Company With Wolves (6/?)
anonymous
March 23 2010, 10:42:13 UTC
England immediately set out in pursuit of his wolfcub, ranging north and east and south and west, but found not a trace of any wolves, much less his own particular wolf. The animals he’d asked had stared at him in bewilderment, or scorn, or sheer shock - why was a rabbit searching for a wolf? Perhaps, the other way around, but...
The seasons passed and the stars in their sky - the stars England had taught America to name and know - wheeled in their celestial spirals, and England came back home to his oak forest again. He found his brothers had very happily made themselves comfortable in England’s huge, well-located (it was near a brook, and had a large vegetable garden on fertile earth, and the views from the hill were spectacular) home. Therefore - coming upon them unawares - he thrashed them with spellwork and the stout bronze-banded oak-stave that served dual duty as mage’s-staff and walking-stick, and kicked them out of his house with much bad language. They cursed his vegetable garden and went away.
England ignored that, and the smell of rotting vegetables, as he ignored the two black eyes and the sprained ankle he had gotten from his brothers. He had other things to do. Squinting through swollen eyelids, he had pored through all his scrolls about scrying spells, and tracking spells, and spells to bring back that which had been lost. He had studied the maps, and the accounts of travelers, and histories of the wolves - the wolves who, voracious for meat and clannish and unable, somehow, to integrate with the other talking animals, tended to live apart, closer to the untalking beasts than to others of their kind. “Dogs,” they called the wolves who could take to civilization.
It was not a kind word. England wondered if they called his America a dog.
And armed with this knowledge, he set off again - further south, further east, further west, and further north. And again and again, ranging all over the wide world, through forests and plains and deserts, over mountain-ranges like the spine of the world and along long stretches of coast, and taking ship to tiny islands like jungle-green jewels set into the sapphire seas - even to the forgotten lands, where the ruined cities brooded in gray, dusty glory - the pride and the tombs of the lost race of Men, who had disappeared in what the legends called the Long Winter. And finally, finally, in the cold Northlands, where the sun set and did not rise for whole turns of the moon, where green-gold-red fire danced in the sky, he heard tales of a wolfpack. That was all, but that was enough.
Company With Wolves (6b/?)
anonymous
March 23 2010, 10:43:02 UTC
And that was how England found himself deep in the woods, cloaked and hooded and with a traveler’s pack slung across his shoulders. His beast-form required less sustenance and was faster, long-leaping and slow-tiring, as compared to his two-legged form - so he’d been traveling like that, mostly, living on snatched mouthfuls of grazing, and using a time/space spell to keep his clothes and luggage in a subspace pocket. But in the deeps of this silent woodland, where forest giants towered high into the sky, their evergreen needles covered with snow, he had stopped - his pink nose twitching, his long ears standing upright in the air, turning and swiveling for the slightest bit of sound - and transformed back into his two-legged form. His rabbit’s-ears flopped down now, the better to keep his heat from dissipating into the Northern cold - perpetual winter reigned here - and he wiggled his soft tail a few times, absently, to get used to the new balance required by the form-shifting.
He shivered, pink-skinned and naked in the killing-cold, and hurriedly spoke the words for the sub-space spell. His clothes and pack and staff fell out of a hole in the air, and England was hurrying into their runes-boosted warmth before the hole flickered out of being.
Then, with his staff, he traced a circle into the snow, using the tip, where a rough-faceted ruby, shaped like a frozen flame, was set. The ruby, flickering like the flame it looked like, melted the snow with quiet hissing, so that bare ground showed stark and black against the white snow in the patterns England traced.
After the circle, he trace-melted a five-pointed star inside the circle, turning it into a pentagram. Then another circle around the first, and in the thin band of snow that was the border between the two, he delicately traced sharp-angled runes, the primary runes at each cardinal point, bolstering ones in between - eight for the eight compass-points, with the anchoring rune at the northern point, and then a ninth rune, the initiation rune, in the very center of the star.
His preparations finished, he stood at the northern point, stretched both his hands over the circle with his staff held parallel to the ground, and spoke the words of his most powerful scrying-spell.
England looked down and frowned in confusion. He’d told the spell to search for wolves - and the rings and the star were alight with red brilliance, as they ought to be, but their wavery, flame-like light danced in place, reaching straight up into the sky, instead of leaning like wind-blown reeds in the direction he ought to go.....
Then he looked up, in time to see wolves rushing for him, and he knew the spell had not lied. The foremost wolf reached England in a single mighty bound, knocking him down and back, so far back that he hit his head against a tree a good five feet behind him. He felt himself sliding into unconsciousness, and the last thing that accompanied him down into the darkness was the sight of deep blue eyes staring right into his.
Re: Company With Wolves (6b/?)
anonymous
March 23 2010, 12:16:05 UTC
FUCK YES YOU UPDATED-
I mean.
Ahem.
I rather love this fill - so interesting and different from the other one! I'm so glad that you're still working on this - I was worried that it'd been abandoned, when it's so awesome!
Re: Company With Wolves (6b/?)
anonymous
March 23 2010, 13:15:09 UTC
Hahaha, thanks for the enthusiastic comment! XD I have a bad habit of not finishing fills but I am determined to finish this one, yes. I mean, the request and the pic are so awesome.
Re: Company With Wolves (6b/?)
anonymous
March 23 2010, 22:24:41 UTC
An UPDATE! I had almost lost hope!
I love how you manage to put in details while still keeping the fairy-tale feel to this story. And England was worried they would call America a dog <3
Here's hoping America can stop the other wolves from eating England.
Re: Company With Wolves (6b/?)
anonymous
March 24 2010, 03:40:57 UTC
Awesome, an update for this!
I love seeing England do magic. It's just so cool. (I'll be honest, my initial reaction was pretty much what the first anon wrote. XD)
Also, everyone keeps talking about how hot and uhhggg the picture in the request is, but the link doesn't work anymore. Anyone have a copy they link me to? I'm dying to see it.
The seasons passed and the stars in their sky - the stars England had taught America to name and know - wheeled in their celestial spirals, and England came back home to his oak forest again. He found his brothers had very happily made themselves comfortable in England’s huge, well-located (it was near a brook, and had a large vegetable garden on fertile earth, and the views from the hill were spectacular) home. Therefore - coming upon them unawares - he thrashed them with spellwork and the stout bronze-banded oak-stave that served dual duty as mage’s-staff and walking-stick, and kicked them out of his house with much bad language. They cursed his vegetable garden and went away.
England ignored that, and the smell of rotting vegetables, as he ignored the two black eyes and the sprained ankle he had gotten from his brothers. He had other things to do. Squinting through swollen eyelids, he had pored through all his scrolls about scrying spells, and tracking spells, and spells to bring back that which had been lost. He had studied the maps, and the accounts of travelers, and histories of the wolves - the wolves who, voracious for meat and clannish and unable, somehow, to integrate with the other talking animals, tended to live apart, closer to the untalking beasts than to others of their kind. “Dogs,” they called the wolves who could take to civilization.
It was not a kind word. England wondered if they called his America a dog.
And armed with this knowledge, he set off again - further south, further east, further west, and further north. And again and again, ranging all over the wide world, through forests and plains and deserts, over mountain-ranges like the spine of the world and along long stretches of coast, and taking ship to tiny islands like jungle-green jewels set into the sapphire seas - even to the forgotten lands, where the ruined cities brooded in gray, dusty glory - the pride and the tombs of the lost race of Men, who had disappeared in what the legends called the Long Winter. And finally, finally, in the cold Northlands, where the sun set and did not rise for whole turns of the moon, where green-gold-red fire danced in the sky, he heard tales of a wolfpack. That was all, but that was enough.
Reply
He shivered, pink-skinned and naked in the killing-cold, and hurriedly spoke the words for the sub-space spell. His clothes and pack and staff fell out of a hole in the air, and England was hurrying into their runes-boosted warmth before the hole flickered out of being.
Then, with his staff, he traced a circle into the snow, using the tip, where a rough-faceted ruby, shaped like a frozen flame, was set. The ruby, flickering like the flame it looked like, melted the snow with quiet hissing, so that bare ground showed stark and black against the white snow in the patterns England traced.
After the circle, he trace-melted a five-pointed star inside the circle, turning it into a pentagram. Then another circle around the first, and in the thin band of snow that was the border between the two, he delicately traced sharp-angled runes, the primary runes at each cardinal point, bolstering ones in between - eight for the eight compass-points, with the anchoring rune at the northern point, and then a ninth rune, the initiation rune, in the very center of the star.
His preparations finished, he stood at the northern point, stretched both his hands over the circle with his staff held parallel to the ground, and spoke the words of his most powerful scrying-spell.
England looked down and frowned in confusion. He’d told the spell to search for wolves - and the rings and the star were alight with red brilliance, as they ought to be, but their wavery, flame-like light danced in place, reaching straight up into the sky, instead of leaning like wind-blown reeds in the direction he ought to go.....
Then he looked up, in time to see wolves rushing for him, and he knew the spell had not lied. The foremost wolf reached England in a single mighty bound, knocking him down and back, so far back that he hit his head against a tree a good five feet behind him. He felt himself sliding into unconsciousness, and the last thing that accompanied him down into the darkness was the sight of deep blue eyes staring right into his.
Reply
I mean.
Ahem.
I rather love this fill - so interesting and different from the other one! I'm so glad that you're still working on this - I was worried that it'd been abandoned, when it's so awesome!
Reply
Reply
I love how you manage to put in details while still keeping the fairy-tale feel to this story. And England was worried they would call America a dog <3
Here's hoping America can stop the other wolves from eating England.
Nuclear war=not okay
Reply
I love seeing England do magic. It's just so cool. (I'll be honest, my initial reaction was pretty much what the first anon wrote. XD)
Also, everyone keeps talking about how hot and uhhggg the picture in the request is, but the link doesn't work anymore. Anyone have a copy they link me to? I'm dying to see it.
reCaptcha: howlers works. Oh, really...
Reply
Leave a comment