Wolf RPG

The time had come.

Everett rose through the lavender fields as the sun crested the sea, and dawn spilled over the island in warm, golden hues. The waking hours, the morning of a new day and a new life, for the youngest Sweetharbor brood.

He did not have every thought set in stone but he had the compulsion to go. Go, in that same familiar press upon his heart, the same that had led him here. God was with him, and would be with him, even in this seemingly small and infinitesimal task.

He saw no things too small for Him, Everett was beginning to learn. He cared for every detail. Be with me now, though Everett knew He was, and so corrected himself, help me trust that You are. Following Him was different than following the fire and the rain. Invisible: but He made Himself known in uncountable ways every day he spent on the island, and even long before.

Everett didn’t know what the children would believe when they were grown, but he prayed that they — all of them, elder and younger — might know God, too.

When he reached the den, he poked his head into the entrance where the family lay sleeping. @Heda, he whispered, I have chosen their names.

accipitra’s world grew bigger day by day. it was not just her world that was growing; she was growing in all ways — taller, bigger, each sense slowly coming to be like the pieces of an ever unraveling puzzle. 

the scent of lavender woke her, but her bright face was turned towards the arrival of not-mother. a face she recognized and cooed towards, tail beating back any other would-be welcome committee as she clambered over siblings and flank to greet him with excited jumps towards his chest and muzzle.

the boy did not yet know the face of GOD but he knew the face of his savior. any time everett walked into the den, he was met with a barrage of fervent kisses, an intensity reserved only for him. the sister's tail deterred him for only a moment before he set his approach to the man's other side.

today arrived with a gift, a name in everett's chest to be bestowed upon him and only him. soon the boy would be formalized as everett's own, a child of GOD.

Silver and gold- like Malakai’s eyes! Like sun and moon! Day and night! This stranger is intriguing and wispy and calls for Ami. The babies seem to know him, they clamor for his touch but Judah hesitates. His tail tucks, ears flatten and he slinks further into the den to watch the proceedings from afar.

Now, Judah was not alone in the deep parts of the den. Malakai did his most to be outside of it now. Each day he needed less and less of mother's milk. But when he was within. When it was night, for example, he was as far away from the younger ones as possible. When Judah wasn't playing with them, Malakai and Judah tucked together in the dark corners- Sun & Moon aglow just like in the sky. When Judah slinks back, Kai presses against him. Protective, or maybe just, possessive.

the night smudge once called saint, child of vaermina,

the snake in the garden of eden —

draws in a simple breath as they are roused. they give no sound to their displeasure though. instead, the witchling has resolved themselves to this fate. unwanted and different though it was.

soon, they would forget the smell of their nightshade mother. soon, they would forget her voice, forget the taste of her mothersmilk.

until this life was all they knew.

sainty, sainty, saint —

a shadow passed, caught in the corner of their corrupted eye. real or imagined ... but either way real to them. they ignore it as they try

unsuccessfully

to ignore the others.

His face breaks when they greet him - a smile and a laugh. Soft, foreign, but joyful. Right. Everett beckons the two who jump at him into his arms and graces them with a kiss of his nose against each of their heads. He notices the reactions of the others -- how Judah and Malakai press together, how Dinah stills behind Heda's back, how one of the youngest seems to ignore the rest.

Names are no solution, but he prayed they would help. Help knit the family together again, with the new additions God sought to weave into their patchwork.

Without words, Heda beckoned him to speak, and he would draw them towards himself one by one, if they let him.

The dark little daughter first. Ava Amara, he spoke over the child, and blessed her with a laugh, another kiss and a soft prayer for her life. To the patchwork son within his arms, Abel Elam, and he offered him the same. They were the ones he had feared for most - and he never stopped thanking God for how He had already helped them.

He turned to the other daughter next - the quiet one, who lingered far from the older pups, Ana Tema, and he prayed that in time, the Lord would heal her, as He did her siblings. And to the last, who turned their face away to stare into the shadows, Tzedeq Zerach, and he prayed that they might turn their eyes to heaven, and one day, understand the light.

He prayed they all might know the Lord, that they all might love each other, as they grew and lived under the guidance of Sweetharbour, under the Lamb who led them.

Everett looked to Heda to see what she might say, if she had any objections, if she thought any name ill-fitting. They would carry them for their lives, after all: Ava, Abel, Ana, and Tzedeq.

two blackwater cubs strode forth to meet their would-be savior. the rest hung back, watchful alongside the graceful figure of heda. 

accipitra sat upon the ground alongside hierophant, expectant gaze upward. 

a new name, a new beginning, a new life. the magnanimity was lost upon the blackwater heathen. her tail bumped the sand in rhythm as she peered at the others as they were called.

tzedeq zerach —

a snort leaves saint's black, leathery nostrils; blind eye roving as their good eye purposefully focuses beyond the man that adopts them.

all to eager to act like they are deaf.

to act like everyone in this too crowded den is nothing more than a nightshade whisper.

they are unfortunately tangible.

but saint is content to pretend that they are not, to pretend that they do not recognize their new name. content to be the cuckoo in the nest that they were.

beautiful names. heda's eyes shone with tears as everett named each of the children in turn, bestowing such an ancient degree of love upon them that as she watched the man, she felt it seemed he had been born to it.
to fatherhood.
perhaps it was her sensitivity over fathers as a whole which made the moment so memorable for her. caracal was father to her children and would be to these, but for ana, abel, ava, and tzedeq, he would share the title with everett.
and heda felt a gentle, low glowing at the prospect of two able fathers tending the littlest of their flock upon the sacred island.
with a strange, small smile intent upon its own secrecy, heda faced the man. "so let it be." god had blessed these children with names. they belonged now among the family of sweetharbor.