Betrayal. One of the most absolute things he refused to forgive for. It came in all shapes and sizes, in all manners of ways. It always seemed to come when he was least expecting it. In much of a sense it was, in Ragnar’s reality, his fault. His fault because he had let himself get too comfortable in these posh summer lands. He had taken the hybrid’s words upon honor alone though she was no Viking and her honor could not be counted upon in the same way. This, he realized as he stormed to and fro in a manner that could have been considered an aggressive pacing, had been his own stupidity. He had worked tirelessly to prove himself to not only her but to the others as well, a willing participant in the contribution of her pack despite that it had been borne of his selfish desire to gain himself the title as her Second in Command. He had grown to respect Pump and even, in his own way, liked her. At the moment, his grievances didn’t even concern the Beta rank, though he supposed it played a small part, but instead how Pump had done little in his opinion about the way the female at their borders had spoken to him as if her sarcasm and lack of respect was no small matter.

It might not have mattered to Pump but it certainly mattered to him.

It was the source of his rage now, no longer hidden behind mischievous smirks and loaded looks but let out of his body in a rush of heat as if it were a living thing coiling from the silken tendrils of his platinum silver fur. Ragnar didn’t care if the new recruits were frightened of him or not - most of them were intimidated by him of their own accord anyway - but the allowance of that kind of behavior to a superior festered like an open and infected wound beneath Ragnar’s skin. Not to mention the female’s brazen audacity to throw Thistle in his face in an indirect threat, at that. As if she held any sort of power and yet Pump had seemed allow it, made it sound to the Viking like she was even standing up for the female despite that she had told the girl to stop insulting him. It was not enough for him. He was her warden, and he had trusted her, trusted her with the life of his mate and children during the meeting (though at that point no one but Thistle and himself had been aware of their mateship). Ragnar had trusted Pump and she had seemed to have so willingly - for a wolf she did not know, whom Ragnar did not trust (and he swore if she stepped a toe towards his mate he would rip her spine from her back) - stabbed him in the back.

It was a costly mistake, because he was a more dangerous enemy than he was a friend, and her betrayal stung like the deep lash of a whip across his back, never giving him peace from it. She had stuck up for him but she hadn't attempted to stop the female the first couple of times she had talked down to Ragnar and the Viking was having a hard time letting that go.

Ragnar fumed in his contemplative silence, pacing too and fro like a caged animal, beating a path in the dirt and trampling the grasses as each step a stomp within a marching like rhythm like an army about to slaughter and destroy. Maybe he was the savage one of them, the feral one, ruthless, selfish and a heathen to his core but at least he could claim that his respect and trust was genuine, that he did not go back on promises he made, that he swore with the specific purpose of Odinn hearing. So caught up was the Viking that he did not even notice Thistle, Caribbean blue eyes fierce and furious trained upon the scar he was leaving upon the earth with his relentless pacing that was not doing the job it was supposed to be doing. His rage still ravaged through him as if it were created by Thor himself, reminiscent of the drug induced rages he had used to put himself into as a Berserker back in Odinn’s Cove (that he was sure if Thistle knew of would likely give her a heart attack given her vast medical and poison knowledge). As Thistle moved into his direct line of vision, he caught only her sandy toes in his peripheral vision it was then that the Viking ceased his rapid pacing and lifted his head to focus his stormy (and perhaps even hurt) gaze upon his wife, for a moment letting her familiarity wash over him, letting the roundness of her sides caution him that she should not be dealing with this kind of stress, that it wasn’t good for her and the babes she carried.

The bear-like Viking moved in silence with purpose towards her, drawing his tongue across the underside of his wife’s chin in greeting with the intention of ignoring her question for the moment, before he moved brushing his muzzle against her rounding sides, the product of their coupling (not really) having decided that he no longer cared if her one night tryst’s seed was the one that took (it did) because to him they were theirs, they were his children because his wife’s Crete had long ago given up any rights to being their father. “I will make this right,” He whispered to the children within her womb, before he pulled back some putting distance between Thistle and himself. “You should go back to the den and rest, I do not wish to stress you with this.” Because if she became to stressed and lost the children he would never forgive himself.

Thistle, Ragnar had come to learn in the month or so he had come to know her, was nothing if not persistent and, equally stubborn. It was endearing, infuriating and admirable all in one awkward package until Ragnar was left grasping at which one he thought it was the most only to come up with no real answer. She was young - having just reached her sexual maturity something she had told him previously allowing him to conclude that she was only just two years of age at most - younger than him, an in this still in certain ways innocent and perhaps even naïve. She was intelligent of that he wasn’t going to dispute but he felt the urge to shield her and protect her from the world …and himself. It was as he locked gazes with her, icy oceanic meeting the azure blue of her irises that he wondered if he had done the right thing by their coupling, by their mateship, by allowing his affection for her to grow until he had begun to fall in love with her. Love. Something he had thought he was incapable of but the deep rooted knowledge that for whatever it was worth he was falling in love with her contradicted that once belief starkly. Ragnar did not hold a belief that things were about to all magically work out unless Odinn willed it so. Perhaps Ragnar had mistook Pump’s words to the stranger to be betrayal, had too immediately been hurt by the appeared evidence that Pump would overlook an actual, driven and contributing member of her pack in favor of some smart mouthed, disrespectful, stranger of a little girl full of contradictions. Perhaps, he allowed, that was the case - that he had merely misunderstood. Odinn did not will things to be easy for his favorite.

Likely, if Odinn did not take pity upon him, Ragnar would find himself in the midst of a storm of trouble. If this was so, as Ragnar had a horrible suspicion of, Thistle and their unborn babes would be drug into the middle of it, likely by association alone, but of course knowing how Thistle was - it was infuriating he decided in the instance of the scenario in his head - she would not stay if Pump decided to throw him out, even though she had too. Ragnar could not fathom that any other pack would accept a pregnant female, nor her pups. If…it came to that. The Viking did not even crack a smile at her stubbornness as he might have otherwise. He was in no gaming mood. “Things transpired this morning along the borders,” He began to tell her, his voice soft and calm - a sharp contradiction to the fury that pulsed off of him - the lack of fury in his voice working to make his words carry more weight and power. “I was a fool. She is not a Viking, she does not have to live up to her word or honor,” Scarred face twisted into an ugly scowl as if the words left a bad taste in his mouth.

“I accosted a stranger at the borders who offered me nothing but disrespect, arrogance and sarcasm, who threw you in my face saying that if she wasn’t accepted there would be one less wolf between teeth and your throat - of which I took to be an indirect threat to you. Pump witnessed how she spoke to me, disrespectful as if she had any right when I would be superior to her in rank if she was allowed in the pack. Admittedly, I was not very generous in my own respect towards her but she did not and does not deserve it. Pump said nothing to her about how she spoke to me at first, seeming to turn a deaf ear to it, even seeming to encourage her behavior for a moment,” Black, leathery nostrils flared as his chest rose and fell in a rapid breath - the only indication that he was still, very much, livid with rage though his voice gave no indication. “It felt like Pump stabbed me in the back, favoring the disrespectful mær,” He spat the word like it was venom, “over me even though she asked her to stop insulting me.”

“I have done everything she has asked of me. I trusted her. It shouldn't have been let go so long.” But that was a broken thing now, and Ragnar was not sure it could be repaired. "She did call me her friend but...I cannot overlook that and the fact that the girl is probably one of ours now. I do not trust her, neither do I like her. I am her superior and she will do well to remember that." Of course if things went as bad as he feared he might not have to worry about it.

Thistle’s words mirrored Ragnar’s own alternate thoughts: that maybe he had misunderstood in his irritation and the new girl’s lack of respect towards him despite that he was the superior in that situation. He had already had a place within the pack, and she was the one who was there looking for a home. Ragnar’s point was that she was asking a favor of him, indirect as it was, and sarcasm and disrespect would gain her no friends with the Viking. Ragnar would undoubtly make the girl’s life a living hell until she realized that he was her superior and he should be treated like such. He would push her to her boundries and then past it until he broke her. It was a cruel way of settling his problems and while Ragnar could be a diplomat he was also ruthless. Clever enough to be both without letting on that he was about to pull the rug out from under another.

Pump appeared, a black smudge approaching the couple, calling herself a ‘backstabbing evil bitch’, and for a moment Ragnar merely stared at her. Seeing her, and watching the way she handled walking into their conversation made him realize that he still respected her even if his trust was a shattered thing that wanted to mend but could not by his own deigns. “I did not call you evil or a bitch,” He told her after his moments pause, because even though he felt like she had in a sense backstabbed him (not to mention his discontent upon her decisions regarding his and Thistle’s pups) he did not hate her. Did not even, dislike her, neither did he think she was evil. In a way, he understood her harsh views on things because they reminded him of his own, ruthless ways.

“I don’t hate you Pump,” He started with slowly as he gathered his thoughts and attempted to shoo his anger at her, and frankly at the entire trangression away. “I still respect you but I don’t agree with the ease in which you left Diluculo join the ranks, especially after she disrespected me from the get-go,” He was frustrated and even so still hurt. “I feel that it should not have gotten as far as it did before you reprimanded her for it. I am your Warden and until you arrive I am the superior when greeting wolves at the borders. I do not know where she comes from but to disrespect a Warden isn’t accepted where I come from. In fact she would have likely been killed, but it doesn’t matter because this isn’t Odinn’s Cove, I know that.” He took a deep breath then. “I feel like in a way you betrayed me, that you didn’t have my back until it got too ridiculous,” Ragnar told her calmly before adding with a leveled look. “For as long as my rank is above hers I will not accept her talking down to me as if she has any right. The domiance of our hierarchy is clear. Even Thistle and I are not true equals.” He warned Pump because he took the hierarchy seriously.

And if they were going to play fast and loose with it he would leave and start his own pack.

“I know you did speak up for me and I appriciate that but it should not have gotten that far.” And with that the Viking fell silent, waiting for Thistle, or Pump - or whomever intended to speak at that point - to speak up.

The bigger picture. Of course there was a bigger picture. In truth, Ragnar had not given much thought to the grizzly bear since the day of his sacrifice to Odinn when he had heard it tear apart a mother cougar whose cub had hid behind his legs. Ragnar could not justify how a grizzly bear that to his general knowledge had stayed away from their lands, was more important than respect of the hierarchy. The bear would die or move on of it’s own accord while the hierarchy would always stay, always be vital to how a wolf pack interacted and worked as a cohesive unit. “If it has not bothered us why anger it by attacking it?” Frankly, Ragnar did not want to be torn apart by the bear as the cougar had been, neither did he really want to see anyone else be torn apart by it. It was a strange thing to consider but he had come to view the wolves within the pack as friends and since he would be a father soon he did not want to leave Thistle alone with them even though technically the pups did not belong to them, anyway.

“I understand the necessity of her joining our ranks, I don’t like it, but I do understand,” Reluctantly, begrudgingly but it was there nevertheless. “That being said I will push her until she breaks, she needs to learn a lesson. She should be punished for it. Perhaps that will teach her to pay more heed to the hierarchy.” Ragnar, in a way, was asking for Pump’s permission to do so, because in the end he was only just a subordinate. “I do have a question, however, though the timing is inappropriate but I do not know when I will get the chance to ask you again with the border patrols and hunting for Thistle and accompanying her to look for her flowers,” herbs whatever it was she used to heal them. “have you given any reconsideration to my offer?” Of course it would have been fair if she told him that she entirely changed her mind given what had just transpired between them. He did not expect the answer to be in his favor given his behavior and likewise would begin to put his alternative plans into action though he was not sure if she would allow Thistle to leave with him. Her words at the meeting had sounded rather resolute to him.