Wolf RPG

Ragnar was not the kind of man to have been born to be idle, even when he was limping from the shallow injuries the bear had inflicted upon him, he still patrolled, still saw to his duties as Warden while making sure to keep a close eye on his wife who fussed over him in what the Viking still saw to be needlessly. She had slathered some kind of green, minty scented goop of paste on the claw marks the bear had left behind on his hip and leg, and while it dulled the stinging the movements caused and soothed the itchy and bothered skin it felt weird and several times he had deigned to scratch at it with his teeth and scrape it off of the tendrils of his fur and wounds though he had torn them back open the first time to the ultimate dismay of his wife who had waddled over to him, cuffed him on the nose and proceeded to slather more crap on his wound. Ragnar had been of the mind to tease her a few times, in that provocative way of his but his tiny Viking had, had none of it.

Whether it was her mood swings with her pregnancy or simply Thistle herself (without the mood swings) Ragnar found that he could not be sure.

As it was the Viking was on the search to gather her some lilacs, both in an unspoken apology for being as insufferable as he was when it came to healing his wounds (and given that Thistle was their only healer she was the one that got stuck with Ragnar) and because he had not forgotten his promise to her that he would find her some. His journey took him on the beach, a myriad of large paw prints showing where he had gone though the sea water rushed to wipe away, with each wave that lapped gently upon the sands, the evidence that he had been there at all. Though he was fairly sure he would find no lilacs here (though it wasn’t as if he remembered in vivid detail her descriptions of them or where he could find them, if that wasn’t blatant enough) he kept going figuring that he would stumble upon them, eventually.

Despite the confidence of that it was not the lilac bush he stumbled upon but rather a familiar figure perched atop the rock that Gavriil had seemed to claim as his own. Icy, oceanic colored eyes took in his hybrid leader with a small twitch of his lips into a smirk, noting that her attention was focused on something out at sea. Slowly, his course altered so he did not pass by her without at least offering a greeting, and partially because he intended to ask her if she could aid him in finding lilacs for Thistle (since he figured she was a female and knew that kind of stuff). “Pump,” He barked a greeting to her, limping to the side of Gavriil’s rock, figuring he might as well not even attempt to join her upon it, though it was big enough for the both of them to stand comfortably. While he was not immobile, and certainly not letting his minor injury slow him down any, he wasn’t up for rock climbing and thus deigned to stay upon the warm sands.

There had been a moment, brief, but there nevertheless, that Ragnar had considered leaving Pump to her daydreams - if that was indeed what she had been doing. It was not often he saw her looking so …peaceful. Of course the last time he had truly seen her face to face (not including the day they drove the bear out) it had not been a very joyous occasion for either of them; but Ragnar was over it. He had never been one to hold grudges. His focus was on his wife, their unborn children, his Priestess, and his duties as Warden. He watched Pump as she descended from her heightened perch to sniff at him, and offered a return greeting as simple as the Viking’s had been to her. Ragnar never had been a talkative creature - unless he was telling Thistle about the Cove, or Odinn. Only thing that he was truly passionate about warranted for an endless flow of words. Her sniffing was almost a little too intrusive to the bear-like Viking but Ragnar held still for her in a manner that relayed his obedience.

A chuckle escaped Ragnar’s lips at Pump’s observation, unable to help himself. “To Thistle’s dismay,” His eyes gleamed with mirth as he tried to hide the smile that began to creep across his muzzle, genuine and rare in it’s appearance. “If she wasn’t so pregnant I might actually be worried, but she can’t do much to keep me in the den,” Unless she was in pain - that, of course - was a different story. Not that he did much other than gently nuzzle her swollen womb and chide his sons for causing her pain, even then he wasn’t sure it did much of anything. “I have had worse.” And just like that he brushed off the shallow claw marks that marred his hindquarters and leg, confident that they would not even scar (and even if they did leave scars it wasn’t as if he, who bore so many of them already, would even care).

Pump’s words in regards to his offer - of which the Viking could only think that she meant his offer in regards to becoming her second in command - caused his brows to rise in a ‘is that right’ sort of fashion but he was silent, though his own curiosity burned beneath the icy depths of his eyes. What had brought about this sudden change? Up until that very moment in time he had been confident that she would just keep pushing against him with the same amount of force and momentum that he, admittedly, pushed her with. For a brief moment Ragnar considered the possibility that she knew about him attempting to gather followers with the intention of making a new pack in Ravensblood Forest but quickly dispelled that. The only ones who knew of it thus far were Thistle, Nerian, and Dagrún. All three of which were tightly bound to the Viking: one of ownership, one of blood (and lived in an entirely different pack to begin with), and the other by love. Not a single one of them were so grasping (except for maybe Dagrún, he was suspicious of) would stab him in the back. He had a feeling that the moments to come would be defining for the both of them, whether she accepted or told him she chose someone else instead.

The listing of his assets made him a nice little resume only to be darkened by her following words of him and being dishonest. As far as Ragnar was concerned he hadn’t, actually lied to her. Simply, he had chosen not to tell her because it seemed irrelevant at the time and easy to ride on the fact that Crete - who had obviously been sexually mature himself - had taken and given Thistle his seed before Ragnar had. Even the most clever sometimes got caught. However, now, now was a different story. Pump had asked and while Ragnar deviated on if the children in Thistle’s womb were Crete’s or his own (though Crete’s biologically) it wasn’t as if they would ever really, truly know. He had to tell her, of course. Ragnar did not make a habit out of lying, stretching the truth: sometimes, but never an outright lie. “It is true that I had Thistle during her heat season before our mateship,” Ragnar admitted to her, openly for he was not ashamed of it. “but it was not I that took her maidenhead. It was her lover from the Plateau that had her first. It is possible that I may be the biological father, yes, but also extremely likely that I am not.” If Ragnar cared to look at it more closely he would realize that the children were indeed Crete’s that Thistle had conceived the first night she had ever allowed a man to touch her.

But Ragnar didn’t want to look that closely, contended with his own convictions, even if they were wrong.

In the truth of things, Ragnar would have told Pump sooner if she had asked. While the fact that he had not told her on his own without her prompting could have easily been seen as deceptive (and maybe in some aspects it had been) the fact of it was that it hardly, truthfully didn’t matter who the biological father was anymore because the DiSarinnos did not want anything to do with their wayward brother’s bastards. Not that Ragnar had intended to give the children over without a fight as it was. He couldn’t help the suspicion that Thistle would have been devastated if that would have happened. As the Fates would have it, Peregrine didn’t seem the least bit interested and that had been that. “Yes,” Ragnar responded in his softened, heavily accented tone at her following question about if he could answer whatever was on her mind with honesty.

His cleverness might have looked like deception - for often the two tended to go hand in hand with one another - but he figured there was no point in lying. He did not intend to be deceptive.

What do you really want?”

In hindsight it was a simple question. Yet, it wasn’t, because Ragnar was more complex than his barbaric and simplistic culture may have led others to initially believe. “You know what I want,” He told her softly, and this was true. He had made no moves to hide his ambition even from the very start. Yet, maybe that very ambition was the root of his particular question. He did not want the Ridge, but he wanted leadership. He wanted respect. He wanted …much. He wanted Ravensblood Forest, but despite the things he had already set into something of a motion between Thistle, Nerian and Dagrun he also didn’t truthfully want to leave. “Aside from that, though, I want my little family to grow. I want respect. I want to stop disappointing my God, Pump,” It was a rare admission, one that he hadn’t even spoken to Thistle of. “He sent me here to spread my culture and if they will have it my religion, the ways of the Northmen. I have done it only in the small measure of Thistle. I want his approval, to prove myself to him, to live to his expectations.” And so far Ragnar was left feeling like he was doing a very poor job of it.

Pump was right to see Ragnar as a rival, because they wanted similar things, very similar. Except for the sole purpose that it was not the Ridge that Ragnar truly wanted but instead Ravensblood Forest, sacred as he believed it was to Odinn. It was the small, perhaps irrelevant fact that would keep Ragnar from challenging her, from becoming what he knew he could be if someone stood in the way of what he truly wanted. He had been willing enough to kill his own brother - thought admittedly Odinn’s Cove had been a perk, initially the silver Viking had only wanted his older brother’s wife, and beyond that a deep seeded vengance for their father, Eitri whom Björn had slain for the helm of the Cove. “To spread our culture and religion, as I said.” Ragnar told her. Not everyone would convert and Odinn, Ragnar felt, certainly knew and understood that. It wasn’t even so much of the religion as it was the culture itself though, gradually, if the culture of Ragnar and his kinsmen was understood the religion aspect would no doubt begin to make sense, as well.

Her words held some merit of truth, but it was only a small sliver to the Viking who had been born and raised to worship the Gods. To him, they were everything, from the thunder and lightening, to life and death. They were in everything, every aspect of nature, every twist of Fate. It so deeply ingrained in their daily lives that while those words made sense to Pump - whom Ragnar did not take for being religious at all - and were easy for her to speak as if it were the most obvious thing in the world; they would never be effortless for Ragnar to swallow completely. Things were done to appease the Gods, to prove that you were worthy of the Hall they lorded over in death. A God’s approval and accordingly, disproval was defining.

There was more than Ragnar could tell her in the time they had before them, as Thistle would, he had no doubt, give witness too. It had been weeks since Ragnar had taken her as his mate and there were many things he had yet to teach her though he deigned to teach her something daily. His head cocked to to the side, a bird like gesture at the question that followed her invitation. “You actually exhibited one of them, at the meeting to decide the fate of Thistle and I’s children. Fairness. We are a brutal people, called heathens and devils by many wolves, but we are fair to our own. We often hold trials to decide the fight of the accused, where the whole pack listens to both sides of the story and makes an anonymous vote on if the accused is guilty or innocent. It is how we inducted the children and outsiders into our culture. They showed they wished to be apart of us as a willing participant in the trail they were granted it.”

But he was hardly done. “I have heard that the wolves around here like to form alliances. Very rarely did we make alliances unless it was beneficial to us to do so. No matter how friendly you are, your allies will put the safety of their ranks before aiding you. They are worthless unless something is gained.” It was more of an opinion than anything else since he was fairly certain that as it stood Horizon Ridge did not have any outstanding allies.

“Friendships are hard to form when you raid from your neighbors, too,” At that Ragnar smirked to himself, a soft snort escaping his leathery, black nostrils. “Only a few of us went on raids so as to not lose most of the strong in one attack if retaliated against, or caught.” Ragnar shrugged. “We took what we needed and then what we wanted, including wolves at times. It was an assurance.” It was survival of the fittest as it had always been since the dawning of the time. There was no guarantee that Pump would consider either of the two real suggestions he offered as beneficial but they were what he wanted to see, since she was taking the time to ask him.

Ragnar had considered that maybe Pump and him, on the grander scale of things, were not truly so different from one another and that, that had been the main reason as to why she let him get away with as much as he did. He had been expected to have been given the proverbial boot long ago because while he definitely respected her and her authority, he also would do what he thought was “right” even if it meant disobeying. Ragnar was willing and unafraid to do what others would not; he did not harbor the same “moral compass” if even had one at all that others seemed to hold in such high regards. Ragnar nodded once in understanding of her unwillingness to share what was hers because he didn’t, really, want what was hers. He wanted his own; and would seek it out, eventually, when his sons were older. He was not, despite what his actions may have been led others to believe, in haste to part ways with the Ridge any time soon. And when that time did come - quite a ways down the road - Ragnar did not wish for it to be on ill terms with Pump. He would not ask her for an alliance if he could scavenge his spread out loyalists into forming into a Viking society because it seemed that neither of them believed in such a thing, but he did not want them to part as bitter enemies, either.

He had enough enemies (most of which seemed to have this knack for being of his own blood).

He considered her words thoughtfully, his scarred face contemplative, the echo of a smirk yearning at the edges of his lips as he considered the irony of this. It was similar to the offer he had made her many months ago, that he had pushed her for and here she was, more or less, returning it to him. “I accept your offer, Pump,” Ragnar told her after a pregnant pause, glimpsing down at her. He could live with her terms. It was what he had been striving for, after all. He could make the balance between father, husband, warden and leader just fine. He had done it before when he had been in her shoes, plus also led raids on top of it. No one could say that Ragnar wasn’t adept at multitasking for a man.

Ragnar had led alone during the first few, and admittedly chaotic months of his leadership in Odinn’s Cove, and even when he had decided to promote someone to be his left hand man it had not been any of his wives. At first he had approached Floki, the most natural choice despite that Floki was considered the “madman healer” (with the utmost affection, of course) because Floki had been one of Ragnar’s closest and most trusted friends. His best friend, even. Floki had declined, and more than once at that. His second choice, had been his youngest brother after he had deduced that Floki would never accept the leadership position no matter how many times Ragnar asked. “You know I will always tell you what I think,” Ragnar told her softly in accordance to her terms. He had told her what he had thought of Diluculo, hadn’t he? That he didn’t trust her, and still to the very day, didn’t like her. Not that he would let his personal feelings meddle in his role as her co-leader. Personal feelings had no place in ruling and were easily separated to make the best choice for the pack. They might not always see eye to eye but they were two different wolves, with two different opinions. It was a matter of balancing them.

In a way, Ragnar saw this as a challenge - one that he was eager to accept and attempt to work with her on because he did like Pump as well as the deep rooted respect he held for her.

“I do not like to lie. In my experience it is better to be upfront about yourself and even about others than it is to hide behind spun stories.” On that particular topic, she didn’t need to worry. Admittedly, he was guilty of stretching the truth, but the only occasion that he had done that had been in regards to Crete because he wanted to ensure that should the DiSarinno male ever go graveling back to the Plateau that he would be justly punished for his crime.

“No, you and I both know that I’m not that kind of man,” Ragnar told her with a smirk that danced across his lips, finally taking form. He had proven it to her many, many times and would probably keep proving it to her, he was sure. He was a man of action, adventure, curiosity, and beyond that: he was extremely opinionated. He would always speak his mind to her, whether she agreed or disagreed with his opinions and so long as she at least listened to them and took them into consideration he could not complain even if she decided against him. In truth, in this particular matter (in regards to what was supposed to be said during these sort of dealings) he was just as awkward as Pump. His only rise to leadership had been as he watched the life fade from his older brother’s eyes. There wasn’t anything to have been said between them, except that Ragnar asked Odinn to take Björn to Valhalla; and then there wasn’t much said but “hail Jarl Ragnar” and that had been that. “I will,” Ragnar promised her with a mischievous smirk to match the glint of it that he noticed in her eyes. He realized as he turned to head back to Thistle, that he hadn’t even asked her about the lilacs. There conversation had left no room for that and in hindsight he could always go hunting for them tomorrow. He had bigger news to share with his wife.