Welcome to Gaia! ::

Quin was awake, barely. The young male staggered out of the cave of the wolf he had come to think of as a father figure. Under Flit's tutelage the young male had grown more accustomed the the language of the wolves amongst whom he now lived and could speak it relatively fluently hough he sometimes had trouble understanding colloquialisms and odd word combinations.

"I am coming, Flit" he yawned, stretching his lengthening limbs out long, his mouth open, tongue curling as his very soul tried to shake off the last vestiges of sleep. His milky, pale blue eyes blinked several times as he came out into the sun and his fur bristled to protect him from the cold. He was getting a ltle more used to the temperatures of this place but he thought he might never be comfortable in the winters here.

As he walked up to the dazzling-hued adult male, Quin eyed him questioningly. "More lessons for words?" he wondered aloud.

The rather compact young male smiled eagerly, his eyes lighting up with enthusiasm as he was told of todays plan. He had learned to hunt when he was little but it was only what would normally be taught to a pup - catching small animals such as mice, voles perhaps a squirrel or rabbit. It was just before he had begun to move on from this to bigger prey that his fateful accident had occured. The time when he woke up in another world.

He shook his head a little, dispelling the vision. It was hurtful of him to think of home, his brothers and sisters, parents too and the heat! His mind came back to the present. "I will enjoy this lesson!" he proclaimed with joy. The words sounded perhaps a little odd, stilted - more like the speech of an adult, too, than an adolescent but it was understandable and that was the key. Things were beginning to get a lot better for Quin as he learned this new tongue more fluently.

"What will we hunt, Flit?" the pied youngster asked.

The young male listened attentively to his tutor's words, carefully translating them in his mind and storing the information within. Quin was not simply like this because of the troubles of communication - he liked to make sure he knew all of the facts of a situation and was correctly briefed before he went into situations. Not that he had trouble when he did nt know what was going to happen, simply that the more information he held the more secure he felt about doing something.

Deer, then. He wondered if it would be the ruddy ones, large their males having huge racks of antlers or perhaps the smaller, spotted kind. Either was good as far as Quin was concerned and if it were the does then all the better - they did not look quite so fearsome but still carried a good amount of meat on them if his eyes had judged correctly.

The young male was familia with deer and wondered what it might be like to hunt the fleet footed browsers who were usually one step ahead of him when he went for wanders in the woods. "How do we do this working as a team?" Quin asked as he caught up and walked alongside Flit.

Quin nodded and smiled a little but he had to admit to himself that he wasn't 100% confidant about the whole thing. Deer, even does, were as large as he himself and larger... How was he supposed to pin one down? Although he was on the cusp of adulthood Quin was not large. He never would be. All the wolves of his pack had been small, wiry, strong but not large - a swift footed menace when they worked together. He had never actually seen his own pack bring down a deer and he wondered if these wolves, al larger than evern the largest male of his pack, perhaps hunted a little differently.

"Flit..." he began, wondering if he should voice these concerns. After all, Flit wouldn't tell him to do something he couldn't, would he? He had probably taught other young wolves who were not fully grown to hunt and so would know how big one had to be to do so.

Quin's tail wagged happily "Flit, I think I'm going to enjoy hunting!"

(( ^^; I think I worded that last post oddly.. He didn't have the accident whilst learning to hunt other stuff, just around about the time he should have begun to learn - hence he never learned. ))

Quin eyed the doe that Flit pointed out to him, nodding at the comments the older male made. The fawny coloured does seemed to mingle quite peacably - seemingly unaware as yet that they were being stalked. The doe that had been pointed out to him did indeed seem to be favouring it and Quin watched her carefully, learning the clues which might tell him another time when a deer was close to exhaustion. He'd never seen one which was hurt before and so took Flit's judgement of the situation to be the correct one.

His eyes narrowed slightly as he looked at all of the other deer around. "Won't her pack protect her?" he asked, not knowing the word for 'herd'. His voice was a whisper but he still wondered how the deer could not hea them, did not flee. Perhaps they were not so good at hearing as a wolf...

Quin copied his mentos movements, shuffling along the ground. It was like a game, her thought, as excitement and adrenaline started to surge through him, ready for the hunt!

He gave a brief nod again, not trusting his voice. This was an important part of a young wolf's life - this first chase and hopefully first catch - of a large animal. There was something intrinsically different about this to hunting mice or rabbits, something grande. Although Quin was not one to be taken by glorious fantasy he was still a young male at his first proper hunt. He almost wriggled in a spark of excitement.

The pied young male eyed the deer as his mentor spoke, nodding all the while. He would be upset if something went wrong and he had to leave things for the big wolf to finish off but... ces't la vie, eh?

His muscles tautened as the excitement transformed itself into sheer adrenaline and got him ready to move quickly. He nodded. He understood. He was ready.

Quin slunk the way he had been directed, ears tilted forward, shooting looks back in Flits direction constantly to see if any more instructions or changes were given. He knew hunts could be perilous - the slightest movement could cause a careful plan to be changed at a moments notice, and he didn't want to miss anything or be the cause of the hunt failing.

His belly rubbed on the cold ground as he twisted forward but he could barely feel it in his excitement. The young male was rarely so keyed up but the hunt held a special place in his heart - especailly as this was to be his first true hunt. He thought he'd feel more like an adult when they were done. If it went well... His eyes flicked back to Flit again.