Ravensblood Forest eden.

@Arturo. Set for last night (11.1)

Aster was quick in her movements as she hastily tracked her way back to Teaghlaigh. Something miraculous had happened; this was something that couldn't be ignored. As she entered the territory, she kept along the treeline and away from the rising sun with her head tilted upwards in frantic calls for Arturo. Her voice was laced with childlike joy and her footsteps were drunk with excitement. Eden was back. Eden!

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Aster's yips were loud enough to wake the dead and, consequentially, the Ceannasach from the slumber he was slipping off into curled around his young daughter protectively. He jerked awake, in that state of awake and asleep, struggling for a moment to grasp upon reality. Slowly, it came to him and he left Chusi in their den, careful not to disturb her though he was surprised that Aster's excited yips hadn't done it. Groggily, Arturo made his way towards the pallid woman, her figure coming into view. “Quiet, Aster,” He shushed her gently. “You'll wake the living dead.” He grinned as he said it. In reality, she only threatened to wake Chusi but it was he that would have to deal with her grumpiness if she was startled from sleep. Slowly he blinked at her, greeted her with tail raised for a second before he took a deep breath of the cool air, though it was her scent that was like the unwanted douse of cold water upon him, abruptly eradicating any last, lingering traces of sleep. She smelled like the woman that had mated with that male that had sought sanctuary at Teaghlaigh's borders. She smelled, beyond of the same pack of a pregnant woman. Abruptly, Arturo grappled with whether he should be angry or confused. “Aster?” Explain yourself. The unspoken words hung between them as he stood at attention, brow furrowed and hackles prickling along his spine.

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Oh, I-I'm...I'm sorry, she stammered as she struggled to control herself. To begin, Arturo seemed to take away a sense of humor from her childlike excitement, though his tone quickly changed. I wanted to tell you that last night, I met someone, she began, my cousin, and she doesn't live far from here. But she asked me to come with her, help take care of her litter, whenever the little ones should arrive.
Aster stopped herself from releasing even a tiny giggle for she feared that Arturo would have her head with a peep. She gulped and awaited his response, hoping she didn't do anything to anger him in her entry.

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She stammered an apology and then delved into explaining. Her beginning 'i met someone' caused his muscles to tighten and pull taunt beneath his coat. Quickly, the gears within his mind started to spin and tick like the gears of a clock working to puzzle out her words. This someone was her cousin, that she lived in a pack close by, and that she wanted to leave Teaghlaigh to live with said cousin to help her take care of the litter. Arturo struggled, for a moment, his brow pulling into a deep v as his burning gaze bore into her, utterly perplexed. He wasn't understanding, and as a man that prided himself on his intellect this was not an easy thing for him to admit. They had just formed, she'd just led some stranger at their doorstep whom he had taken in as an associate and as if nothing mattered she was ready to up and throw it away? “Why?” Arturo asked because that was what he was struggling to wrap his mind around. He had not gotten the sense that she was a fickle beast but as everything was so new it felt like ...a waste of time. A waste of his time. “Isn't that what her mate and pack is for?” He asked her, his hackles bristling with his inner frustration which did not take form upon his stoic, cold (if not perplexed) mask.

“And what about this Family, eh Aster?” He asked her quietly, gauging her reaction as he ghosted towards her a step, his movements tense. “What about Teaghlaigh?” Perhaps this was too soon after their founding but right now he felt as if she was throwing everything: Teaghlaigh's laws and everything she had sworn to stand for and uphold back in his face. Like it was something that could be tossed away — like a child tossing away a toy it was no longer interested in. He had no problems with paths parting ways but this was sudden, entirely out of the blue. She'd gone there, decided there and then came back to tell him she was leaving without even talking it through with him of The Family first; the problem was she wasn't a Comhlach. She was apart of The Family and her choices affected them as well.

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Aster sat back with her ears pressed against her head in submission. Maybe he didn't understand, but that was fair, for he didn't know all that they'd been through together. I know that this is sudden. This, Teaghlaigh, will always be my family, but I thought she was dead Arturo. When her family was slaughtered, when my parents were taken from me, Eden was what I had. And when she disappeared... Aster had to stop for at that point she'd become choked with emotion.
I'm afraid to lose her again, Arturo. I'm terrified of the thought that us not being together means one day, I won't be able to find her anymore. As a kid, I couldn't do anything. I was blind and alone and terrified, but Eden helped me and guided me into adulthood. She flicked her clouded eyes up to Arturo's before finishing off her position.
Teaghlaigh will always be my home, my family, and I am always going to be there if I am needed, but this is something that I can't ignore. Please. Tears brimmed her large eyes, threatening to pool over, but she kept herself composed in the face of her superior.

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Arturo listened to her choked words in silence, cold and ...unmoved. The gangster would never have uprooted himself from Teaghlaigh for any one of his children even if he'd have thought they were dead, but then again letting go was something he was good at. His children had scattered to the four winds, none of them, he was sure, lingered any longer in the Teekon but he had not lain Teaghlaigh to abandon to follow them. He wouldn't. But he was not necessarily clingy, either. His children would always be part of Teaghlaigh but he would never abandon The Family. He trusted he raised them well enough to fend for themselves. Yet, to him, it seemed that Aster was like a small child, the way she explained it. She needed this ...Eden in ways that she, as a grown adult, sworn to a pack that was more than a pack should have. “So,” He began, licking his jowls expelling a harsh breath of air. “Your first thought was to turn your back on Teaghlaigh to go be with her? You didn't think about coming to discuss this with me? Or The Family? It didn't occur to you that if you just asked me I would have let you visit, I would have let be present for her birth? Your first duty should be to Teaghlaigh. The Family before Everything Else. You know this.”

“How do you call Teaghlaigh your home and your Family when you are so ready to leave us for another? With no intentions to even discuss your options?” She had gone about it all wrong, in his personal opinion. “You're apart of The Family, Aster. You're not a Comhlach. Your choices affect The Family as a whole, not just you.” He took a step forward, his tail arching over his back and his lips curling back from his teeth in a low growl. Though she had not necessarily done anything to compromise The Family he couldn't help that he felt ...betrayed. He'd taken her in, made her apart of The Family and not even a full week after their claim she was leaving them. Without consulting him first, without trying to work out anything. She just told him. "Your past is your past Aster and you have to let it go. Teaghlaigh is your future. You have us," but he got the feeling that his words would meet with the resistence of a brick wall. “You should have talked to me,” But she had already made up her mind and that was the problem. “If you leave us, Aster, I cannot guarantee that The Family will welcome you back.” He had always believed firmly that once apart of The Family always apart of it but he was not so sure how this reincarnation of Teaghlaigh would take Aster's so sudden departure from their fledgling pack; and they would know of it, of course. They would know and they would vote because maybe he was taking things much more personally then they needed to be and maybe it was a little bit of sleep deprivation preventing him from looking at it in his usual calm and collected manner. Perhaps they would assure him that she would always be welcomed back as per Family tradition ...or maybe they would not. He couldn't say. In the end, the majority would have the vote and he wouldn't know until the meeting took place.

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I understand. And I apologize for making this decision like this, but this is something I feel that I need. I understand completely if you command me to never come near these borders or the Family ever again. Aster retreated even farther into herself with Arturo's words, and inched herself back from his form. The Family does come first, which is why no matter what my punishment for leaving may be, I will respect it as I respect you. Even if I'm permanently cast from these borders, I will continue to understand my duty to the Family. I didn't place my word in vain, Arturo.
She hadn't by any means. Aster was a smart woman and she knew what she was doing. She understood risks and still she knew what was right for her.

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Arturo didn't agree but he didn't have to. Her mind was made and he would not keep her here against her will. He was angry, frustrated and confused — surely an adult woman with a mate and pack was capable of taking care of her offspring without Aster who had sworn her loyalty to him and The Family. This felt like a slap in Ceannasach's face. Like the loyalty and love of The Family wasn't enough for her. If it wasn't enough then she didn't deserve it all. “The Family before Everything Else,” Arturo repeated to her. It was one of the two laws she had sworn to both obey and enforce and yet she hadn't put The Family first. She'd put herself first as if what she did had no consequence to The Family. But it did. That was how they worked, how they operated. “by not talking your options through with me you have broken the law,” She would not negotiate nor try to work something else that ensured that she was putting Teaghlaigh first. What else was he to believe?

He gave a clear of his throat followed shortly after a low rumble in his chest. “When we reach a decision we will find you and inform you of it.” If her sentence was banishment or death then at least she would be given the respect of an enemy: of knowing what awaited her. And if The Family decided that she would always be welcome back, still she would know what to expect. With nothing further to say to her his tail lashed behind him. “That's it. You can go.” He dismissed her coolly, though he did not yet turn his back because he was never the first to turn his back. No, he would see her out of the territory but that was where his manners would end: beyond she would be on her own.

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Aster heard him loud and clear; he no longer wanted her there, and she wasn't going to stay where she wasn't wanted. With a respectful bow, Aster turned and made her way out of the territory, ready for the journey back to Eden.