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Check out my novel in this setting here: https://bewere.net/product.php?id=1077", "count": "2", "submission_left_submission_id": "3739609", "submission_left_file_name": "5776418_laruf_262._mapping_new_terrain_-_trade.rtf", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_huge": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/huge/5776/5776418_laruf_262._mapping_new_terrain_-_trade.jpg", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_large": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/large/5776/5776418_laruf_262._mapping_new_terrain_-_trade.jpg", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_medium": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/medium/5776/5776418_laruf_262._mapping_new_terrain_-_trade.jpg", "submission_left_thumb_huge_x": "300", "submission_left_thumb_huge_y": "300", "submission_left_thumb_large_x": "200", "submission_left_thumb_large_y": "200", "submission_left_thumb_medium_x": "120", "submission_left_thumb_medium_y": "120" } ], "description": "[i]“In the times before time, there was not one sun and two moons, but simply two suns: one to watch over the earth during the day, and one the night. Back then the earth was still the domain of the impetuous old gods. It was they who walked the forests and fields, and left canyons where they stepped, and lifted mountains so they could have somewhere to rest; it was they who directed the seas and carved the rivers, and every day rose upon a different earth for their whims. When the night-sun failed to rise, they did not fail to notice. The old gods walked up to the empty sky, tore the night-sun from where she rested, and cast her down to the darkened earth. In the moment of impact she split into two: the great ancient wolf Mar and his counterpart, Lira, both bound to the night, yet held apart from it...\"[/i]\n\n__________\n\n(I've been waiting on uploading this one so I could put it up on SoFurry too, but, uh......)\n(Also also, please [b]download[/b] the file to read this - formatting tags -do not- carry over on the inline reader!)\n\n[b]The Bridge Between[/b] is the direct novella sequel to Heart of the Forest, taking place some 2ish years after the conclusion of the original novel (which if you haven't read yet, you can pick up a copy [url=https://bewere.net/order.php?s=kawika]here on the Bewere shop![/url])\n\nAt this point Lannon and Sulla have settled quite comfortably into their bond & their new life together, and have been traveling around going on little adventures of their own. This story sees them passing through Heatherfield where Lannon, a hunter, locks on to new prey: the head of a local group of bounty hunters, who seek out and murder Sulla's people to sell their pelts and those of their bonded companions for profit.\n\nOut at the markets Lannon notices a figure from his past, a trader of wares and information both who should be able to point him in the right direction to begin his hunt...\n\n[URL=https://subscribestar.adult/lukas-kawika]My $5+ subscribers[/URL] can read the entire 5 part, ~23k word novella right now, while I'll be uploading on a (roughly) every-other-weekly schedule to my galleries~", "description_bbcode_parsed": "“In the times before time, there was not one sun and two moons, but simply two suns: one to watch over the earth during the day, and one the night. Back then the earth was still the domain of the impetuous old gods. It was they who walked the forests and fields, and left canyons where they stepped, and lifted mountains so they could have somewhere to rest; it was they who directed the seas and carved the rivers, and every day rose upon a different earth for their whims. When the night-sun failed to rise, they did not fail to notice. The old gods walked up to the empty sky, tore the night-sun from where she rested, and cast her down to the darkened earth. In the moment of impact she split into two: the great ancient wolf Mar and his counterpart, Lira, both bound to the night, yet held apart from it..."

__________

(I've been waiting on uploading this one so I could put it up on SoFurry too, but, uh......)
(Also also, please download the file to read this - formatting tags -do not- carry over on the inline reader!)

The Bridge Between is the direct novella sequel to Heart of the Forest, taking place some 2ish years after the conclusion of the original novel (which if you haven't read yet, you can pick up a copy here on the Bewere shop!)

At this point Lannon and Sulla have settled quite comfortably into their bond & their new life together, and have been traveling around going on little adventures of their own. This story sees them passing through Heatherfield where Lannon, a hunter, locks on to new prey: the head of a local group of bounty hunters, who seek out and murder Sulla's people to sell their pelts and those of their bonded companions for profit.

Out at the markets Lannon notices a figure from his past, a trader of wares and information both who should be able to point him in the right direction to begin his hunt...

My $5+ subscribers can read the entire 5 part, ~23k word novella right now, while I'll be uploading on a (roughly) every-other-weekly schedule to my galleries~", "writing": "The lynx took in a slow, steady breath of the cool evening air, let it swell within his lungs, and then sighed it back out, his adorned ears twitching with a slight twist in the wind around him. It felt like small, gentle fingers brushing along his revealed fur, his winter coat just starting to come in, his tans and beiges and soil-browns tinting to the grey-whites of stone, cloud, and ash instead. Mascara marks of dappled shadow along his face and muzzle helped to hide him while he crept among the low brush of the woods; broad, padded footpaws muffled his step; shallow shoulders, sleek but strong musculature, slightly hunched figure, kept him bound like a spring, ready to snap into motion at the slightest insistence.\n\nAnd the city made him uncomfortable. He reached over to scratch at an itch on his arm, one tall, tufted, jeweled ear flicking over towards the crackling of the fire nearby. He had been here once before, years ago, and recalled the sights and sounds and smells with the same sort of vague familiarity as in a dream; back then it had been wonder that had filled him to look around and see all the buildings, to meet all the people, to recognize all the ways in which civilization had carved its way out of the natural surroundings. Even out here in the endless prairie beyond the city’s limits he could feel its presence pushing down on everything around it, a stone in the moment before it breaks the water’s surface.\n\nThe fire popped again and drew his other ear, this one clinking with the gentle clack of amber on amber. The lynx rubbed his paws together, folded his fingers over one another, and reached in towards the heat, fingers spread; he wet his lips, swallowed, and closed his eyes, still following the dancing flame behind his eyelids. This, too, moved with a sort of pressure, tickling at his senses in the same way as a fresh bowl of stew enticed his nose, or the sounds of the forest eased his ears.\n\nIt was so strong, so present, that a part of him felt that he ought to be able to reach out, and…\n\n“Lannon.”\n\nThe lynx’s eyes fluttered open, and he turned away from the bright glare of the fire. Barely an arm’s length away he remained aware of yet another presence, this one much warmer than the flame, much more welcoming than the city, much more constant than the wind: he reached out with his near paw, and then with that hidden sense inside of him, and felt the connection blossom as sweetly inside him as it had the very first time.\n\n“Shualaya,” he responded, whiskers flicking, the word now cozy, comfortable, familiar after such extended use. Beloved. Most cherished. The wolf’s paw felt warm and soft in his own, even through the calloused pads and small pinpoint scars; Lannon turned his within the other male’s, squeezed, and smiled up at his familiar muzzle. “What is it?”\n\nThe wolf paused for a moment in thought, the vibrations, the sensation, of the process tickling at the edges of Lannon’s consciousness. This in itself was like standing outside a room while a conversation went on behind the closed door: if he paid attention, if he needed to, it would be trivial to put an ear up to the wood and listen in – but so too would this be improper.\n\nWhen he spoke again, his sharp fangs glittered in the light of the fire, and the amber of his own matching earrings sparkled like two smaller flames all their own. “At the markets today. You saw something-”\n\n-that caught my eye, and nearly froze me in my place. It seemed that my subconscious recognized it before I myself did; truthfully I have never seen such a thing, and I hoped I never would. I could do nothing but stare, for not only could I not recognize what the things themselves were, but then I felt the opposite for the shockingly familiar face running the stall-\n\n“-and I could tell that you recognized him.” The wolf drew his paw away from Lannon’s to intertwine with his other again. “And also that you were not expecting to see him here. Another friend from the academy?”\n\n“No.” Lannon shook his head, piercings jingling. His right ear bore the amber, twin bone hoops with the sunfire droplets hanging down; the other carried three metal studs along one side, a cuff along the other, and a hanging chain bridging across. He had since removed and sold the ruby beads that originally decorated it. “Close, but no. He is – if I am not mistaken – Feras.”\n\nHe felt his partner’s confusion before it presented itself on the lupine’s muzzle. The wolf frowned, tilted his head, and dug around in his own thoughts and memories. “Feras…”\n\n“A traveling peddler. He has aged – as I am certain I have – but I am sure it was him.” A weasel of short chocolate and caramel fur, bearing the same triple studs that Lannon did alongside twin onyx bars pierced through each little ear: “one for himself,” Lannon’s father had told him, “one for his community, one for the roads he shall follow, and one for the connections he shall make. After all, a trader is nothing without everyone around him.” \n\n“From your village?”\n\n“Originally, yes. I never knew him then.” The lynx reached for a stick, poked at the base of the fire, paused in his own thoughts. “But he was the one who took me away from there, who brought me where I needed to go. I first passed through Heatherfield,” with a nod towards the city on the horizon, “on his caravan… gods, that feels so long ago, Sulla.”\n\nThe wolf nodded. “That would be… eight years, now?”\n\n“Around then. Eight or nine.” Lannon tossed the stick onto the fire. “And yet, in some ways, it feels as though it is a journey I just finished.”\n\n“It will always feel that way. It’s part of learning, and learning is an ongoing process.” Sulla tilted his muzzle up to the sky, the pale blue light of the twin moons overhead mixing with the glow of the fire. His left eye glittered warm, still-water blue. “I remember the day I first noticed your presence in the woods…”\n\n“You do?”\n\nAnother pause, before the wolf returned his gaze to his mate. His right eye, now facing the fire, sparkled a rich mossy green. “In a way. Parts of me remember. It’s a sensation of familiarity, of…” He waved a paw.\n\n“Wahuliwa,” the lynx supplied. The word had no simple equivalent in Common.\n\nSulla nodded. “Yes. Wahuliwa. The body remembers, though the mind might not.”\n\nLannon scooted himself closer to the wolf, skirting around the fire, brushing his loose, airy clothing back so he could move more easily. Blades of grass tickled up through his thickening fur as he did so – and then a strong, powerful arm reached around his shoulder to tug him in, wrapping him once more within the scent of soil and stone, moss and woods and wolf.\n\n“I am sure,” he purred, “your body does remember, hunter. I should be disappointed in myself if it did not. Ea lal va’ai’on, va’a pero-eo pra…”\n\n“Oohh…” Sulla’s voice rumbled in his throat, and his grip on the lynx’s shoulder tightened. Lannon chuckled into the lupine’s thick fur, reaching out with his own claws to push and press and knead. “Such amorous words. Is something more on your mind, little cat?”\n\nLannon pressed in a little bit closer, nudging his own consciousness along the wolf’s through this ethereal bond they shared – and there, of course, felt a mirror to his own latent desire, ever present. He flicked his tongue out across his fangs.\n\n“You tell me…”\n\n~ ~ ~\n\nThe so-familiar sweet, sizzling heat tingled throughout his body still, the pressure and pleasure heightened, deepened, magnified by what he shared with Sulla. As the night deepened, as the fire died out, and as the twin moons gave way to the single sun again, as soon as Lannon opened his eyes he could still feel the recent memory of their pairing tickling there beneath his tail – and even now while he trudged along the streets of the city, the organized cobbles unfamiliar and uncomfortable to his bare footpaws, the lingering sensation brought him a constant warm joy.\n\nHe knew it was something he would need, too, for today’s errand. Sulla had returned to the tavern near the chapel, not to drink but rather to listen; Lannon felt his presence far behind and over one shoulder, holding still, that same faint lodestone pull. The awareness of perception tingled, and Sulla smiled back at him, in that strange, esoteric way.\n\nThe mingled scents of the market assaulted his senses even before the lynx had turned the corner to the main thoroughfare. All the noise of the city rose around him, all these voices and sounds and nonsense: the creaking of wood, the clatter of tile, the clink of coinage. Laughter, shouting, conversation, bits and pieces of words floating through like pollen on the air… music lilting distantly along from somewhere else.\n\nAnd yet again he felt that same presence over again, pulling his attention, drawing him towards it. An electricity in the air, the hollow sensation of expelled energy following a strike of lightning; Feras’s stall stood down a side street, wares swaying in the breeze that made its way down in between the buildings, carrying their foul scents over to Lannon.\n\nSo the lynx followed, willing the beat of his heart to still, right paw coming up to slip beneath the fabric of his opened jerkin to finger at the small pinprick scar layered within his fur. He swallowed, wet his lips again, forced his ears to remain upright, then slowed to a stop before the stall, and focused on the weasel behind the counter with his onyx-adorned ears-\n\n-instead of the wolf pelts hanging for sale off to one side of the display. Lannon could tell by scent that some had already been tanned, while those that had not varied in states of freshness; there were the familiar browns and greys of the deeper woods, then the softer stone and cloud hues from those who lived closer to the grassland, and even a single pelt of pure white. The weasel displayed all of his usual other wares as well – silver and pewterware, hand-carved instruments, soap likely from Lannon’s home village, stacks of cloth and linen and even silk, charms, talismans, candles, light weaponry – but none of these interested him.\n\nThe lynx rested his paw along one of the stacks of textiles, thumbpad feeling across the weave. He cleared his throat. “Hello.”\n\nThe weasel’s little ears perked, the onyx bars glittering in the sunlight. “Hello, and welcome! I’ve just arrived two days ago from-” And then he paused, mouth agape, and tilted his head one way… then the other, then leaned back a little bit, and angled his head to peer at his customer from down along the slant of his short muzzle. “As I live and breathe… Lannon Asaros! Could that be you?”\n\nThe lynx extended a paw across the counter; Feras clasped it in his own and gave one good, firm shake. “I see you, Feras.”\n\n“You’ve… changed!”\n\n“You’ve stayed the same.”\n\n“What can I do for you? I apologize I haven’t crossed through Avriel these past few moons-” The weasel bent over to reach beneath the counter for something. “-but, things have just been so busy with the trade picking up…”\n\n“I haven’t been home too much, either. Don’t worry about it.” Lannon’s nose twitched; Feras drew out a cast-iron teapot and accompanying cups, one in front of himself and one before his customer, and then deftly poured the silky orange liquid. He already recognized the aroma. “What trade?”\n\nFeras paused as he took a sip, ears flicking again, and briefly savored the flavor. “I like to keep two pressed bricks of this in my cart,” he explained; “I know it was your mother’s favorite, and I actually picked up a taste for it from carrying it along with each shipment. Two so I have one to drink now, and one to age.” He cleared his throat. “The pelts, of course.”\n\n“Yes.” Lannon glanced at them again, then forced himself to look away. “I noticed.”\n\n“It’s foul work. Awful. I avoided it as long as I could, but… I don’t know. Something’s changing in the forest. It feels… different up there.”\n\n“I imagine it does.”\n\nFeras took another sip. Stone-grey eyes scanned the street behind Lannon; the lynx’s ears swiveled to follow the point of interest, but found nothing of note. The weasel reached up to scratch behind one of his ears, the twin rods in that one jingling softly. It seemed as though he were thinking; Lannon watched as Feras rolled that mouthful of tea from one cheek to the other, then finally swallowed it down.\n\n“So,” the weasel said, pouring himself another cup, “you’re interested in pelts.”\n\nLannon stifled the nervousness simmering inside of him. The streets, the buildings all around, suddenly felt as though they had begun to tower in over him. “Did I say that?”\n\n“Wolf pelts.” Feras lifted the cup to his muzzle and inhaled the steam, rich, heady, savory. Lannon’s mother used to laugh when she poured it for new guests, knowing that it would be too bitter for their taste. “Hunted off the indigenous population of the forests of Loria. The tribesmen and their… companions. It’s tantamount to murder, some would say.”\n\nThe heat seared through the wall of the cup and into Lannon’s fingerpads. He gripped the metal a little bit tighter.\n\nFeras shrugged. “But not most, I would wager. And so the trade continues, as an ethically sourced luxury, so long as your understanding of ethics is somewhat skewed. It pays damned well, and that’s the sole reason I try not to think about it, and gods know I spend as little time and conversation as possible dealing with that source.”\n\nFinally Lannon placed the cup down. “You trade with them directly?”\n\n“Of course I do. You know me, Lannon.”\n\n“Where can I find them?”\n\n“Hmm.” Feras rested his chin in one paw, and drummed at the counter with the fingers of the other. Lannon only now noticed that the weasel had lacquered his claws, in the style of the nobility; he had chosen black, an inky velvet like the night sky. “I imagine someone like you has seen much in the… seven years? Eight? Since I first brought you through here.”\n\n“More than you could know, Feras.”\n\nWith that the weasel tapped his cup down against the counter. “Well, we’ll see about that. How about you meet me for a drink down at the Brass and Bronze once Little Brother is out? And you and I can make a trade of information.”\n\n“You’ve got a deal.” Lannon picked his own cup back up. “My husband will be there too.”\n\nOnyx-adorned ears perked. “Husband! Now that’s something old Asaros didn’t tell me.”\n\n“A little over a year now, about.” He took a sip. “Oh, this is good. Is this the aged?”\n\n“Yes, it is. And you have my congratulations; I never would have expected it of you. Normally these go for a premium, but – one pressed tea cake, as a gift from me to your everlasting happiness?”\n\nLannon reached for the pot. “Can you make it two?”\n\n“I can if you pay for the second.”\n\n~ ~ ~\n\nLannon had never liked taverns. If there was any forest border village, then as a matter of course it would have two things: a tavern and a hunter, and he had visited the former of these back in his hometown perhaps three times while he had lived there. Back then it had been for a different reason – it simply did not interest him – but now that he had been through the woods, now that he had Sulla nestled into the back of his head at all times, now that he had changed, it was for the same reasons he disliked the city itself.\n\nThese walls rising up around him felt somewhat… oppressive. He had been glad to see that Feras had picked a table back by one of the windows, but even with his shoulder pressed up against the sill so that the wind could reach in and stroke his fur, Lannon still felt the encroaching anxiety of a cornered animal. The haze of smoke, the cool, stinging bite of alcohol, all of these other unfamiliar scents, just further pushed on his senses – so that sudden sweet, gentle clarity pierced through upon that awareness in the back of his mind shifting, nudging, imposing a little bit more strongly.\n\nSulla was on his way back. The lynx straightened up in his seat, took another breath of the air from through the window, and folded his paw around his own tankard. “Varora. Apologies. I was – somewhere else. You were saying…?”\n\nFeras nodded behind his own tankard. He held the liquid there in his maw, tasted it, rolled it back and forth again, swallowed. In the dimness of the tavern his jewelry may as well have not been there at all. “Am I correct in my assumption that you already have… experience, so to say, with these – hunters?”\n\n“Bounty hunters.” One of Lannon’s ears flicked, amber clicking. The chair beside him scraped across the floor; Sulla’s presence washed across him a moment before his scent did, the bigger wolf settling into place, brushing a leg across his own, swinging his tail over to nudge at the lynx’s much shorter one. Instinctively he leaned over to rest his weight across his husband. “We are acquainted, in a way.”\n\n“Lannon.” One big paw squeezed his shoulder. “Au lal ea il’huli?” What are you thinking?\n\nThe lynx leaned over and tilted his head a bit. He kept his voice down and responded in the same language. “We are hunters,” he rumbled, “you and I. There is prey.”\n\n“Do not get in over your head. I have distanced myself from it.”\n\n“I’m not planning anything.” Lannon rested his paw along Sulla’s leg beneath the table. “Not yet. I’m a scholar, beloved; I seek to learn.”\n\nThe wolf drew in a slow breath. “I trust you.”\n\nSeeing the exchange had finished, Feras looked from lynx to wolf, and then back. He pursed his lips. “I believe I could piece together your interest in the matter,” he said, with a slow nod. “But, that is none of my business. As I discussed with you at my stall earlier today, Lannon: information for information.”\n\n“Of course.” He folded his paws atop the table. “I can tell you all about what happened to me in the years since I’ve seen you. I had it all recorded in a journal, but now that is in the care of Archmistress Rima, down at the academy in Solm where I initially arrived, and-”\n\n“No, no.” The weasel waved a small-clawed paw. “That’s too easy. Everyone can give me information on themselves. It is a story of which you yourself are the author: this allows you to bend and twist it as you like. No.” Those claws tapped against the ale-soaked wood of the table. “I seek what you know of others.”\n\nLannon tilted his head in thought. “That complicates it somewhat.” He chewed on his lip. “What in particular are you looking for?”\n\n“Do you remember the types of stories I would bring for you and the other kittens, all those years ago?”\n\nOld familiarity tingled within Lannon’s thoughts, again like recalling a dream. He smiled as he remembered. “My father told me that you were the one who brought him the story of my namesake.”\n\n“Lannon the warrior.” Feras grinned and pointed up at the roof of the tavern – or rather, the sky beyond it. “Guided by the stars there, there, there… there, and there. Belt, sword, shield.”\n\n“Hmm…” Now Lannon drummed his claws along the table. His other ear flicked again as Sulla shifted in his seat. “Let me see.”\n\nAround him the noise of the tavern continued to stir, rumbling through his senses and pounding away at his being. He bit his lip again, tilted his head, turned to look out the window… and just barely saw the bright rim of the smaller moon where it poked out from behind another building across the street.\n\n“Feras,” he went on, still looking out the window, “do you know who put the moons in the sky?”\n\nSulla’s ear twitched. Across from him the weasel shifted. Lannon heard the sound of his mouth opening, then closing again.\n\n“I can’t say I do.”\n\n“You are already familiar with the… wolves, up in the northern woods. You know of…” Our, he was going to say, and then caught himself; “...their ways, in as far as you recognize the hunter-companion bond.”\n\nFeras folded his paws together, black-lacquered claws glimmering in the dimness. Lannon turned his head until his piercings clinked.\n\n“Down here in the cities, beyond the edge of the forests, the moons are known as Big Sister and Little Brother. They dance, they twirl, they play…” He waved a paw as he spoke, causing little currents of air to swirl about his fingers. “To the wolves they are the first bonded pair: Lira the huntress, Mar her companion. The wolves we see today, those who walk on two legs, are descended from the ancient beasts: Mar towered over his bonded huntress, the top of her ears barely coming to his shoulder, and it was through that shared blood that their bond held. What one saw, so too did the other; their thoughts, their feelings, their observations, every aspect of their lives, shared as though they were indeed one individual split between two bodies. This was the way of things.\n\n“But not all was well, in those times long since past. In the times before time, there was not one sun and two moons, but simply two suns: one to watch over the earth during the day, and one the night. The night-sun thought her domain shallow and oppressive: why was it that she should get only half of the cycle? Why couldn’t she have the day and the night, or even share both with her beloved sister? And so the night-sun sought to remedy this, and one night she simply stayed asleep, seeking to wait until her sister’s time to join her.\n\n“Back then the earth was still the domain of the impetuous old gods. It was they who walked the forests and fields, and left canyons where they stepped, and lifted mountains so they could have somewhere to rest; it was they who directed the seas and carved the rivers, and every day rose upon a different earth for their whims. When the night-sun failed to rise, they did not fail to notice. The old gods walked up to the empty sky, tore the night-sun from where she rested, and cast her down to the darkened earth. In the moment of impact she split into two: the great ancient wolf Mar and his counterpart, Lira, both bound to the night, yet held apart from it.\n\n“But,” and here Lannon held one paw up to the window, where Little Brother had risen a hair’s breadth further above the roof across the street, “this, of course, only deepened the divide: now there was a day-sun and nothing to warm the night but the cold, distant stars. And every night that passed, Lira and Mar looked up to the sky and felt a strange, distant longing, the thing they call wahuliwa: a memory of a memory, something recalled within a dream. The night sky called to them, and day by day they made their way closer. Through the woods, and up the mountains, and though they peered up at the empty place in the sky that used to be theirs, they could not remember.\n\n“As they traveled, they followed the course of every living thing who finds their perfect other: they spread. One line remained west beyond the mountains – today we see these rugged traits expressed in the Alenari wolves – and one settled in the forests.” Lannon nudged against Sulla beside him. “Yet another continued to the southeast, eventually becoming what we know as the lighter, sleeker Doriani wolves. Lira and Mar held close to their eastern descendants, but were not among them. The two sun-spawn knew, deep inside, that they were something else entirely, and so every night they still returned to the mountain where they awoke to gaze longingly at the sky.”\n\nFeras watched him for a moment longer, then went to sip from his tankard while forgetting he had already drained it. Then the weasel placed it back down, seeming as though he had not even noticed.\n\n“So what happened?” he asked with a tilt of the head. “They had to have found their way back, didn’t they?”\n\nLannon sat back in his seat. “Nobody knows. The tales differ: some believe that, one night, they realized that they themselves were what was holding them back, and simply returned to the sky. Some believe that at the end of their lives they fell asleep instead of passed on, and it is their slumbering bodies which now rise into the sky every night. Others hold that Lira and Mar continued east, into the snow beyond the forests.” \n\n“Into Taiko? There’s nothing there but a few small snow leopard clans.”\n\nLannon shrugged. “As it may be. Some even say the old gods realized their own mistake and returned them to their place, their sunlight dimmed into moonlight for their split individuality. But whichever conclusion fits, they all share one thing: Lira and Mar deliberately chose to remain separate, finding comfort, solace, companionship, and love in the union they shared, rather than sacrifice that for complete loneliness. Lonely – while complete.”\n\nAgain the weasel nodded, visibly working through Lannon’s tale. He tapped his painted claws across his tankard, looked out to the night sky, leaned in a little, turned back to the table again. When he spoke again he kept his voice low, barely audible over the din of the tavern.\n\n“You are wise beyond your years, Lannon Asaros.” Grey eyes appraised him, and the wolf beside him. “I would almost think it was not the lynx I knew before who sits before me, but rather another wolf, bearing his face and voice. The hunters – bounty hunters – with which I deal are nomadic, as they all are, but the leader of this group lives in Fros. The group itself is new to the area.”\n\nSulla rumbled a bit. He folded his paws atop the table. “Fros. That’s just northeast of here, is it not?”\n\nFeras nodded. “Barely half a rainy day’s walk. They just returned with a new haul, as you probably saw today, so they’ll be around for a while.”\n\n“Is there anything else you can tell us?”\n\n“He’s a wolf, and he’s big. I would almost think him a tribesman of your husband, here. Same browns, greys, tans.” Grey eyes flashed to the wolf. “But I can’t imagine someone from your culture would fall into such a trade as… well, as that. That, and there’s not a lick of dialect or accent to him; man’s been speaking Common since the first. Missing an eye, but hasn’t affected his aim at all. Good with a bow, not the best I’ve seen in my travels, but good enough that I’m not comfortable until I’ve put two hills between myself and his camp.” Feras raised a paw for another refill. “Apologies. I’m assuming you’re going to end this trade of his.”\n\nIn the back of his head rather than in his ear: “Lannon…”\n\nThe lynx’s fur bristled a bit. He flicked his tongue across his fangs. “Feras. Is that really what you would expect of me? Little old Lannon Asaros? Going out of my way to seek out and enter combat with an experienced, professional hunter and killer?”\n\n“It’s not what I would expect of Azalon’s son Lannon.” The weasel leaned back upon the server’s arrival, nodded his thanks, then motioned to his guest’s cups as well. Sulla covered his with his paw; Lannon allowed his own. “But, from when we spoke in the market today, and meeting you here, and listening to speak, and seeing what you share with your husband? It is what I would expect of this Lannon, the one who sits before me.”\n\n“Little cat, we must speak of this.”\n\n“Tss.” He patted Sulla’s leg again and once more spoke to him in his native tongue. “And so we shall, beloved. I have an idea. Nothing more. And I can do nothing without you by my side.”\n\nFeras waited for this exchange to finish. He sipped his drink again and once more looked out the window, Little Brother’s light reflecting in his eyes. “If you speak with him,” he went on, “I would recommend Lannon go alone, or at least with you staying out of sight. He is naturally suspicious of those of his own species; I recognize you for who you are through my travels and the knowledge I have collected, and so too will he be able to, via his own experience. It’s dangerous.”\n\nSulla crossed his arms. “I can handle myself.”\n\n“I don’t doubt that. Gods, but I don’t. But he hunts for the profit: come to him as a prospective buyer, or as a fellow hunter with valuable insight, and he will listen.” He looked to Lannon again. “In an… amusing bit of irony, his name is also Mar.”\n\n“Oh.” Lannon smirked. “That is amusing. Ah – will you need me to write that one down for you?”\n\n“Gods, I was hoping you’d ask. It would be a wonderful help.”\n\n“I’ll do that and get it to you first thing tomorrow morning. Oh, and one more thing – when are you planning another visit back to Avriel?…”\n\n~ ~ ~\n\n“Where did you learn that story?”\n\n“Sulaya told it to me.” Lannon shifted where he lay naked in the grass, one leg crossed over the other, arms up behind his head. He followed the ghost-lines of constellations far overhead, Sulla’s faint, thought-vision guidance nudging him along through their bond: Lannon the Warrior, or Lan-On, the Giver. Arima, the Forgemaster; Sharaz, the crow who guides the heavens, with the stolen light of the sky caught in her beak… “On one of the nights we spent together.”\n\nA rumble of contentment vibrated both through Sulla’s chest as well as their bond. He reached over from where he lay beside the lynx to rest his paw along his bare leg; Lannon reached down to cover it with his own.\n\n“She guides you well. My daughter is… rash, bold, and headstrong, overconfident and unmitigated…”\n\n“Will there be a compliment, somewhere along this?”\n\n“...and you temper her as the mangrove stills a swirling wave.”\n\nLannon purred as well, halfway leaning over to nudge his muzzle against Sulla’s shoulder. Their entwined paws dropped to the cool grass between them. “Shualaya, you make me wish she were here.”\n\n“Pah. And yet, you are stuck with me.”\n\n“Mm.” He continued his roll, pushing until his paws pressed down on Sulla’s shoulders and he looked down at him from above, legs spread about the lupine’s lap. “So I am. Truly I have received the poorer end of this bargain.”\n\nA low chuckle rumbled in Sulla’s throat. “Stuck with me,” he went on, and reached for his mate’s wrist, “though I would rather be – stuck in you.”\n\n“Ohh. I can feel it. Is that what this is about?” Lannon huffed as Sulla pulled him down closer, then willingly slid the rest of the way down. Chest to chest, he ran his muzzle in against the wolf’s neck, inhaled his scent, nuzzled into the fur there. “Hunter, she is your daughter-”\n\n“But it is you who I see.” Sulla tilted his head away to show more of his neck; Lannon’s lips brushed across a wire-thin line of tight scar nestled within his fur. The wolf slipped once again into the Old Tongue. “You, my beloved, my beauty, whose heart grows for every day that passes. I feel it in you, Lannon: you give me all the love you can and still overflow with more, and it brings me endless warmth and fulfillment to see you share this love of yours with others.”\n\nLannon’s paw descended further, down across the rippling lines of sleek muscle threading through Sulla’s chest and belly, then fingers spreading within the somewhat thicker, denser ruff of pubic fur – and the backs of his knuckles slid across the warm, slick wetness of his emerging shaft, twitching with the beat of his pulse. He shifted his weight a little more comfortably, then wrapped his paw around that growing arousal.\n\n“I only wish,” he sighed, “that I could do it more often…”\n\n“As do I.” Sulla’s head rolled back; his other paw pressed down into the grass and that rumble again began in his chest, as he nudged upwards into the slow stroking. Lannon’s fingers nudged against the rim of his sheath, squeezing against the supple skin, sliding it back further, welcoming it to then fold forward over him again. “So I suppose, in the meantime, you will have to do with me.”\n\n“Mmr.” Lannon nudged forward again, then continued further down with his paw. The slickness of Sulla’s shaft smeared down across his fur; he spread his fingers, rubbed across the wolf’s sack, rolled his balls up into his palm, massaged gently. “Poor, poor me. Oh, whatever will I do…”\n\nThe distance between them closed, Lannon once more nuzzling up beneath Sulla’s chin, the wolf turning his head to plant a series of short, sweet kisses across the lynx’s head. He continued grinding his hips, then spread his legs, pushed in against his mate, rolled him over onto his back – and straddled his body, arms out on either side of Lannon’s head, barrel chest heaving with slow, steady breaths. Lannon flicked his tongue out across his lips as he looked him up and down, from his familiar muzzle, to his broad shoulders, to his bared chest and belly… to the thick, pulsing meat that hung down across his belly underneath its own weight, unswollen knot lifting out the rim of his sheath, hefty sack swaying, dragging with each stroke of his paws.\n\nThe lynx lifted one leg up, then the other; grasping onto Sulla’s arms he settled himself into place, rump against lap, that firm, wet heat twitching against him, further drawing out his own arousal. “Right here, beloved?”\n\n“Would you rather anywhere else?”\n\nAnother sweet, rumbling purr. Lannon rocked his hips a little bit. “Again? So soon?”\n\n“What can I say? Seeing you as you are now, moving, speaking, thinking like a hunter… you were not born to this life, and yet you embrace it as though it is a part of you.”\n\n“And so it is, and I would have it no other way. Who do you think I have to thank for that?”", "writing_bbcode_parsed": "The lynx took in a slow, steady breath of the cool evening air, let it swell within his lungs, and then sighed it back out, his adorned ears twitching with a slight twist in the wind around him. It felt like small, gentle fingers brushing along his revealed fur, his winter coat just starting to come in, his tans and beiges and soil-browns tinting to the grey-whites of stone, cloud, and ash instead. Mascara marks of dappled shadow along his face and muzzle helped to hide him while he crept among the low brush of the woods; broad, padded footpaws muffled his step; shallow shoulders, sleek but strong musculature, slightly hunched figure, kept him bound like a spring, ready to snap into motion at the slightest insistence.

And the city made him uncomfortable. He reached over to scratch at an itch on his arm, one tall, tufted, jeweled ear flicking over towards the crackling of the fire nearby. He had been here once before, years ago, and recalled the sights and sounds and smells with the same sort of vague familiarity as in a dream; back then it had been wonder that had filled him to look around and see all the buildings, to meet all the people, to recognize all the ways in which civilization had carved its way out of the natural surroundings. Even out here in the endless prairie beyond the city’s limits he could feel its presence pushing down on everything around it, a stone in the moment before it breaks the water’s surface.

The fire popped again and drew his other ear, this one clinking with the gentle clack of amber on amber. The lynx rubbed his paws together, folded his fingers over one another, and reached in towards the heat, fingers spread; he wet his lips, swallowed, and closed his eyes, still following the dancing flame behind his eyelids. This, too, moved with a sort of pressure, tickling at his senses in the same way as a fresh bowl of stew enticed his nose, or the sounds of the forest eased his ears.

It was so strong, so present, that a part of him felt that he ought to be able to reach out, and…

“Lannon.”

The lynx’s eyes fluttered open, and he turned away from the bright glare of the fire. Barely an arm’s length away he remained aware of yet another presence, this one much warmer than the flame, much more welcoming than the city, much more constant than the wind: he reached out with his near paw, and then with that hidden sense inside of him, and felt the connection blossom as sweetly inside him as it had the very first time.

“Shualaya,” he responded, whiskers flicking, the word now cozy, comfortable, familiar after such extended use. Beloved. Most cherished. The wolf’s paw felt warm and soft in his own, even through the calloused pads and small pinpoint scars; Lannon turned his within the other male’s, squeezed, and smiled up at his familiar muzzle. “What is it?”

The wolf paused for a moment in thought, the vibrations, the sensation, of the process tickling at the edges of Lannon’s consciousness. This in itself was like standing outside a room while a conversation went on behind the closed door: if he paid attention, if he needed to, it would be trivial to put an ear up to the wood and listen in – but so too would this be improper.

When he spoke again, his sharp fangs glittered in the light of the fire, and the amber of his own matching earrings sparkled like two smaller flames all their own. “At the markets today. You saw something-”

-that caught my eye, and nearly froze me in my place. It seemed that my subconscious recognized it before I myself did; truthfully I have never seen such a thing, and I hoped I never would. I could do nothing but stare, for not only could I not recognize what the things themselves were, but then I felt the opposite for the shockingly familiar face running the stall-

“-and I could tell that you recognized him.” The wolf drew his paw away from Lannon’s to intertwine with his other again. “And also that you were not expecting to see him here. Another friend from the academy?”

“No.” Lannon shook his head, piercings jingling. His right ear bore the amber, twin bone hoops with the sunfire droplets hanging down; the other carried three metal studs along one side, a cuff along the other, and a hanging chain bridging across. He had since removed and sold the ruby beads that originally decorated it. “Close, but no. He is – if I am not mistaken – Feras.”

He felt his partner’s confusion before it presented itself on the lupine’s muzzle. The wolf frowned, tilted his head, and dug around in his own thoughts and memories. “Feras…”

“A traveling peddler. He has aged – as I am certain I have – but I am sure it was him.” A weasel of short chocolate and caramel fur, bearing the same triple studs that Lannon did alongside twin onyx bars pierced through each little ear: “one for himself,” Lannon’s father had told him, “one for his community, one for the roads he shall follow, and one for the connections he shall make. After all, a trader is nothing without everyone around him.”

“From your village?”

“Originally, yes. I never knew him then.” The lynx reached for a stick, poked at the base of the fire, paused in his own thoughts. “But he was the one who took me away from there, who brought me where I needed to go. I first passed through Heatherfield,” with a nod towards the city on the horizon, “on his caravan… gods, that feels so long ago, Sulla.”

The wolf nodded. “That would be… eight years, now?”

“Around then. Eight or nine.” Lannon tossed the stick onto the fire. “And yet, in some ways, it feels as though it is a journey I just finished.”

“It will always feel that way. It’s part of learning, and learning is an ongoing process.” Sulla tilted his muzzle up to the sky, the pale blue light of the twin moons overhead mixing with the glow of the fire. His left eye glittered warm, still-water blue. “I remember the day I first noticed your presence in the woods…”

“You do?”

Another pause, before the wolf returned his gaze to his mate. His right eye, now facing the fire, sparkled a rich mossy green. “In a way. Parts of me remember. It’s a sensation of familiarity, of…” He waved a paw.

“Wahuliwa,” the lynx supplied. The word had no simple equivalent in Common.

Sulla nodded. “Yes. Wahuliwa. The body remembers, though the mind might not.”

Lannon scooted himself closer to the wolf, skirting around the fire, brushing his loose, airy clothing back so he could move more easily. Blades of grass tickled up through his thickening fur as he did so – and then a strong, powerful arm reached around his shoulder to tug him in, wrapping him once more within the scent of soil and stone, moss and woods and wolf.

“I am sure,” he purred, “your body does remember, hunter. I should be disappointed in myself if it did not. Ea lal va’ai’on, va’a pero-eo pra…”

“Oohh…” Sulla’s voice rumbled in his throat, and his grip on the lynx’s shoulder tightened. Lannon chuckled into the lupine’s thick fur, reaching out with his own claws to push and press and knead. “Such amorous words. Is something more on your mind, little cat?”

Lannon pressed in a little bit closer, nudging his own consciousness along the wolf’s through this ethereal bond they shared – and there, of course, felt a mirror to his own latent desire, ever present. He flicked his tongue out across his fangs.

“You tell me…”

~ ~ ~

The so-familiar sweet, sizzling heat tingled throughout his body still, the pressure and pleasure heightened, deepened, magnified by what he shared with Sulla. As the night deepened, as the fire died out, and as the twin moons gave way to the single sun again, as soon as Lannon opened his eyes he could still feel the recent memory of their pairing tickling there beneath his tail – and even now while he trudged along the streets of the city, the organized cobbles unfamiliar and uncomfortable to his bare footpaws, the lingering sensation brought him a constant warm joy.

He knew it was something he would need, too, for today’s errand. Sulla had returned to the tavern near the chapel, not to drink but rather to listen; Lannon felt his presence far behind and over one shoulder, holding still, that same faint lodestone pull. The awareness of perception tingled, and Sulla smiled back at him, in that strange, esoteric way.

The mingled scents of the market assaulted his senses even before the lynx had turned the corner to the main thoroughfare. All the noise of the city rose around him, all these voices and sounds and nonsense: the creaking of wood, the clatter of tile, the clink of coinage. Laughter, shouting, conversation, bits and pieces of words floating through like pollen on the air… music lilting distantly along from somewhere else.

And yet again he felt that same presence over again, pulling his attention, drawing him towards it. An electricity in the air, the hollow sensation of expelled energy following a strike of lightning; Feras’s stall stood down a side street, wares swaying in the breeze that made its way down in between the buildings, carrying their foul scents over to Lannon.

So the lynx followed, willing the beat of his heart to still, right paw coming up to slip beneath the fabric of his opened jerkin to finger at the small pinprick scar layered within his fur. He swallowed, wet his lips again, forced his ears to remain upright, then slowed to a stop before the stall, and focused on the weasel behind the counter with his onyx-adorned ears-

-instead of the wolf pelts hanging for sale off to one side of the display. Lannon could tell by scent that some had already been tanned, while those that had not varied in states of freshness; there were the familiar browns and greys of the deeper woods, then the softer stone and cloud hues from those who lived closer to the grassland, and even a single pelt of pure white. The weasel displayed all of his usual other wares as well – silver and pewterware, hand-carved instruments, soap likely from Lannon’s home village, stacks of cloth and linen and even silk, charms, talismans, candles, light weaponry – but none of these interested him.

The lynx rested his paw along one of the stacks of textiles, thumbpad feeling across the weave. He cleared his throat. “Hello.”

The weasel’s little ears perked, the onyx bars glittering in the sunlight. “Hello, and welcome! I’ve just arrived two days ago from-” And then he paused, mouth agape, and tilted his head one way… then the other, then leaned back a little bit, and angled his head to peer at his customer from down along the slant of his short muzzle. “As I live and breathe… Lannon Asaros! Could that be you?”

The lynx extended a paw across the counter; Feras clasped it in his own and gave one good, firm shake. “I see you, Feras.”

“You’ve… changed!”

“You’ve stayed the same.”

“What can I do for you? I apologize I haven’t crossed through Avriel these past few moons-” The weasel bent over to reach beneath the counter for something. “-but, things have just been so busy with the trade picking up…”

“I haven’t been home too much, either. Don’t worry about it.” Lannon’s nose twitched; Feras drew out a cast-iron teapot and accompanying cups, one in front of himself and one before his customer, and then deftly poured the silky orange liquid. He already recognized the aroma. “What trade?”

Feras paused as he took a sip, ears flicking again, and briefly savored the flavor. “I like to keep two pressed bricks of this in my cart,” he explained; “I know it was your mother’s favorite, and I actually picked up a taste for it from carrying it along with each shipment. Two so I have one to drink now, and one to age.” He cleared his throat. “The pelts, of course.”

“Yes.” Lannon glanced at them again, then forced himself to look away. “I noticed.”

“It’s foul work. Awful. I avoided it as long as I could, but… I don’t know. Something’s changing in the forest. It feels… different up there.”

“I imagine it does.”

Feras took another sip. Stone-grey eyes scanned the street behind Lannon; the lynx’s ears swiveled to follow the point of interest, but found nothing of note. The weasel reached up to scratch behind one of his ears, the twin rods in that one jingling softly. It seemed as though he were thinking; Lannon watched as Feras rolled that mouthful of tea from one cheek to the other, then finally swallowed it down.

“So,” the weasel said, pouring himself another cup, “you’re interested in pelts.”

Lannon stifled the nervousness simmering inside of him. The streets, the buildings all around, suddenly felt as though they had begun to tower in over him. “Did I say that?”

“Wolf pelts.” Feras lifted the cup to his muzzle and inhaled the steam, rich, heady, savory. Lannon’s mother used to laugh when she poured it for new guests, knowing that it would be too bitter for their taste. “Hunted off the indigenous population of the forests of Loria. The tribesmen and their… companions. It’s tantamount to murder, some would say.”

The heat seared through the wall of the cup and into Lannon’s fingerpads. He gripped the metal a little bit tighter.

Feras shrugged. “But not most, I would wager. And so the trade continues, as an ethically sourced luxury, so long as your understanding of ethics is somewhat skewed. It pays damned well, and that’s the sole reason I try not to think about it, and gods know I spend as little time and conversation as possible dealing with that source.”

Finally Lannon placed the cup down. “You trade with them directly?”

“Of course I do. You know me, Lannon.”

“Where can I find them?”

“Hmm.” Feras rested his chin in one paw, and drummed at the counter with the fingers of the other. Lannon only now noticed that the weasel had lacquered his claws, in the style of the nobility; he had chosen black, an inky velvet like the night sky. “I imagine someone like you has seen much in the… seven years? Eight? Since I first brought you through here.”

“More than you could know, Feras.”

With that the weasel tapped his cup down against the counter. “Well, we’ll see about that. How about you meet me for a drink down at the Brass and Bronze once Little Brother is out? And you and I can make a trade of information.”

“You’ve got a deal.” Lannon picked his own cup back up. “My husband will be there too.”

Onyx-adorned ears perked. “Husband! Now that’s something old Asaros didn’t tell me.”

“A little over a year now, about.” He took a sip. “Oh, this is good. Is this the aged?”

“Yes, it is. And you have my congratulations; I never would have expected it of you. Normally these go for a premium, but – one pressed tea cake, as a gift from me to your everlasting happiness?”

Lannon reached for the pot. “Can you make it two?”

“I can if you pay for the second.”

~ ~ ~

Lannon had never liked taverns. If there was any forest border village, then as a matter of course it would have two things: a tavern and a hunter, and he had visited the former of these back in his hometown perhaps three times while he had lived there. Back then it had been for a different reason – it simply did not interest him – but now that he had been through the woods, now that he had Sulla nestled into the back of his head at all times, now that he had changed, it was for the same reasons he disliked the city itself.

These walls rising up around him felt somewhat… oppressive. He had been glad to see that Feras had picked a table back by one of the windows, but even with his shoulder pressed up against the sill so that the wind could reach in and stroke his fur, Lannon still felt the encroaching anxiety of a cornered animal. The haze of smoke, the cool, stinging bite of alcohol, all of these other unfamiliar scents, just further pushed on his senses – so that sudden sweet, gentle clarity pierced through upon that awareness in the back of his mind shifting, nudging, imposing a little bit more strongly.

Sulla was on his way back. The lynx straightened up in his seat, took another breath of the air from through the window, and folded his paw around his own tankard. “Varora. Apologies. I was – somewhere else. You were saying…?”

Feras nodded behind his own tankard. He held the liquid there in his maw, tasted it, rolled it back and forth again, swallowed. In the dimness of the tavern his jewelry may as well have not been there at all. “Am I correct in my assumption that you already have… experience, so to say, with these – hunters?”

“Bounty hunters.” One of Lannon’s ears flicked, amber clicking. The chair beside him scraped across the floor; Sulla’s presence washed across him a moment before his scent did, the bigger wolf settling into place, brushing a leg across his own, swinging his tail over to nudge at the lynx’s much shorter one. Instinctively he leaned over to rest his weight across his husband. “We are acquainted, in a way.”

“Lannon.” One big paw squeezed his shoulder. “Au lal ea il’huli?” What are you thinking?

The lynx leaned over and tilted his head a bit. He kept his voice down and responded in the same language. “We are hunters,” he rumbled, “you and I. There is prey.”

“Do not get in over your head. I have distanced myself from it.”

“I’m not planning anything.” Lannon rested his paw along Sulla’s leg beneath the table. “Not yet. I’m a scholar, beloved; I seek to learn.”

The wolf drew in a slow breath. “I trust you.”

Seeing the exchange had finished, Feras looked from lynx to wolf, and then back. He pursed his lips. “I believe I could piece together your interest in the matter,” he said, with a slow nod. “But, that is none of my business. As I discussed with you at my stall earlier today, Lannon: information for information.”

“Of course.” He folded his paws atop the table. “I can tell you all about what happened to me in the years since I’ve seen you. I had it all recorded in a journal, but now that is in the care of Archmistress Rima, down at the academy in Solm where I initially arrived, and-”

“No, no.” The weasel waved a small-clawed paw. “That’s too easy. Everyone can give me information on themselves. It is a story of which you yourself are the author: this allows you to bend and twist it as you like. No.” Those claws tapped against the ale-soaked wood of the table. “I seek what you know of others.”

Lannon tilted his head in thought. “That complicates it somewhat.” He chewed on his lip. “What in particular are you looking for?”

“Do you remember the types of stories I would bring for you and the other kittens, all those years ago?”

Old familiarity tingled within Lannon’s thoughts, again like recalling a dream. He smiled as he remembered. “My father told me that you were the one who brought him the story of my namesake.”

“Lannon the warrior.” Feras grinned and pointed up at the roof of the tavern – or rather, the sky beyond it. “Guided by the stars there, there, there… there, and there. Belt, sword, shield.”

“Hmm…” Now Lannon drummed his claws along the table. His other ear flicked again as Sulla shifted in his seat. “Let me see.”

Around him the noise of the tavern continued to stir, rumbling through his senses and pounding away at his being. He bit his lip again, tilted his head, turned to look out the window… and just barely saw the bright rim of the smaller moon where it poked out from behind another building across the street.

“Feras,” he went on, still looking out the window, “do you know who put the moons in the sky?”

Sulla’s ear twitched. Across from him the weasel shifted. Lannon heard the sound of his mouth opening, then closing again.

“I can’t say I do.”

“You are already familiar with the… wolves, up in the northern woods. You know of…” Our, he was going to say, and then caught himself; “...their ways, in as far as you recognize the hunter-companion bond.”

Feras folded his paws together, black-lacquered claws glimmering in the dimness. Lannon turned his head until his piercings clinked.

“Down here in the cities, beyond the edge of the forests, the moons are known as Big Sister and Little Brother. They dance, they twirl, they play…” He waved a paw as he spoke, causing little currents of air to swirl about his fingers. “To the wolves they are the first bonded pair: Lira the huntress, Mar her companion. The wolves we see today, those who walk on two legs, are descended from the ancient beasts: Mar towered over his bonded huntress, the top of her ears barely coming to his shoulder, and it was through that shared blood that their bond held. What one saw, so too did the other; their thoughts, their feelings, their observations, every aspect of their lives, shared as though they were indeed one individual split between two bodies. This was the way of things.

“But not all was well, in those times long since past. In the times before time, there was not one sun and two moons, but simply two suns: one to watch over the earth during the day, and one the night. The night-sun thought her domain shallow and oppressive: why was it that she should get only half of the cycle? Why couldn’t she have the day and the night, or even share both with her beloved sister? And so the night-sun sought to remedy this, and one night she simply stayed asleep, seeking to wait until her sister’s time to join her.

“Back then the earth was still the domain of the impetuous old gods. It was they who walked the forests and fields, and left canyons where they stepped, and lifted mountains so they could have somewhere to rest; it was they who directed the seas and carved the rivers, and every day rose upon a different earth for their whims. When the night-sun failed to rise, they did not fail to notice. The old gods walked up to the empty sky, tore the night-sun from where she rested, and cast her down to the darkened earth. In the moment of impact she split into two: the great ancient wolf Mar and his counterpart, Lira, both bound to the night, yet held apart from it.

“But,” and here Lannon held one paw up to the window, where Little Brother had risen a hair’s breadth further above the roof across the street, “this, of course, only deepened the divide: now there was a day-sun and nothing to warm the night but the cold, distant stars. And every night that passed, Lira and Mar looked up to the sky and felt a strange, distant longing, the thing they call wahuliwa: a memory of a memory, something recalled within a dream. The night sky called to them, and day by day they made their way closer. Through the woods, and up the mountains, and though they peered up at the empty place in the sky that used to be theirs, they could not remember.

“As they traveled, they followed the course of every living thing who finds their perfect other: they spread. One line remained west beyond the mountains – today we see these rugged traits expressed in the Alenari wolves – and one settled in the forests.” Lannon nudged against Sulla beside him. “Yet another continued to the southeast, eventually becoming what we know as the lighter, sleeker Doriani wolves. Lira and Mar held close to their eastern descendants, but were not among them. The two sun-spawn knew, deep inside, that they were something else entirely, and so every night they still returned to the mountain where they awoke to gaze longingly at the sky.”

Feras watched him for a moment longer, then went to sip from his tankard while forgetting he had already drained it. Then the weasel placed it back down, seeming as though he had not even noticed.

“So what happened?” he asked with a tilt of the head. “They had to have found their way back, didn’t they?”

Lannon sat back in his seat. “Nobody knows. The tales differ: some believe that, one night, they realized that they themselves were what was holding them back, and simply returned to the sky. Some believe that at the end of their lives they fell asleep instead of passed on, and it is their slumbering bodies which now rise into the sky every night. Others hold that Lira and Mar continued east, into the snow beyond the forests.”

“Into Taiko? There’s nothing there but a few small snow leopard clans.”

Lannon shrugged. “As it may be. Some even say the old gods realized their own mistake and returned them to their place, their sunlight dimmed into moonlight for their split individuality. But whichever conclusion fits, they all share one thing: Lira and Mar deliberately chose to remain separate, finding comfort, solace, companionship, and love in the union they shared, rather than sacrifice that for complete loneliness. Lonely – while complete.”

Again the weasel nodded, visibly working through Lannon’s tale. He tapped his painted claws across his tankard, looked out to the night sky, leaned in a little, turned back to the table again. When he spoke again he kept his voice low, barely audible over the din of the tavern.

“You are wise beyond your years, Lannon Asaros.” Grey eyes appraised him, and the wolf beside him. “I would almost think it was not the lynx I knew before who sits before me, but rather another wolf, bearing his face and voice. The hunters – bounty hunters – with which I deal are nomadic, as they all are, but the leader of this group lives in Fros. The group itself is new to the area.”

Sulla rumbled a bit. He folded his paws atop the table. “Fros. That’s just northeast of here, is it not?”

Feras nodded. “Barely half a rainy day’s walk. They just returned with a new haul, as you probably saw today, so they’ll be around for a while.”

“Is there anything else you can tell us?”

“He’s a wolf, and he’s big. I would almost think him a tribesman of your husband, here. Same browns, greys, tans.” Grey eyes flashed to the wolf. “But I can’t imagine someone from your culture would fall into such a trade as… well, as that. That, and there’s not a lick of dialect or accent to him; man’s been speaking Common since the first. Missing an eye, but hasn’t affected his aim at all. Good with a bow, not the best I’ve seen in my travels, but good enough that I’m not comfortable until I’ve put two hills between myself and his camp.” Feras raised a paw for another refill. “Apologies. I’m assuming you’re going to end this trade of his.”

In the back of his head rather than in his ear: “Lannon…”

The lynx’s fur bristled a bit. He flicked his tongue across his fangs. “Feras. Is that really what you would expect of me? Little old Lannon Asaros? Going out of my way to seek out and enter combat with an experienced, professional hunter and killer?”

“It’s not what I would expect of Azalon’s son Lannon.” The weasel leaned back upon the server’s arrival, nodded his thanks, then motioned to his guest’s cups as well. Sulla covered his with his paw; Lannon allowed his own. “But, from when we spoke in the market today, and meeting you here, and listening to speak, and seeing what you share with your husband? It is what I would expect of this Lannon, the one who sits before me.”

“Little cat, we must speak of this.”

“Tss.” He patted Sulla’s leg again and once more spoke to him in his native tongue. “And so we shall, beloved. I have an idea. Nothing more. And I can do nothing without you by my side.”

Feras waited for this exchange to finish. He sipped his drink again and once more looked out the window, Little Brother’s light reflecting in his eyes. “If you speak with him,” he went on, “I would recommend Lannon go alone, or at least with you staying out of sight. He is naturally suspicious of those of his own species; I recognize you for who you are through my travels and the knowledge I have collected, and so too will he be able to, via his own experience. It’s dangerous.”

Sulla crossed his arms. “I can handle myself.”

“I don’t doubt that. Gods, but I don’t. But he hunts for the profit: come to him as a prospective buyer, or as a fellow hunter with valuable insight, and he will listen.” He looked to Lannon again. “In an… amusing bit of irony, his name is also Mar.”

“Oh.” Lannon smirked. “That is amusing. Ah – will you need me to write that one down for you?”

“Gods, I was hoping you’d ask. It would be a wonderful help.”

“I’ll do that and get it to you first thing tomorrow morning. Oh, and one more thing – when are you planning another visit back to Avriel?…”

~ ~ ~

“Where did you learn that story?”

“Sulaya told it to me.” Lannon shifted where he lay naked in the grass, one leg crossed over the other, arms up behind his head. He followed the ghost-lines of constellations far overhead, Sulla’s faint, thought-vision guidance nudging him along through their bond: Lannon the Warrior, or Lan-On, the Giver. Arima, the Forgemaster; Sharaz, the crow who guides the heavens, with the stolen light of the sky caught in her beak… “On one of the nights we spent together.”

A rumble of contentment vibrated both through Sulla’s chest as well as their bond. He reached over from where he lay beside the lynx to rest his paw along his bare leg; Lannon reached down to cover it with his own.

“She guides you well. My daughter is… rash, bold, and headstrong, overconfident and unmitigated…”

“Will there be a compliment, somewhere along this?”

“...and you temper her as the mangrove stills a swirling wave.”

Lannon purred as well, halfway leaning over to nudge his muzzle against Sulla’s shoulder. Their entwined paws dropped to the cool grass between them. “Shualaya, you make me wish she were here.”

“Pah. And yet, you are stuck with me.”

“Mm.” He continued his roll, pushing until his paws pressed down on Sulla’s shoulders and he looked down at him from above, legs spread about the lupine’s lap. “So I am. Truly I have received the poorer end of this bargain.”

A low chuckle rumbled in Sulla’s throat. “Stuck with me,” he went on, and reached for his mate’s wrist, “though I would rather be – stuck in you.”

“Ohh. I can feel it. Is that what this is about?” Lannon huffed as Sulla pulled him down closer, then willingly slid the rest of the way down. Chest to chest, he ran his muzzle in against the wolf’s neck, inhaled his scent, nuzzled into the fur there. “Hunter, she is your daughter-”

“But it is you who I see.” Sulla tilted his head away to show more of his neck; Lannon’s lips brushed across a wire-thin line of tight scar nestled within his fur. The wolf slipped once again into the Old Tongue. “You, my beloved, my beauty, whose heart grows for every day that passes. I feel it in you, Lannon: you give me all the love you can and still overflow with more, and it brings me endless warmth and fulfillment to see you share this love of yours with others.”

Lannon’s paw descended further, down across the rippling lines of sleek muscle threading through Sulla’s chest and belly, then fingers spreading within the somewhat thicker, denser ruff of pubic fur – and the backs of his knuckles slid across the warm, slick wetness of his emerging shaft, twitching with the beat of his pulse. He shifted his weight a little more comfortably, then wrapped his paw around that growing arousal.

“I only wish,” he sighed, “that I could do it more often…”

“As do I.” Sulla’s head rolled back; his other paw pressed down into the grass and that rumble again began in his chest, as he nudged upwards into the slow stroking. Lannon’s fingers nudged against the rim of his sheath, squeezing against the supple skin, sliding it back further, welcoming it to then fold forward over him again. “So I suppose, in the meantime, you will have to do with me.”

“Mmr.” Lannon nudged forward again, then continued further down with his paw. The slickness of Sulla’s shaft smeared down across his fur; he spread his fingers, rubbed across the wolf’s sack, rolled his balls up into his palm, massaged gently. “Poor, poor me. Oh, whatever will I do…”

The distance between them closed, Lannon once more nuzzling up beneath Sulla’s chin, the wolf turning his head to plant a series of short, sweet kisses across the lynx’s head. He continued grinding his hips, then spread his legs, pushed in against his mate, rolled him over onto his back – and straddled his body, arms out on either side of Lannon’s head, barrel chest heaving with slow, steady breaths. Lannon flicked his tongue out across his lips as he looked him up and down, from his familiar muzzle, to his broad shoulders, to his bared chest and belly… to the thick, pulsing meat that hung down across his belly underneath its own weight, unswollen knot lifting out the rim of his sheath, hefty sack swaying, dragging with each stroke of his paws.

The lynx lifted one leg up, then the other; grasping onto Sulla’s arms he settled himself into place, rump against lap, that firm, wet heat twitching against him, further drawing out his own arousal. “Right here, beloved?”

“Would you rather anywhere else?”

Another sweet, rumbling purr. Lannon rocked his hips a little bit. “Again? So soon?”

“What can I say? Seeing you as you are now, moving, speaking, thinking like a hunter… you were not born to this life, and yet you embrace it as though it is a part of you.”

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