emaleth, a tiny whisper, breathed to her beloved sister, fellow witch. but her sister must have slept, to keep to such a silence. it seemed to be so from the familiar sound of her breath and its pattern, slow and easy. with little time to lose, knowing soon another wolf would come to sit with them and also not wanting to miss that, deirdre turned and moved with some measure of trepidation toward the Otherworld.

but the evening was the warmest she had ever known! there was hardly any white on their doorstep but for the intermittent dusting of it; the falling sun warmed her this hour, and nature beckoned her. it truly did! the quiet birdsong and the sentinels alike summoned her, and deirdre, the little witch, whispered: earfh. a thin wind seemed to encourage her further forward, and she was obedient to natures whim as it told her something she vaguely understood, but would soon learn and know.

deirdre moved forward, her tail waving as she moved to investigate every thing, every where. a pink bud hanging low caught her interest, and deirdre marveled at it. it was very soft to the touch, pleasant, and pretty to her eyes. it was not yet bloomed, and that it would someday she did not yet know. she lingered here, just outside of the den, for a little while... earth distracted her from her task, her plan, her idea.

it led her deeper into itself, but it was sweet and kind and welcoming all the while. the cub did not know how far she had wandered, only that she had wandered at all... and when she looked over her shoulder, there was no den in her sights. not wise to tracking, deirdre did not think to retrace her steps or anything of the sort. she simply turned around and traipsed in the direction she felt would lead her there... which was the wrong way. a seed of nervousness was planted, but the earth calmed her. the babe paused when she thought she heard her name, and turned to see a strange, hazy looking thing, hardly perceptible in the shadow it was suspended in.

the babe did not question this, as she might question all other things and beings. she moved to catch it, and as she bounded upward in an ungraceful arc, it was gone! but it appeared again, and as it came to be she felt she heard her name again. deirdre moved after it with more determination this time, but when she moved to hold it again it was gone! are you feasin me? deirdre asked, and the branches seemed to shake with quiet laughter, and grow quite still thereafter. again she heard her name, but with it, she also heard athair; and so she knew where she was going, and could even smell him around. yes, tufts of his fur here and there, distinctly athair. her tail waved, and she was compliant and unquestioning again. she had quickly learned this thing could not be caught... but it could be followed.

to others, they might not see as she did, nor hear as she seemed to; but before her eyes was a newfound friend crafted into a thing others would identify as a will-o-the-wisp, if they could see it. for it very much might look like there was a ball of blue flame that moved forward as you moved forward, and followed as you went away. in the darkness of the forest, it was easy for her to notice.

She had been gone for a while, through no fault of her own. Wednesday had aspired to return early, but her injury had become infected and caused her to fall sick on her journey home. So sick that she could scarcely move. A kind loner had patched her up to good health; but that kind loner was nowhere to be found anymore. Well, food was food, and she had nearly starved with the scraps the healer had given her.

Wednesday was as good as new. Better, perhaps. But she could not return to Ferahgo empty-handed... nor her lady-love, who she had thought of with every passing second. Wednesday would not ever abandon her; and as Springtime approached, she remembered the getaway Erz had told her of. Wednesday knew there were girls here, could smell them! And so she would deliver something to her life, her love. And would show Ferahgo she had an eye for treasure, too.

The wind was in her favor. But it seemed to change and Wednesday stood at the borderline. Her angle was different this time. The bulldozer debated what approach might be best; to spring in, guns blazing, as she had the last time... or to act natural. Well, a hideous mug like hers could not blend very well, could it?

So she opted for the middle-ground. She kept her head low, and her pace average. The cub was certainly nowhere near her now at the borders... And so she had to move deeper. She grit her teeth; this would be a suicide mission if she was seen, caught, noted. She was hardly lucky, but the one thing she had was the wind on her side. Only this would mask her presence for any short measure of time. Wednesday moved into the wood, the forest protesting her presence in any way it could.

For when she felt she had checked her step, beneath her was suddenly a branch that snapped and echoed! Wednesday would freeze, and none would be near, yet, but perhaps one had heard... No movement. Another step that she was certain she had made sure to not step on something and beneath her, another branch! And as she looked up and stepped forward, she was slapped in the face by them. It fueled her; she hated this place, and she would have one or all of the daughters it coveted, it kept!

deirdre turned her head as the wood seemed to scream. she was alert, and another sound, similar... the young babe looked to the direction that she had been heading, and then back to the place the sound had come. in truth, the way the wood moved reminded her of the things she heard within the whelping den when a loved one returned to her. and though the wind seemed to encourage her in another direction, deirdre could not help the excitement in her heart.

athair! she shouted, sur-pise! deirdre is here! and she headed toward 'him', a skip in her step. she herself was close to the den, far from the she-wolf that intruded; but the echoes in wednesday's wake could be heard all around the sudden quietness. deirdre herself, too, stilled then. the birds sang no more. the sentinels stood still and stalwart, and she felt their great size and felt safe. she was not sure if she should head forward anymore, though she desired to. something told her that all was not well, and so instead the little witch waited here, not knowing better, not knowing her intuitiveness had not led her astray.

Wednesday grit her teeth; she did not know the correct way. The forest seemed to be a labyrinth, and it tested her patience so. If she were not given any hints, she would find her grave—

The one ear she had left moved forward. A sweet little voice, the sweetest she had ever heard, called in the most lovely of accents. Her heart moved to her throat as she thought of her lover, and how she might adore to hear this voice before bathing in the blood of the one who had it. With such a sweet little song such as that, Wednesday was certain the countess would be so pleased, and remain young forever! She was only so imaginative for Erz, who she hoped would be immortal, and who made Wednesday herself feel that way.

What luck. Luck was on her side. Wednesday plunged forward, then. She had her mark. And she was not wrong, was she? No. She would take the little girl and leave, quick as anything. Perhaps no one would know she was even there, should she get this done quickly enough. Wednesday thought she had spotted something in the distance, and saw the face, the most beautiful, vibrant face, and doggedly moved forward.

The thing spoke again, froze. But Wednesday had heard, even lengths away, and the small blip of a girl would grow bigger...

Wednesday could not stop now. She would need to cuff the girl, knock her out so that she would simply remain silent. The pretty girl would not know what hit her; she hoped no one else would, either. But the woods were a labyrinth; a dizzying maze, and the face she felt she saw was gone. Wednesday stopped abruptly, her face twisting and her eyes bulging in her frustration. Too big, the forest was. Too big.

Little girl, she breathed to the woods, her voice gravel, repugnant: I have been sent for you. You must come to me, or you will make the one that sent me very... what would strike a child, who understood nothing but happiness and did not know fear? Sad. Her muzzle pointed downward; signs of the child were present, but so too were signs of a wolf she did not wish to see. Wednesday was at full attention, now. It was unquestionable that someone else be near them, now, then. Tufts of fur that meant recent passing... Wednesday looked over her shoulder, the fear of life in her eyes. She would die here if she did not do this thing.

And so again she bolted forward, jaws seeking to grab anything near the earth and releasing them if it was not the skin of the she-cub. She felt she only had seconds. Seconds! She must use her final freedoms, before discovery. She must wreak havoc, must try for her love... Wednesday would keep this promise, the one promise she had made in her life. Her oath and her loyalty and her word, all for Erz.

she lay there, quiet. the nearness of the other only changed so the other came nearer. deirdre did not know what to do. she felt quite sufficiently hidden, as she could not see the other. safer, too, when she placed her broad paws over her pale eyes. something told her she should not move, not even so much as an inch, and so she lay there, frozen. a voice spoke then, distinctly not her fathers, and she listened. some words she knew, and she was learning more and more; fundamentally, she grasped what was asked of her. deirdre had been taught to obey her elders in the most basic sense. in the ranking scheme, she and emaleth answered to none, but to listen and heed the words that others spoke was a lesson well instilled in her.

all the same, deirdre did not know, now. one paw slid from her eye as she contemplated in silence, between wanting to please those who had taught her and who she loved and between her shyness, her fear of others. osprey she had known by name and even by smell, so integrated she was! but deirdre could not catch wind of the other, and so there was no way for her to know anything.

she made an error when lifting her head. she saw the wolf in the distance, sniffing. she never perceived anyone as anything less than lovely; she saw the good in everything. in the light of the others orange eyes, deirdre thought she saw something good, but when their eyes met...

the babe could not help what happened next, really. deirdre had decided she did not want to lay; she wanted to go to her mother, or her father, or emaleth, or osprey, or tachyon, or anyone but this wolf who spoke of sadness. deirdre turned and bolted, but her legs would not carry her fast enough, and she had hesitated. a little sound of uncertainty had almost bubbled forth from her lips when she felt a heavy weight against her crown, and she slid unceremoniously against the ground into a protective, thick veil of thorns. even still, the babe had never known any hurt, even as she slid against the earth. a peaceful sleep took her to another place, for the time, as the commotion of the moment ceased.

Found! Wednesday need to snap at the earth no more. Her success was imminent. She would survive this. The idiot whelp had exposed herself; pretty, and foolish, as the stereotype went. Fatally beautiful, even... What Wednesday would take with her was an angel. Perhaps Erz would let the cub grow into adulthood, so as to take her at her most beautiful. Wednesday wondered at what loveliness the other might grow into, if given the chance, so lovely she was now...

Ah, arms reach! Small legs, but growing legs, though still small legs! A swift swipe was all it took, just as the thing was about to pipe up again! Oh, how prettily she fell, too, and slid against the earth. Wednesday was aware of how hideous she was as she looked at the babe... but this cub was not for her, it was for Erz, who would want the thing whole and lovely and unscathed. Wednesday stopped and stared at the sleeping beauty, the Aurora Rose, and noted belatedly the cage of thorns that surrounded her. Thick, large. Donnelaith was hell. Donnelaith was not making this easy.

Wednesday tried to reach for the puppy with a foreleg. No, out of reach. So she moved to tear into the biting thorns, and bled for it. It was like damn devils snare, the stuff! It choked her as she bent downward, and so she withdrew and tried a new angle... but the brambles were thick and her persistent efforts were futile. She choked against the thorns around her throat, but she felt her teeth connect to thin childsflesh and was renewed, even as she fought for breath. The weight was hefty... her movements were urgent. She might soon run out of time, and Wednesday would not leave empty-handed this time, not when she was so close, not when she was here, feeling Deirdre's strong pulse.

he had lifted his border restrictions, for the caches must be filled with meat from the spring calves and lambs. his children were growing larger by the day, bounding out of doors and speaking not only their witches' language, but recognizable words, questions, sentences. eilidh remained a dedicated fixture near to the den, while casmir brooded along the borderline, no doubt recovering from his grief. he had not taken up with aria, and lasher thought this good, as he often enjoyed lustful and passionate interludes with the young beta in the shadowed places of the forest.

he patrolled, a thought of peregrine rising unbidden to his mind, and instead of shoving it aside, as he was usually wont to do, lasher allowed it a place. what had become of the devil? surely he had sired more children upon fox, turning out their last brood as her small red sides swelled with their new progeny. the caldera was a forbidding place, and thus his thoughts of his former lover were forbidden.

luke, ayishi -- he must trek to the hollow soon and visit the pair of them. he missed very much the touch of his pale, blue-nosed lover -- he would make a night of it, reacquaint himself with the muscularity and desire that dwelt in luke's body. and the little cherub -- ah! he would teach new things, so that the memory of their pleasure would not die when lasher had returned to donnelaith.

a thread of scent passed before him and it was familiar in its hateful musk; fear prickled to spike his nape. she had returned.

remembering ferahgo's words -- she was a woman without a home -- lasher whirled and began to dash in the direction of the den. his children wandered now, as small children did! they were vulnerable, and his heart raced wildly in his chest.

it was only by the grace of brambles that his daughter had been spared! taltos rushed into a terrifying scene; the woman's thick muzzle and masculine neck straining toward the spare bit of pale fluff he took to be deirdre, cowering in fear beneath the thorns where only she and emaleth were able to safely fit. more macabre still -- the rivulets of blood that ran from the wolfess' flesh as she fought not only for breath, but the soft flesh of his daughter, too near to those maddened fangs.

lasher sprang in a moment, silent, lethal; his own teeth flashed once and sought to sank themselves into the side of the woman's throat. rage curdled his belly; a thorny vine slashed his muzzle, but if he had gained purchase, his jaws would lock upon her flesh. the druid would not be denied her death a second time.

She had not heard him. Too intent was she to pluck the child from her bassinet of thorns that she did not heed the new stillness as one of danger. Wednesday thought she herself to be the danger; she had forgotten entirely about Donnelaith and its wolves as she thought of herself, of her love, of the babe she would bring to her. Ah! Sweet thoughts. The death of a child was worth the happiness of her love; she did not care a thing for youth and naivety, or the laughter of a cub. She cared only for the pleasure she would bring to her countess. To the token she would show Ferahgo, a reason she had been gone.

Her grip was ginger upon the babe when she caught her. A gentle tug would pull her nearer, but it was then she was forced to release when the body of another caught her. Wednesday had not even seen him! And could not struggle to get away! Desperately she sought to reach his daughter again; if Wednesday could clutch her throat as this man gripped for the perfect spot upon her own, she might be spared for sparing the cub! And so a hostage would be needed.

Wednesday would not survive this, she knew. But she thrust herself against the man in a parry, hardly a deterrent, so that she might howl to the one she loved, bid her adieu! Throat exposed, it was all but his, so when he caught it, she tried her hand, dove toward the babe in the thorns, and felt the fangs of Lasher against her windpipe to catch her mad fall. Still Wednesday drove her weight down. She wanted her body to fall upon the thorny castle the babe rest within. She wanted to smother the little sleeping thing. If her love could not look upon this angel, could not have her, no one would.

She choked against his grip, and jerked within it like the madwoman she was.

The thorns were strong. They stabbed her, and did not crumple beneath her hefty weight try though she might. She bled, and the seen was macabre and terrible to look upon as rivers of red sprinkled themselves all around the babe she had coveted for her heart.

his jaws, they closed around her throat; a haze of red fell over lasher's vision as he began to throttle her, paws seeking to grip the soft loam as she writhed and bucked within his grasp. the woman did not attempt to fight, and the fact she tried again to reach his little witch enraged lasher beyond measure; horror that deirdre had not moved to run away gripped him. had he been too late?

using the greater part of his strength, taltos sought to wrench her off the clutching thorns, taking a deep and black delight in the audible tearing of fur and of flesh. her head he would thrust violently against the nearest tree he could reach; blood churned the soft dirt beneath his paws into mud, and he slipped against her, but his onslaught continued.

his grip grew ever tighter; fantasies of the death she would reach danced before his eyes -- a suffocation, then he would dash her maddened brains over the earth of donnelaith!

Wednesday felt herself being forced from the thick thorns, and wheezed, KILLED HER, to stroke fear in his heart, to perhaps distract him from the task at hand, to look at his darling, but the words incensed him, DEA- and then her head was slammed against the tree! Her skin was torn, and this only made matters worse. Stars, stars she saw! She tried to escape him then, but she couldn't. Tighter was his grip. In the final show of her strength, she surged forward, toward the thorns again; perhaps this would make him relent, or perhaps he would find the strength to rip her head clean fr—

Ah, and so it happened that way! He had never released her, even with his weight being carried but one meager foot forward, and her body fell forward without its head. There might have been a scream, or maybe a gasp, or perhaps an ugly snarl...

No, there was none of that. Er, seemed to be her final word, incomplete, but as good as a prayer from her devoted lips.

she shouted but her struggling had lacerated deeply the flesh about her own throat in a horrid ring of raw flesh and jagged sinew. lasher savaged her flesh with deliberate clenchings of his teeth, snarling at her attempt to triumph. she drew him but a handful of inches before he gave a second large jerk of his muzzle and away her head came, to bounce among the thorns. perhaps they would pierce her eyes, her nose. score her unfeeling flesh -- lasher did not care.

the body fell away, his grasp released; he stumbled over it in his attempt to snap for the head again, to seize it up in his teeth! to slam it clumsily into the tree again and again and again until a welter of gore and blood burst from the severed neck and from the ears and the nostrils, until he heard the skull crack.

then and only then did taltos toss the head away with the last of his strength and whine for his snowy little witch, peering through the thorns, shuddering them with the pawing of his feet; her flank rose and fell; she lived, but would she wake? the alpha gave a terrible wail and sought to press his muzzle through the briars much as the woman had done, wincing as they caught his ears and his cheeks, even tearing thin stripes of pain along his eyelids. "deirdre."

throughout the tumultuous affair she slept peacefully. she perceived no struggle, and dreamt of all she loved. when it was over with, she slept only a little while longer. but she heard her name, and so one eye peeked open to reveal their emerald glow. 

he bled, and she moved toward him to lick the wounds on his eyelids in a crawl. she smelt blood, and was aware of a dull throb in the back of her head. you sad? she checked, thinking of the woman's words. i don't like her. i not liftening to her. deirdre bad? all that transpired, she tried to comprehend.

"no, no," he said breathlessly, gently, slipping a little in the gore as he reached to grasp deirdre in his jaws. however, he paused, frustrated that he could not draw her through the briars, and moved over to a less thorned place. "now listen to me, little witch. you must come out of there, and you must close your eyes when you touch my nose with your own." he did not want her to see the churned earth and the blood, the decapitated woman. lasher reached out his muzzle -- "come now, love." 

his heart beat wildly.

the shock of it all had the cub quite oblivious to what happened; the pain was hardly there, in the back of her head. it was like she had forgotten it all. blood slid from the thorns, but never reached her. as her father summoned her, however, fear gripped her heart and she remembered something that kept her here. can't, she whispered, her voice a little wobbly, then. not for a second did she look away from him as the blood dribbled down the teeth of the briars. when he reached out his muzzle, the cub mimicked him, her neck extending... but her limbs were filled with lead, and she whimpered, a breath catching in her throat. this was a fear she had never before known, but it was not her father she feared. no, her eyes were filled with love, but her heart was filled with dread, the intuitive knowing that something was not quite right. she squirmed nearer to him but once, as though she were an inch-worm, before her insides churned and she felt something she knew come upon her. scared, she murmured quietly, looking to her father.

she was scared; taltos heard it in her small voice, in the goatish smell of fear that surrounded them both. desperation grasped him -- he did not wish to panic her -- and so with a slow and pained blink of his eyes the man thrust his muzzle beneath the nearest crown of thorns and called softly to his little witch. "i am with you, deirdre -- be not afraid."

he was her father, her teacher -- he would be her messiah in this time of fear of of trouble. she need only walk across the waters of her own terror and come to him.

his voice was the salve to the wounds invisible to the eye this hour, and she closed her eyes and moved in blind compliance. she wore a crown of thorns for the sacrifice as they knotted and pulled at her growing furs, and then she felt her muzzle bump against his own. the contact shocked her entirely, and so her eyes snapped open and turned to see the headless wretch who had come against her. red was all she saw upon the other, and that there was no longer a head she could not see from the way the other was slumped against the tree. no! she resisted then, though only verbally as she froze before the shepherd that was athair. but she remembered her instruction, and tightly closed her eyes. it brought her a misguided sense of comfort, because deirdre believed that she could not be seen by the sleeping monster.

he pushed his muzzle through the branches then, stifling a throated cry as the briars tore at his flesh. blood welled, perhaps terrifying his daughter further; his jaws parted to grasp her, and though he wore not the same colour of pelt as her attacker had, he meant to grasp her and pull her from the thicket all the same.

desperation welled in his breast; perhaps eilidh or the willow might be better suited for the task, but lasher felt he must rescue deidre now! he must bring her forth!

once she felt his grip, she melted into it and was prone, easy to take from the confines of her dwelling. she kept her silence, and her eyes remained closed tightly together so that she did not see the macabre scene that surrounded her. the briars had been think enough to not see past, but the blood seeped through all the same. she did not wish to move lest she disturb anything else, and also desiring to be obedient to the wolf she so adored. here she did not yet fear him, the moment too fresh to make an impression upon her mind.

once he had her, lasher bore her gently home, stopping only to lick blood and dirt from her leaf-strewn pelt, and guide her to the willow's bosom with a few murmured words of what had occurred. grimly then he returned to the scene of the murder, where he gathered his failing spirits and called to inform his clan of what had happened.