Lotte is a jerk. No promises that she will be nice. All welcome, anyway!
The galvanizing force behind Lotte’s stepping down from leadership was simple: her boy was gone, and she found it hard to stay put and mark borders and do things that seemed stupid and inconsequential when she could be out there looking for him. Impulsive, often to a fault, she didn’t consider the impact this might have on her remaining three children. She knew they were safe. She didn’t know that about Roarke. She couldn’t rest until she knew that. Even if he’d found another settlement and wished to remain there — even knowing they’d never be as good for him as his real family — she thought she could endure that.
A less practical wolf might have delved into paranoia and madness, wondering who had taken him and what they would use him for, but Lotte was an earthy creature and knew that sometimes, cubs just wandered off. She couldn’t place the blame on an unknown kidnapper when she knew, deep in the marrow of her bones, that all of it was hers to claim. She had let her boy go, somewhere between trying to decide whether she felt comfortable letting Arturo sire Hemlock’s children and wondering where August had disappeared to.
She was angry and despondent by turns; it would’ve been nice if she could lose herself in apathy or find some kind of hypnotic release in the drum of her paws. Today, though, she returned home with the soles of each paw bleeding and raw as if she’d run again through fir — and she still felt violently, virulently wretched. “I want my son back,” she said aloud to no one, wondering if what she just needed was a good, hard venting session. There was a pressure building in her chest that she couldn’t fight, and she wasn’t talking. Not to her husband, her sister-wife, or her remaining children. Not to anyone but a little boy whose fur was beginning to change color now, marking the start of his life as a muodonmuuttaja and a soturi without his mother to guide his way. She realized that in her absence, another cub had newly come to Teaghlaigh — another cub who was not Roarke — and this whipped her fury higher and whiter and hotter. For once, she could not appreciate her husband’s affection for children or Hemlock’s nurturing ways. Lest she do something truly stupid, like summon the new wolves to her and murder the child, she turned right the hell around.
There was still daylight. She could still look for him.
A less practical wolf might have delved into paranoia and madness, wondering who had taken him and what they would use him for, but Lotte was an earthy creature and knew that sometimes, cubs just wandered off. She couldn’t place the blame on an unknown kidnapper when she knew, deep in the marrow of her bones, that all of it was hers to claim. She had let her boy go, somewhere between trying to decide whether she felt comfortable letting Arturo sire Hemlock’s children and wondering where August had disappeared to.
She was angry and despondent by turns; it would’ve been nice if she could lose herself in apathy or find some kind of hypnotic release in the drum of her paws. Today, though, she returned home with the soles of each paw bleeding and raw as if she’d run again through fir — and she still felt violently, virulently wretched. “I want my son back,” she said aloud to no one, wondering if what she just needed was a good, hard venting session. There was a pressure building in her chest that she couldn’t fight, and she wasn’t talking. Not to her husband, her sister-wife, or her remaining children. Not to anyone but a little boy whose fur was beginning to change color now, marking the start of his life as a muodonmuuttaja and a soturi without his mother to guide his way. She realized that in her absence, another cub had newly come to Teaghlaigh — another cub who was not Roarke — and this whipped her fury higher and whiter and hotter. For once, she could not appreciate her husband’s affection for children or Hemlock’s nurturing ways. Lest she do something truly stupid, like summon the new wolves to her and murder the child, she turned right the hell around.
There was still daylight. She could still look for him.
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