phoenix rising

This place was so very different. Much more temperate, the heat she had been used to tamed by mountain air currents. But there was still much that was the same - the taste of sea salt in the air, the rich green in moss and plant life that spread wide before her, and opportunity. 

Rhea always was one ambitious bitch.

She had awoken under the shade of a towering oak tree, it’s thick, twisted branches reaching up, out, and all around as though tentacles aiming for the heavens. The confusion of coming to in a foreign land caused only momentary hesitation before it was replaced with an arrogant sense of desire. New lands, new peoples, new chances for prosperity.

She would no squander the opportunity for gains when she could help it. Despite the odd, precarious situation, the well-built female walked about with confidence, a bounce in her step and a smirk on her maw as she rubbed cheeks with shrubs and brushed shoulders with tree trunks. From the mere scents in the air, this was a place worth staying in, and therefore a place worth claiming. Marking.

If there was someone else already settled here, Rhea would take her chances. She couldn’t smell any territory markers, so as far as she was concerned she had free reign. Songbirds and seabirds filled the air with their cries and whistles, while down below a singular wolf took advantage of an opening.

This land was too good to pass up.

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 The woman was a storm. 

 Spat from the depths like some regurgitated morsel, she erupted from the frothy tumult and pulled herself from the waves. The sand was dusted charcoal, a coarse mix of sediment pounded and pillaged from the temperate earth nearby. 

 Dreadnought stood. 

 A wind buffeted from the North, and she welcomed it, retching bile and bay foam from her maw as she skirted the shallow beach. It was far from a graceful entrance, though she had never been one for flash. 

 Turning inward, she strode through a wet wood, perpetually damp from the brackish spray. Stepping over a serpentine tree, Dreadnought sniffed the scent of another. 

 So, she followed. 

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Thick scruff she’d against coarse tree barks, the large female acting with anything but subtlety as her ambitions led the way. This place was new, a fresh start, and - from the lack of scents from others - it was ripe with opportunity. How she had manifested here after her years in the straits, she couldn’t answer. 

But she was here now, and she wasn’t about to look the gift horse in the mouth. She’d rather mount it and race ahead of the others.

Her aggressive marking of the terrain seemed to lead her from the trees, where the trunks parted way for thickly-greened slopes and steps toward the sea. The heavy ocean air filled her lungs, leaving a greedy grin on her maw as she strode further... but not before coming across the scent of another. A female.

Ears perked, her tongue clicked inside her cheek, and Rhea gurgled in excitement - what sort of challenge might she be faced with? Twisting and turning, she maneuvered her way from the forests and down closer to the shores, her sights settling on a wolf dappled and streaked with browns.

“You there, what’s yer name and yer interest here?” Her voice boomed, holding an air of authority she didn’t yet have, but presumed anyways. Holding her head and tail high, Rhea loomed forward with the chill of the sea spray misting against her furs.

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 There were strangers approaching the beach. Meissa had clawed out a temporary den under the face of some cliff. Just enough space to be comfortable, to curl up in, and to observe the world around her. The black sand curled under her paws as she scraped away a slightly bigger hole, unearthing a tiny red crustacean that hurried to bury itself back into the sand. For a smaller wolf, the nest would probably be much more comfortable and spacious. The salmon-eyed beast was massive for most wolves' standards. Unknown to her, she'd been born from a long lineage of beasts built for war, seeded by a monstrosity who cared for her, for a time. All those memories were faded, bare remnants of a past that taunted her whenever she looked upon something even the slightest hint familiar.

 And something here was deathly familiar.

 Steam escaped from her lips into the chilled sea air as she rose out of her shadows, shaking off the dust and turning towards the scents that drew themselves in from the forest. The beast moved quickly, stalking towards them with fierce eyes. She didn't know why, couldn't know why, but something about that stench made her blood boil. Why? The beast had no claim here, this was not her land. She was just a temporary resident. And yet...

 “What about you?” she growled as she approached, split tail curling up above her and head lowered in warning, “Who are you and what's your interest here?” Normally she'd be more curious than not, but something about this decorated wolf made her insides coil and burn, hissing within her. Yet, when looking upon this wolf's face, she had no idea who the hell she was. Just that something deep inside her was furious, and she wanted to know why.

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 Like some predatory leviathan, another wolf slithered from the moist undergrowth, revealing herself with a cacophony that rivaled the waves. She was a sight - a decorated, frothy mix of navy, not unlike the churning sea. Dreadnought stood still, her body maintaining a confidence that she’d earned.

 Before she could speak another emerged, just as striking as the first. They loomed large, two forces met of seemingly equal measure. Dreadnought looked from one to the other. It seemed they were rather fond of speech without substance, all wind and bluff and bluster.

 She addressed them both.

 “If you’re staking a claim you should say why you deserve to,” her head swung to the other wolf, “and if you’re defending this land you should explain why it isn’t properly marked.”

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 Demands of claim or otherwise made Meissa scoff, coming back into awareness of herself. While there was something destructive and deeply seated within her that distrusted the other decorated woman, she could not place her paw on it.

 So, without moving her eyes from the pirate queen's face, she spoke. “Don't like strangers showing up to a place first time and acting like they own it.” She blew air from her nose, shaking her head. “You can have the beach. Damn sand gets everywhere.” and she turned, prowling away, eyes on the two as she went so they would not turn and attack her. All the while, she was chastising herself - why had she bothered to come and make a fool of herself in front of two strangers?

 The beach wasn't hers - she felt no love for it. It was simply where she had awoken and remained those first few days.

 It was the jeweled woman who turned her stomach within herself, just the appearance of which made her wish to slather and brawl, like the beast her father had been before her mother had tamed him and, apparently, died not too long thereafter. Yet, she knew nothing of her parents except a twisted pain that made her know fear and anger but also that soft pit in the back of her heart that spoke of how she had loved them, once upon a time.

 This woman sparked no such love. So she left, into the woods.

---

Hopped thread order to leave - exit unless stopped.

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