Otatso Wetlands Sorry Isn't Enough

He was wonderful but she'd still left - lured away from the Keep and from her promise to the pack for loyalty. Stark frowned at that, his eyes narrowing for a moment as he listened to her stammering. She'd never stammered so much around him, and it was something that he recognized in her as a response to emotions. "I would have listened to your concerns!" Stark said vehemently, thinking back as best as he could to when the two had left - it was the middle of all the turmoil, the first thing he'd discovered since taking the pack over. "How do you think it looked to me, right after I tried to start fixing things, that you two - wolves I thought were my friends - left?" Thankfully he'd had Banner and Rhodes to help keep him afloat. 

She asked about his state and Stark took a couple steps back, away from her, as if somehow she was looking past him and seeing the truth of everything. The male felt a cold shiver run down his spine and he swallowed back what he wanted to stay; what he wanted to scream because how could he properly answer that? He'd found the woman he loved and she had been gone to him and then she'd died right in his arms. He'd had to carry her back to the packlands they'd met in, tell the son that Stark was now raising alone, and now....now he was whatever he was. 

Finally Stark seemed to realize that he hadn't actually answered her, that all the thoughts swirling in his head seemed to be just a cacophony of thought and no sounds had come along with them. "Octavia died." He finally said as he swallowed back another rise of emotion, blinking back the tears that stood in his eyes.