Learning about the animals of Avanthal

by **Soren Frostfawn** on March 3rd, 2013, 3:00 am

8th of Spring 513 AV

The morning light shined right in Soren's face. he groaned and rubbed his eyes as he got out of bed. Half asleep already Soren washed up for the coming day and dressed himself without a thought in his head except one: It was too early to do anything. He had this thought often in the mornings until he woke up. Soren wasn't a morning person by a long shot. It was the start of Winter and the beginning of a new year. He had just met Jesslyn Skyglow and a few other Vantha of Avanthal. Today he had decided he was going to learn something.

The Frostfawn's were always notorious for their animals. The place to go to learn about animals was always the White Elk Stables and it was run by Lusina Frostfawn. Soren had never met the woman but she was rather famous in the Frostfawn hold. Maybe just being in the stables would gain him some form of knowledge about animals or animal husbandry.

The mornings were usually cold in Avanthal so Soren dressed in the usual furs and headed out of his arvinta and headed to the White Elk Stables. He didn't know what kind of animals he would find there but just learning about something new made the young Frostfawn excited for the day ahead.

by **Lorelle** on March 3rd, 2013, 5:02 am

Lorelle awakes as a little wet nose presses itself into the palm of her hand. Her eyelashes flutter open and she looks down to see her little pup that she got a month or so ago. A smile brightens her face as the pup, Eva, climbs up onto her chest and starts lapping at Elle's face with her pink tongue. The wet tough tickles, making Lorelle laugh and push the puppy gently off of her and back onto the bed beside her. [color=#4000BF]"Alright, alright Eva! Calm down. I'll take you out just let me get dressed,"the girl asks, sitting up and stretching out her body.

Elle just sits a moment in her bed, soaking in the morning air. It is way to early for a girl like Elle, but ever since Eva has come into her life she has been getting up earlier. This is mainly just to take care of the pup and usually she will then go back to sleep. But as Lorelle watches Eva grab one of her gloves off the pile of clothes in her room, it seems that that pup has different plans for today.

It doesn't take long for Elle to get up and get dressed in her simple top and pants. She grabs her brush and quickly runs it through her hair. After that she finishes getting ready by pulling on her boots, buttoning up her coat, putting on her scarf, stealing back her glove from Eva and putting it on as she looks for the other one, finds it and puts it on. Last she slips in her earrings and looks back to the pup."What do you think? Presentable?"she asks the pup with a laugh. Eva gives out a bark in response."And I'll take that as a yes!'she says with another laugh.

After she is done with this, she takes her little orangish red puppy outside to do her business. Eva is always done quickly for she would rather play in the snow instead of sitting still standing in it freezing her tail off. To prove this point, the young pup takes a playful stance with her paws down and her butt up in the air and starts playfully barking at Elle. At this Elle lets out a laugh and throws some snow on the dog. At first Eva stands still in surprise, then she shakes off the snow and barks again. Elle just smiles.

"Come on Eva, let's get you inside so I can go to the White Elk stables. Dad wanted me to go and see how the place is for one reason or another,"she tells the pup as if it is human and can understand her. She walks a little ways back towards their hold before turning around and patting her thigh."Well come on now, I haven't got all day!"

Eva stares at Elle a minute before finally getting the message and running over to her master. The two then proceed back into the hold and then into Lorelle's family's Artvinta. Elle leaves Eva with her parents, says her goodbyes and then heads out again and starts for the White Elk stables. A smile continues to play on the Vantha's lips as she walks for nothing in the day so far as made her want to loss it. That plus she is excited for some unknown reason. She doesn't know why, but she has a good feeling as to what the day will bring.

by **Soren Frostfawn** on March 4th, 2013, 3:24 am

The white elk stables. It was a simple barn like structure but it was huge to house all of the different animals. Soren's favorites were always the raptors. He always wanted to train a great falcon or maybe even something large enough to carry of a full human being. He smiled, simple dreams were fun to think of.

He opened the door and rubbed his eyes, it was still too early in the morning to be out and about. From a distance he heard a gentle voice, melodic. As Soren got closer he soon realized it was singing, a female voice was singing. He tried to walk on the balls of his feet to see who it was without sounding any alarms from the woman.

She had long white-blonde hair that curtained around her soft and gentle looking face. The hair was streaked with purple, which Soren took as a sign she was of Vantha descent. Her face was nice oval shape and her cheek bones were high giving her a very delicate but graceful look. She seemed to have a lengthy frame and her limbs followed that format. She was tall and elegant looking and seemed to be of someone who was at peace while in the stables. Her lips were a soft pink and her eyes a golden color with dark pupils. She was holding her hand out to feed a few falcons, her long pink nails holding out some of the feed.

Soren smiled as he saw the falcons. He was near the raptor area of the stables. The smell of the stables never really bothered him that much as the Frostfawn hold always kind of smelled of animals 25 hours out of 24. He stepped toward the woman and held up his hand in a gesture of greeting "Hello, I am Soren Frostfawn. I was wondering if I could learn something about caring for animals here."The woman let out a surprised yip and backed up sighing in relief as she heard his surname of Frostfawn"Well you've come to the right place Frostfawn"She said softly and a little reserved giving him a shy smile that seemed to come with some warmth."I am called Yuna by the way"She said this while extending a hand but looking down toward the floor. Soren took her hand and smiled, it would seem he would have his first lesson in caring for animals here, perhaps with this woman. He had heard of yuna from talk around the Frostfawn hold. He only knew she worked in the stabled with Lusiana.

by **Lorelle** on March 4th, 2013, 3:55 am

Lorelle sings as she walks. Well if it could be considered singing. It is mostly just a series of Os and Ahs. She keeps everything pretty much in her high range, not caring to stretch her low range at the moment. She sings two basic notes over and over again. Most people would get annoyed by this, like her parents. However since it is just her and the air listening at the moment, she does not mind being annoying. The sky can deal with it for all she cares.

Soon enough Elle sees the barn that is the White Elk stables. Her singing comes to a halt and stops a minute. She sighs before deciding it is best to go on and get this over with. It is not that she minds going to the stables or that she doesn't want to please her father. It is just that she thinks that learning about animals she may never come in contact with again is kind of silly. She would rather stay at home and train with Eva rather than train with animals strange and unknown to her.

However, her father insisted she go and learn and maybe find out something she didn't know. Plus he wanted to know how the old place was doing. Never going against her father's wishes and so she is here, staring at a barn. Taking a deep breath, the Vantha goes forward with calm brown eyes. Once she reaches the doors, she doesn't hesitate in going on and pulling them open and stepping in.

The first thing Lorelle notices is the strong smell of animal ... Well everything. Her nose wrinkles slightly, but she doesn't find the smell unbearably terrible. Just slightly terrible. Deciding not to waste any more time, she takes another step and she is then fully inside the stables."Hello?"she calls out, unsure what else to do, "Anyone here?"

Not getting a response at first, Lorelle walks further into the barn. Suddenly she hears voices of others and she follows them. She soon sees two people, a male and a female. Around them are a bunch of falcons. "Hello?"she says, barley keeping her slowly growing irritation out of her voice, "Either one of you know who I should talk to about learning about caring for animals here?"

by **Soren Frostfawn** on March 9th, 2013, 1:19 pm

[quote="Soren Frostfawn"]

He noticed the woman come in and heard the obvious annoyance or frustration in her voice. Soren sighed and looked to the ground, he didn't really have high hopes already for the woman. Soren didn't like negative attitudes at all really and tended to stray away from the people who carried them.

He bit his lip and shrugged deciding to be warm and inviting despite his first impressions of the woman. "Well I think you're in the right place, I believe Yuna works here and she can show us a few things about the animals."He said and nodded to the purple haired woman. Yuna shifted a little uneasily at being called upon by the two Vantha but gave a few short nods"I think I can show you some things about the animals if you like."She said her voice quivering and wavering a little.

He smiled to himself. As a Frostfawn he had been surrounded by animals most of his life just from the various people around the hold that had jobs in animal husbandry and falconry. He was always interested in animals but this would be the first time he would actually learn about them at all.

by **Lorelle** on March 16th, 2013, 8:16 am

Lorelle notices how the man looks to the ground after she speaks. She keeps her face straight and forces herself to think of something else so her eyes don't turn. Even so the very outer rim of them turns dark red. It is a very small amount of each iris that turns and it is very highly unlikely that anyone could see it from so far away as Soren is. For this reason Lorelle doesn't care. That and she really could care less anyway. She is in one of those moods that just makes her not care all that much what others think. Well she does, but she won't admit that to herself. Let alone anyone else.

The Vantha puts on a small smile as the man seems to at least make an attempt at not being disgusted with her. He points her in the direction of the purple woman who then takes a turn to speak. Lor's smile widens at the girl's words. She nods her head and says in a now nice voice that is free of her previous irritation,"Great."

The outer and inner rims of Elle's irises start to turn a soft gold color that begins to seep into the rest of her irises. This color is the color the Vantha woman's eyes turn when she is happy. The eyes now wouldn't be lying for she is happy that she will get to learn some things about animals as she really does love the creatures and she loves being able to take care of them. Especially Eva. The pup is her world and if she can find out more things about making sure she is taken care of correctly than Elle will take it.

by **Soren Frostfawn** on March 24th, 2013, 10:52 pm

Soren scanned the cages looking at all of the interesting birds he had no name for. He stopped in front of a particularly interesting snow white bird with a pure white beak and matching talons. It snapped at Soren as he walked by. It seemed exceedingly hostile but incredibly beautiful. He wondered about the bird. It was clearly fierce and dangerous but what type of bird was it? It was a bird he had seen only once before. He had been a small child when several completly white and fiercesome birds swooped down in the middle of Avanthal, catching small dogs and cats in their talons and flying off into the horizon. It was a swift and bloody sight to see as well as horrifying. One of the snow white birds made off with his childood pet Tarus, a small brown dog. Despite that he found the bird before him magnificent and Yuna obviously saw him gazing at the bird.

"It is a type of hawk, a frost hawk. This one is particularly troublesome. Always trying to bite me when I try and feed him. They are incredibly bothersome creatures to us, they always take the livestock and pets from Avanthal when the ice is thick and they are hungry." She said quickly and softly not looking at Soren and always looking at the hawk. He nodded in thanks for the information about the bird. A hawk. It was a marvelous animal to be sure.

Soren stepped away from the cage to give it a little space and to not agitate the animal any longer. He looked back to the woman. He suddenly realized that he never got her name. He sized the woman up. She seemed to be of average height, around five foot and maybe weighed a buck ten or fifteen Soren would say, though he was no expert on judging a woman's weight by any means. She was slender and curvy with long black curly hair. Her looks were dazzling, though her attitude seemed to be a bit negative. Soren forced that last thought to the back of his mind, maybe she was just having a bad day or she was a little testy this morning. Maybe she just didn't like Soren. In any case he decided he shouldn't judge the woman based on her one behavior towards him. He extended his hand to the Woman"Soren Frostfawn. I came here to learn about birds and other animals to gain knowledge to hunt them, what about you? I didn't catch your name either."

by **Lorelle** on April 1st, 2013, 7:28 am

Lorelle looks upon the hawk with the others and instead of being awestruck by its beauty, a much different feeling takes hold of her. This is a feeling of fear. The worst kind of fear too. For it is not the fear for herself, but the fear for someone else. Not a person, but an animal. An animal that she knows this hawk wouldn't mind attacking and carrying off. In reality this fear isn't just for the animal that she is suddenly worried about, but really for herself as well. For what would she do without her pup? A pup that is currently a good carrying off size. She will grow of course, but right now she would be in great danger if such a bird found her because of her small size.

Because of this fear, Elle stays quiet and just listens as the hawk is explained about. She hangs back and watches as the man seems quite fascinated with the dangerous animal. Elle can see why he is so enthralled. The bird really is quite beautiful. In a dangerously mesmerizing way that is.

Lorelle's attention is turned as she hears the man's voice speaking to her. She looks at him, trying to figure out how he feels about her. She doubts he feels like he wants to be around her. Most don't. Only when Eva is present is really bearable. No wait, that is not true. She is bearable when she wants to be. At the moment that is not a want, but she has decided to try to loosen up. She doesn't need people not liking her for no reason other than the slightly negative attitude she has brought in with her.

A small smile brushes the girl's lips as she takes his hand and shakes it before taking it back and returning it to her coat pocket."Nice to meet you Soren. My name is Lorelle, Lorelle Snowsong," she answers his question concerning her name first,"I am here per my father's wishes. He was once part of the Frostfawn hold and thinks I could always benefit from some knowledge about animals. Plus I have a puppy back at home and I am always wanting to make sure I know all I can about taking care of her so that I can, well, care for her."

by **Lullaby** on August 9th, 2013, 8:08 pm

Here is your reward!

Soren :

Lorelle :

A quiet song to soothe the heart

If you have any questions or concerns regarding your grade, please send me a PM and we can figure it out.

Closed Learning about the animals of Avanthal