Lion Head Mesa and if you could still see the moon

This post is awful cause I've been trying to write it all day, but I wanted to get something up.   :X

Braenar didn't remember his mother, at least not in the ways he wanted to. He could recall some physical things: the bold copper of her eyes that mirrored the primary colour of his own, the way she differed from the rest of their family with a pelt of ash and charcoal, the warmth of her smile whenever she looked his way. But it was the finer details that her firstborn had so desperately tried to hold onto in the months that followed her untimely demise, like the comforting scent of her fur and the soothing lilt of her voice. For a long time Braenar struggled with losing these parts of his dam, fearing that he would forget her entirely as time passed by. At the tender age of twelve weeks, he had been too young to understand why she would no longer be coming home to them, though old enough to know that he'd never see her again.

Born under the sign of Cancer, Braenar had always been a sensitive and emotional creature. Thus, the loss of Emese had troubled him greatly and continued to do so in adulthood, though he was far more capable of channelling that grief elsewhere. He looked to the stars for guidance, continued to study and learn to better manage his emotions. Braenar would miss his mother always, but solemn thoughts of her did not have to control his mind; she would wish him to move on and find himself, rather than dwell on the misery that accompanied his childhood.

The eclipse had helped him realise this, and he'd considered his own departure long before his father announced his. He'd kept his revelation to himself while Ira seemed to withdraw into himself throughout the lunar cycle that followed the event that transformed him entirely. Braenar, ever concerned his sire's welfare as he resisted sleep, nourishment and companionship, felt in his bones that changes would soon occur in Ad Astra.

These came in the announcement of Ira Astoria's need to depart and as a result, Braenar's decision to follow. He sympathized with Riddle and Erzsi, the siblings he would leave behind, but Braenar would not allow guilt to consume him again. To begin anew, far from the place of his birth, was in part what he believed to be his calling, and in part a very real fear of losing his one remaining parent forever.

They'd travelled for weeks and as they entered the Teekon, Braenar was audibly exhausted. He trailed lazily behind his father, grumbling inwardly as they ascended yet another incline, one thankfully not as steep as others they'd faced. When at last the tawny yearling dragged himself onto the ledge, he parted his jaws in a well-earned, exaggerated yawn. When he opened his mismatched eyes again, he looked toward the crimson form of his sire, but ended up staring right past him. A vast body of water lay before them, seemingly endless, and Braenar moved in to stand alongside his fellow traveller to gawk at this expanse. "The most beautiful thing I've ever seen," he laughed then, trying to mask the confusion and caution he felt, "I'm so thirsty, I could probably drink it dry!"