Stone pluck and slope locus

I continue to be somewhat addicted to the daily word puzzles, which started with Wordle – trying to guess a five letter word in six attempts. Soon it had a sister game, Octordle – eight words in thirteen guesses  each (and within that there is a sequence game, and a rescue game where there first few guesses have already been made) and my favourite, Quordle – four words  in nine guesses each. In Octordle you end up with eight random words, and sometimes they seem such a bizarre selection that I’ve been prompted to write a story including them. Good creative practice for me, and sometimes takes the story in peculiar directions!

I completed a practice Octordle earlier, and was intrigued not only by the words, but by the pairs as they appeared on the grid:

• SLOPE – LOCUS
• VIXEN – SENSE
• KNIFE – FORTE
• STONE – PLUCK

Slope locus is maybe connected to the idea of genius loci, the spirit of place, but obviously slope locus is very specific – I’m not sure how it could be translated into Latin though!
Vixen sense! There are many foxes in our village and in the autumn you can hear them shrieking at each other as they find partners and fall in foxy love , and in spring they have their cubs and are out on the scrounge for anything edible.
I guess knife forte is a skill or strength in using a knife. I have just looked up ‘forte’ and not only does it mean  skill, but it actually can also mean part of a knife blade – from the handle to the middle. In fact,  the meaning we most commonly know, derives from the less known meaning!
And stone pluck,  I guess it might be a fighting term, when you snatch up a stone to hurl at your enemy.

It will take a lot of concentration and imagination to use these new phrases meaningfully in some piece of writing, but if I succeed in creating a piece which makes sense then I will certainly share it here!