Application: Firekeeper and Blind Seer (Jane Lindskold's Firekeeper saga)

[beastsouled.livejournal.com]

The young woman who walked into the Sorting Room carried a bow and quiver of arrows on her back, but ignored those in favor of a knife with a large garnet set in the hilt. She looked to be about twenty, and very fit. Her curly brown hair was chopped close to her head where it wasn't pulled back into a tail, and her tanned skin was laced with pale scars where her clothing--well-worn leather--didn't cover it. She was barefoot. She crouched as she looked around warily with the knife in her hand, and her dark eyes missed nothing.

The wolf at her side was equally wary-looking. He came up to the woman's chest (no mean thing, for she was not a short woman) and had piercing blue eyes. He growled once, low in his throat. "I do not scent danger, but neither do I scent our destination."

The woman flicked her eyes in the wolf's direction and answered back. Her speech was more akin to an animal's, though, all growls and silence and body language. "Does it smell like Hawk Haven or Bright Bay? This stone room looks similar to their keeps."

"I cannot say. It smells alien, and though you might not wish to hear it, I can feel magic here, stronger than anything I've felt before." Blind Seer--the wolf's name--had been sensitive to such things following an illness months before.

Firekeeper--the woman--frowned. "Could we be in the Old World, then?"

"It is a possibility. I had thought the gateways to be more accurate than that, though."

Firekeeper grunted in displeasure and noticed the a sheet of parchment on a table nearby. She picked it up, wrinkled her nose, and returned it to the table. "I cannot read this. Is it a language you know?"

The wolf gave her a somewhat exasperated look, but placed his front paws on the table and looked down at the parchment, reading. "It appears similar to the writings of Hawk Haven, yes. I will tell you what I can. Perhaps we can learn more about where we have come."


( The world is so very large, and in these years we have seen so little. We go to see more. )

"I have read the hogwarts_hocus faq, and understand it is a crazy, cracktastic sorting community and RPG.
I have read the hogwarts_hocus rules and agree to abide by each and every one of them.
I agree to be a good sport and not get my knickers in a bunch.
One day, marmalade will rule the world. "

((Since it's heavily hinted that there's at least something of a telepathic component to Beast-speak, if your character is a telepath, feel free to be able to understand them when they're talking in italics. Also if your character is an animal with human-level intellect. Otherwise, it's translated mostly-nonverbal communication.))