Autumn had settled heavily over Mythris that night the warmth of the day disappearing with the sun, leaving the forest cool and damp beneath a mostly clear sky. A thin mist gathered between the trees, curling low across fallen leaves while the occasional breeze stirred the canopy overhead.

Eidola had not intended to wander far, sleep had simply refused to find her, and eventually the quiet of the night had seemed preferable to lying awake. She moved without any particular destination, following familiar paths until something strange flickered at the edge of her vision.

A tiny blue white light hovered between the trees made Eidola stop. At first she thought it was moonlight catching upon something wet, but then the light moved. Delicate wings opened and closed around a body no larger than an ordinary butterfly, its glow bright enough to illuminate the leaves beneath it.

Her ears slowly folded backward as she had seen it before. Not here, but somewhere buried within dreams and visions she had never been able to fully understand. The same delicate wings, the same ethereal glow. Eidola had always thought of them as spirit butterflies, little fragments of whatever strange place her visions came from.

Except those belonged inside her head. You're not real... the butterfly continued to hover before another light appeared behind it. And another.

Eidola's breath caught as pale glimmers slowly emerged throughout the mist until what she had mistaken for distant moonlight became dozens of tiny glowing wings scattered between the trees.

---

 

In and out of sleep. True deep restfulness was evading Solana the same as it was Eidola. It caused the little girl to rouse from the birthing den. To tangle herself from the limbs of her family and out onto the worn packed earth just outside of it.

The night was cool, quiet, and the thin mist which blanketed the earth stirred at the mid of her legs for the much smaller wolf. She, too, would be faced with that same glow in the distance, where all else was deep darkness, savor the moonlight above. The young girl was obviously compelled to follow it and acting without much thought of consequence was not like Solana. She didn't pause for fear nor the sake of danger.

Quick steps brought Solana further into the forest, where here the moon's light could only touch in thin rays between tree branches. It's the light of the butterflies which stood out the most.

Woah… A whisper from her mug as she came up to the other woman from somewhere behind, yet her crimson gaze remained transfixed on the glowing creatures. Are they moon spirits? She asked, now tilting her head in the other's direction as she fished for answers.

Solana doesn't remember seeing this wolf before, but as far as she has become aware, there were plenty she had yet to meet. All Leona's siblings, for one! And as Solana began to explore further from the densite and follow her parents around on activities, the smell of other wolves on the trails made her well aware of many yet still to meet and know as pack. Today, it would be Eidola's turn.