Qeya River they sent me away to find them a fortune

The devourer kept on the move. From the Witches Marsh he moved north. The Teekon Wilds were an unknown to him and without the mental map of the lands he ventured forward with purpose and the tempered caution of a wanderer in unfamiliar lands. His focus had been so singular on Ragnar's abandoned legacy, left to the wastes of the Norns who begged for him to take the helm and carry his father's legacy on the back of his own. The Devourer. The Ravenous. His title proceeded him, at least in the vast Eldingar Valley but here he was nameless. Faceless. His name(s) were not whispered upon their lips cautious attuned to the old saying “speak of the devil and he shall appear”. He missed the recognition but Rigr was not blind to the rare opportunity this presented him with. He looked little like his father and any wise conqueror knew that the best place to start was always with information. Berserkers flew into battle like demons, in a hot and unquenchable rage. It was an acquired taste and accordingly, the quickest poison was not always the best. This he had not learned from his battle mentors. In part, his strategical mind was inherited from his father ...but also his mother. The (perhaps once) pure and innocent Gala was clever and cunning and her wisdom was a treasure.

The morning sun broke over the horizon as the scarred northman drew nearer to a river, steps slowing as he acquainted himself with the land for a moment, bi-colored gaze following a large chunk of sea ice that floated past him lazily. His breath left his lips in white furls of warm steam that writhed into the air before it dissipated. It reminded him of home. With thoughtful steps he neared the bank of the river — ears alert to pick up the tell-tale sounds of ice shifting under weight in case he'd mistaken earth for snow covered ice. Besides the crunch of the snow underfoot as his weight shifted carefully the ground was silent and solid. With head bent he lapped at the icy cold waters of the river.

Immediately following the night of celebration, the little Groenendael traced the shoreline eastward. She bade farewell to the pinnipeds and their rocky shoals, danced her way across the mirror-like river delta, and looked with poignant fondness upon Marbas’ island. Restlessly she wandered the cape, nimble paws carrying her past a series of rocky cliffs as she chased a pod of dolphins, stopping only when territory borders forced her to. Kierkegaard’s scent drew her to the sirens’ hallowed ground; and yet, a pressing need to keep moving spurred her onward. At the eleventh hour she bathed in seawater set aglow by bioluminescent plankton — and just as the first glimmers of dawn began to outshine the glittering expanse of stars, the inky ingénue set her sights further north and turned away from the breathtaking radiance that surrounded her. With a single backward glance and a fierce ache in her heart for those she would leave behind — Doe, Marbas, Kierkegaard, Dagfinn, Starbuck, Szymon, and Chusi — Coelacanth left the Teekon Wilds entirely, intent on finding her wayward twin.

A heady combination of joy, excitement, and fading adrenaline made the little Groenendael careless. She bore her share of Szymon’s kill with pride, the swanlike arch of her graceful neck made more evident by the way her finely-sculpted head bowed beneath the weight of her prize. There was, despite her waiflike delicateness, a saucy snap to her fluid, soundless steps, and the renewed brightness of her Neptune eyes restored a sense of liveliness to her inky visage. The deep-voiced murmur of a nearby river caught her attention and she turned toward it eagerly, intent on slaking her thirst. The weather was too cold now and this river too swift to safely submerge within the floe-riddled depths, but the notion of bathing her face and legs appealed to her — she moved with alacrity, widening her stride and admiring the soft crunch of snow beneath her feet.

She rounded a bend and was faced with a titan.

The submissive sheepdog cross’ response was dictated by wild instinct alone; her body responded for her, an atavistic compulsion cradling her tiny form into a position of eloquent submission. Ink-plumed tail swept low, sketching a signature in the frost between her hocks, as her carriage dipped and her ears folded demurely against her head, their trademark tufts tangling in the dusty fur at her nape. Her fangs held on to her prize for a moment too long, perhaps, before her slim jaws slackened and she laid the chunk of mountain goat willingly upon the earth, and her blood-streaked tongue licked carefully at her lips in an appealing way as she turned her seablue eyes away from the ash gray behemoth. At this point, she didn’t know whether he had noticed her or not — she had responded to the sheer size of him as her vulnerability as a loner and a halfbreed dictated. Even with his head bent, his battle-hardened musculature and great height cut an impressive silhouette.

The sound of footfalls upon the snow laden ground of the river bank drew to the devourer's attention to the other's approach but the viking did not immediately respond. Instead, he favored to continue to sate his thirst first deciding if they stuck around then he would turn his attention to them. Black, leathery nostrils flared as the scent of blood and meat filled his nostrils as he took a last few laps of the icy water, feeling it's progression down the strong column of his throat to where it settled in his stomach before his head rose and his salmon pink tongue drew across his jaw, upper lip and nose to catch any wayward droplets of water before his golden eye fixed upon her almost lazily. He sensed no immediate threat and a singular glance told him this intuition was true.

He turned to face her in full, bi-colored gaze taking her in with earnest now and beheld silence. She was not full wolf, the her long ears tapering off with tufts he could tell despite that they blended in with her inky coat with her submission. Her subservient posture greatly satisfied the devourer more than he thought it would. In Svartalfheim her status as half-breed would have seen her as a thrall. Oh but what a striking and ethereal thrall she would make. A thrall with her beauty would have made him the envy of all his fellow Berserkers. Not that Rigr had much stock in their envy. He'd only ever wanted their respect and their fear. But to have such a lovely creature as she as his! The idea was enticing to the devourer who drew nearer to her, his interest not in her food but in her.

If she let him Rigr would seek to investigate her, to smell her to judge what he truly sought to know: if she was healthy, if she belonged to anyone, her age.

At first, the waiflike sheepdog cross was comforted by the titan’s evident disinterest in her meal — but when it became apparent that his hunger was for another thing entirely, her heart began to skip and stutter wildly within her breast. Her tiny form, made tight and compact by the fear that now accompanied her automatic submission, took up a palpable trembling that only increased in intensity when the Devourer drew near to take stock of her. The huff of his breath against her fur as he drank in her scent was more than she could stand, and though the answers could be easily gleaned without a single consenting word from her — yes, no, a little over a year — she could stay still no longer. Leaving her meal behind, Coelacanth put every last ounce of energy into a sprint that led her north, toward the coast she knew and the wolves she trusted.