04-23-2013, 07:21 PM
Jack turns on paws to regard the young Fianna who emerges from the fray of mealtime. He is silent, though he does weave back and forth before him as he answers a few unasked but helpful questions, shifting his weight from right flank to left and back again. As he gives the direction to the Caern heart he even starts with a leap in that direction, though only to leap back a moment later. His paws plant into the powdered snow again and he looks up at the Fianna. His chest puffs, and his head bobs, though it is more than a lupine translation of a nod. His entire body undulates with the gesture of thanks.
A chuff of recognition returns Nina's nod goodbye, and he begins at a steady lope deeper into the bawn and toward its heart. His pilgrimage is in the same direction as hers, but decidedly separate. He even waits below as she shares her memories, circling the trails and sharpened apexes of the surrounding outcroppings with careful leaps and creeping crawls.
When it is clear and ready to accept his own chiminage, he approaches the chasm and sits dutifully beside it. His story is one of witnessing kin-pack's blood shed. It is one of seeing death as a pup, whilst hidden within the ground in the hollow of a tree's roots from danger, his earliest memory one that offers thanks as much as chiminage for the spirits of earth that gave him shelter all those years ago. And then of crawling across roads, tucked within the leather jacket of a new patriarch, and ape kin father, the wind on his face and the faint smell of whiskey in his nose, the horizon – earth's very face – stretched out before him. A sunset, the earth swallowing the sun into its womb, to nurse it before spitting it up the next morning.
When he is finished he retreats back to the bush as the snow continues to accumulate. Finds a spot of shelter. Nestles into himself in it and shuts his eyes as the night grows darker and colder.
A chuff of recognition returns Nina's nod goodbye, and he begins at a steady lope deeper into the bawn and toward its heart. His pilgrimage is in the same direction as hers, but decidedly separate. He even waits below as she shares her memories, circling the trails and sharpened apexes of the surrounding outcroppings with careful leaps and creeping crawls.
When it is clear and ready to accept his own chiminage, he approaches the chasm and sits dutifully beside it. His story is one of witnessing kin-pack's blood shed. It is one of seeing death as a pup, whilst hidden within the ground in the hollow of a tree's roots from danger, his earliest memory one that offers thanks as much as chiminage for the spirits of earth that gave him shelter all those years ago. And then of crawling across roads, tucked within the leather jacket of a new patriarch, and ape kin father, the wind on his face and the faint smell of whiskey in his nose, the horizon – earth's very face – stretched out before him. A sunset, the earth swallowing the sun into its womb, to nurse it before spitting it up the next morning.
When he is finished he retreats back to the bush as the snow continues to accumulate. Finds a spot of shelter. Nestles into himself in it and shuts his eyes as the night grows darker and colder.