between them that the Lorekeeper was confident they would be able to speak to one another with little issue. He was glad to not have to resort to charades.

“Lobo? Ehh?” Gaven’s was confused for a moment until it dawned suddenly on him and he let out a short laugh. “Oh, her? No. She doesn’t belong to me. I don’t command her. She is her own being, who I have just met in this very instant. She just got to you first.”

He glanced at Livid while she spoke. Gaven would try his best to make sure the fellow got the she-wolf’s message but…he couldn’t guarantee it. Mostly because he would rather put it in his own words and the things he crafted with his mouth were sometimes dishonored. He would try, but only for Livid’s sake.

“She wants to know what you are doing here,” Gaven told the man. “I’m going to make a wild guess and say you’re travelling through. The wolves won’t let you stay here unless you are intending to stay here for good. Do you know what I mean? Otherwise she’s going to consider you trespassing and probably chase you off. So I would start with your name and your business and then if you’re real nice to me I might tell her you’re incredibly harmless and let you stay at my camp so you don’t freeze or get accidentally killed by some wolf with an intense kneejerk reaction to the sight of anything on two-legs, hmm?”

[000]

Ahote blinked and stared, not that he wasn't already doing that.

The stranger explained that the wolf wasn't his and that, in fact, they'd never met, but then he went off on a whole tangent that he struggled to understand.
It was spoken fast and he had to repeat the words in his mind as they were spoken.
It was probably a good half a minute before he finally replied.

Wolves--there was definitely more than one.
He glanced around, but could see no sign of any others.

"No," he answered, latently answering the question that had been asked in the middle of the other's odd explanation; he truly didn't quite understand what was meant.

A pack of wolves cared that a human was traveling through their territory?
After seeing how this one reacted to him, he supposed the wolves in the north must be far more aggressive than the southern sorts.
He had to wonder just how big this pack might be, too, that the human seeming so friendly with one didn't even know that particular beast until then.
Sticking around didn't seem the best plan, but he wasn't too keen on backtracking either.

He hadn't been ripped to shreds yet.

At this realization his muscles loosened, posture straightening somewhat; while the fingers remained firm around the knife, the hand itself fell to his side.
The wolf in question appeared to be waiting, probably for word back from the growling human; who knew how long the beast could hold onto that patience.
Whatever was going on, he was at least being given a chance, even an offering for a place to stay, and so should probably make the best use of it.

"Ahote," he answered.
"Traveling;" as was guessed.

It was simple really: he was heading north.
What business would a wanderer such as himself have other than survival?

The smell of wood burning began to taint the air.
His eyes widened, gaze briefly shooting away from the pair before hastily returning to them, not wanting to leave the cautious vigil despite the surprise now in store.

He made a gesture with his free hand, pointing in the general direction of where his fire was.
It wasn't exactly necessary, for a plume of smoke was beginning to drift loftily in on the wind.

In his icy condition he'd been rushed to make a fire, and planting it but a few inches from a cluster of trees probably wasn't the best idea.
Burning down the grove hadn't exactly been on his list of things to do, but he couldn't move from his spot to fix the mistake with two probable hostiles staring him down.
His eyes now flickered nervously between the pair and where the fire was no doubt growing, eating away at the nearest tree and preparing to blaze out of control.

"Hurry."

[Livid (RP)]

Thankfully, Livid did not manage to bite Gaven's head or, more realistically, his hand off. Fortunately, the Lorekeeper understood the treacherous job that all the Rangers had to undertake. The constant worrying that an enemy pack had sent a group to carry out yet another assassination, humans discovering and trying to build upon their land or, as this case was about to demonstrate, natural elements getting out of control.

“Apology accepted, Livid. I am Gaven, your Lorekeeper, and handy interpreter. At times.”

"Great to have you aboard," the wolf replied, with no hint of irony. "Perhaps you should cover for Rangers more often, if this is going to be a common thing."

Livid sat and watched patiently as Gaven tried to make out what the human's intentions were, speaking in a tongue that made her head hurt. The Ranger was unusually quiet and patient, aware that to speak out of turn would make Gaven lose concentration. He was certainly making an effort to defuse and make the situation clearer to her, which she very much appreciated. She would have to remember to put in a good word for him with the higher ups if things went well. Which they were doing, since the human had lowered his knife and seemed to be more at ease than he first was. Livid even made an effort to wag her tail disarmingly when he looked at her, to provide Gaven's words with a bit of visual reassurance.

I don't want to hurt you if you don't want to hurt Gemini, stranger. In fact, we may be able to help each other.

Just as she thought the situation was beginning to cool down... it got hot again, but in an entirely different way. Letting out a yelp, Livid watched helplessly as the human's fire crept up the trees of the border. Originally, she felt anger. How stupid could this human have been to light such a fire and leave it unattended? But then, rationality came to her: she had distracted him. This was as much her fault as his. As the human ran to try and take control of the flames, Livid turned to Gaven.

"Gaven, tell him to shovel dirt on it!" she instructed him, before racing forward and trying to throw dirt on the flames near the base of the trees. Without oxygen to feed it, the flames that had reached the trees would only just falter out. Hopefully. Livid bitterly thought that, if they were in the North, snow would be an ideal thing to halt the fire. But, for the moment, they had to depend on literally anything to smoother the flames.

One thing was for certain: this was totally out of the ordinary for her.

[Gaven]

“Well, someone here appreciates me for my work,” he joked with Livid and winked at her before dumbly realizing she couldn’t see his face. “I think Gemini is starting to really click with me.”

Gaven wondered if Livid would believe him if he told her that small-talk with her was easy, but communicating with the bedraggled human in front of him was difficult. It took him a long moment to catch on that the man’s drawn-out pauses were happening for a reason. There was a brief flare of frustration burning in Gaven’s chest, a sort of fire of indignancy, as if the human had slighted him by not immediately understanding him. The logical part of his mind stepped in and quashed it. Gaven never had the work he did in his clan by failing to learn how to control his emotions around humans. He could be reasonable, maybe even polite, if he really tried. It wasn’t the man’s fault there was a language barrier between them and Gaven’s flowery speech was difficult to follow. It was unfortunate he was only able to string a few coherent words out of him.

“No,” he replied to Gaven and the elf frowned to himself. Then the human informed the Lorekeeper his name was ‘Ahote’ and he was travelling. Gaven could relate to one of those things. Once.

Then Gaven saw his eyes widen. Gaven wouldn’t have followed his gaze or his gesture, still not trusting the man entirely, except Livid suddenly yelped next to him and the wolf mask momentarily snapped in her direction. Then he smelled the smoke as it crept into his mask and the black muzzle of the object jerked towards the human; Ahote didn’t need to see his face to see the tense, accusatory position of his body.

“Fenedhis! You have got to be joking,” Gaven hissed. He reached out to grab Ahote’s arm and roughly jerk him in the direction of the fire, roughly pushing him to run and conveniently making sure he never had his back to the man; for all Gaven knew distracting them was his intention “Go! Take care of your fire, fool!”

He didn’t add the part where he was going to personally have the man’s hide if he burned down the grove; he felt that part was heavily implied. Livid knew a thing or two about fire craft and Gaven would have been impressed if there had been time for it. She had the right idea; smothering it was their best option. Gaven was kicking dirt at it himself but if it caught through the brush then…

Stupid humans and what they friggen’ do.

[000]

"Aiee...," the man bit his cheek as he squeaked out this note.
Nerves fell in one moment when the wolf raced off towards the light, then racked up the next as the man in the mask rushed forward, jerking him by the arm in the same direction that the wolf had gone.

The knife he was holding for defense was forgotten as the stench of smoke stung his eyes, which were met by the curious sight of the canine tossing dirt up on the flames.
Feeling an elbow in his back for another shove, Ahote stepped aside while he stumbled forward, sheathing the dagger as he danced around the blazing tree, avoiding embers as they popped in the air and sizzled against the snow.

The licks of flame had already spread a good deal, coursing along the trunks of the whole copse he'd set his fire against.
Stupid, stupid, stupid--ah...he didn't have time to curse himself!

Finding what he deemed a good spot where he might not set himself aflame, the man fell to his knees and began digging furiously, pulling aside the snow and tossing it on the fire.
The action almost seemed to make the fire only worse, the flames lashing as steam rose in a loud hiss.

After he dug through the shallow layer of frost, there he found bits of dried, dormant grass--and, beneath it, moist mud.
Quickly he began shoveling the hardened soil onto the fire, tossing grass and dead leaves with it that burst apart.

But the fire wouldn't give.
Oh, parts of it were snuffed out, but others crawled along the clustered trees, teasing the snow and the taller blades of dried grass.
Ahote reared back as his position was compromised, rolling away from a dash of flame, slamming his palm down on a clump of pale grass just as it started to catch fire.
Smoke was filling the air now in dark clouds, burning his throat, pulling on his lungs.

"¡Deshazte de la maleza!" he shouted to the pair, popping up onto hands and feet.
Hurriedly he was hauling snow again, throwing it against the fire and the trees, only now he was moving in a rough circle, digging some sort of furrowed ring around the copse.

[Livid (RP)]

This was not her day.

The human did as she and Gaven instructed but, in the process, he was throwing dead leaves and grass into the flames. Feeding it. Livid growled irritably. Fortunately, the human quickly realised his mistake and began shovelling actual dirt on the flames as he had been instructed. Gaven also lent a hand, something which the Ranger was immensely grateful for. Even though her instincts were screaming at her to run, her duty compelled her to stay and defend her pack from this natural threat. A few agonising minutes crept by and, just when the Ranger thought that the fire was growing beyond their control, she noticed it was beginning to fan out, a lack of oxygen preventing it from climbing further. Her digging became more frantic, like she was ready to dig all the way down to the centre of the earth and to whatever the Strait's equivalent to China was.

"It's going down!" she called to her two companions. "Keep at it."

The mixture of snow and dirt combined provided a nice, suffocating solution to the fire's wrath. Hopefully, after a while, it would begin the very final stages of dying and, covered in soot, she would turn to the human, her ice blue eyes alight with an entirely different fire. 

She was pissed, but a little voice in her voice told her that Gemini could make use of this creature and his budding fire skills.

"Gaven," she spoke to the Lorekeeper. "Please inform this human that, once he's sure his fire won't be a problem any longer, he may enter the packlands. Once he's able to control it, we could make use of this. Be sure to tell him not to go setting any more fires unsupervised, we don't want a repeat performance of what just happened."

The Ranger, covered in soot, turned away to clean herself. She was visibly annoyed at how the human had earned her scorn and respect simultaneously. Nevertheless, she could hardly allow a personal grudge to get in the way of what would frankly be a worthy and useful asset to the pack. "Oh, and advise him to pick up some language skills," she called to Gaven as she departed. "If he's to live with wolves, he'll have to learn how to understand them. Thanks for your assistance, I'll be sure to put in a good word to the Strider... whoever that may be."

And this was exactly why Livid could not turn away a worthy recruit: they had lost a few good wolves recently.

(ooc: annnnd he's in. Welcome to da house of fun. Sorry this took a while. <33)

[Gaven]

Despite his outward demeanor Gaven was optimistically hopefully that the clumsy human wouldn’t burn the entire grove to the ground; it was winter and even though some of the drier brush caught easily it would be much harder for the fire to burn through the damp bark of the trees around them. Even as it warmed next to the snow it would only melt it and turn everything wet. He helped knowing this, maybe only so he wouldn’t look completely useless in the eyes of this rather discerning wolf. If only he took such cares regarding his other actions on that evening.

By the time they managed to get the fire out the inside of Gaven’s mask was boiling from his hot breath filling it. He flipped it up onto his forehead as Livid did a very good impression of speaking calmly and acting like a mature adult; it took no great sorcery to see the both were a bit rankled from the experience, though Gaven’s panting kept him from letting Ahote know just what he thought right then.

“Oh, sure, I will definitely tell the dangerous lummox everything you just said. Verbatim.” Gaven gasped in response to Livid’s instructions. Then he immediately turned to Ahote and reached out to snatch him by one of his stupid tiny human ears and yank him straight towards the ground; if he managed to dodge that maybe Gaven would just smack him. “Ahote! Who taught you how to make a fire? How are you not dead? My wolf friend here thinks I should let you stay if you cross your heart and promise not to set another forest on fire, but I personally think I should kick your ass right now. Are you getting all this or are my big foreign words confusing you?”

Of all the humans Gaven met, Ahote was one of the least annoying but probably only because he was alone and vulnerable. Gaven could only assume the man did not actually mean to set the forest on fire; if he had, he certainly did a poor job of it. Humans had done much worse back in his homeland. A different elf would have killed Ahote on the spot but Gaven had unfortunately been raised to be a bit soft on humans; spy work required some level of decency, even towards people you didn’t necessarily like. He backed off, letting Ahote have his space and the comfort of knowing Gaven wasn’t immediately interested in abusing him further.

“Stay at my camp, I can handle the fire until you learn,” Gaven told him, slight disgust creeping into his voice at the idea of evening offering such hospitality to the man. “You might be a complete airhead of a human but I guess even I can’t let you starve or freeze out here.”

In return Gaven hoped he wouldn’t get a knife in his throat while he slept. It was the little things that mattered when you decided to trust complete strangers.

[000]

It took a bit of work, but at last the fire seemed to die down, the last of the blaze churning as it began to set its own demise, the melting snow swirling around its fuel.

Ahote stood, breathing hard, his gaze flickering over the copse he'd managed to nearly turn to ash.
There was a small spark way up high, near the leaves of the canopy, and he felt his heart stop--then start again as the same spark fizzled away.

It was over.

The man wiped the sweat from his brow as the wolf rumbled to the other human, and before he knew it, he was being shoved face-first to the ground without warning, his nose buried in the mud and snow.
"Ai-aiee!" he cried out in surprise, gritting his teeth while fingers curled tight against the ground.
Perhaps it was the adrenaline washing away or the wolf standing nearby, but he , for he didn't immediately lash out at the stranger.

After getting an earful he was let go, his spine springing back straight while feet stumbled back a few steps, a hand rubbing quickly over his pinched ear.
He grimaced at the two strangers, eyes flashing over a face now revealed.
The almost murderous expression that met his gaze stopped him dead from rebuking the...offer.

There was an awkward moment of silence before at last he conceded with a simple "Sí...."
What other choice did he have but to freeze the night through?