the familiar feel of rock beneath her paws lended some comfort, but she'd since though twice about her plan to revisit the plateau. it was a monument, a perfect image of it, the pack in the early days, stuck firmly in the back of her mind, and something about visiting it seemed wrong. 

her breath moved like sandpaper up and down her throat, head low as she pushed herself against the mountain rock. exhaustion came quicker than she'd expected; surely something to do with the weight she'd dropped the past few weeks. pausing, she faltered and sat ungracefully, chest rising and falling quickly with each breath while her mind whirled like a broken compass.

she'd never apologized. in the heat of all that had happened, she'd known how she'd hurt him, but she hadn't said what burned on her tongue. fangs cut through the soft flesh of her cheek, suddenly, remorselessly, eliciting nothing but a stiffening of her frame. was it her pride? she didn't want to believe that, would rather that the words had become lost in the labyrinth of last night.  

muzzle was tugged in the direction of the sound swiftly, falling upon a wolf who she took a moment to separate from the back of her mind. "rannoch" her brow furrowed in distracted question, and after a beat she neglected to stand, instead pulling herself into a more orderly position. she surveyed him; he looked entirely different from when she'd seen him last, and still the same. her muzzle twitched as a half-formed question faded and died, instead settling for merely watching as he approached.

she wanted to lean again, against the harshness of the rock, it's relative coolness. yet she remained upright, watching Rannoch and knowing, as she had when they'd first met, that there was something good about him, something she could trust. "my father's dead." flatly, then, a moment later, "and I've made so many mistakes." she didn't feel like attempting small talk, not now.

here was understanding that she had not expected, empathy she'd not know would exist between the two. she was silent for a long moment, drawing in the words and using them to patch the ugliest wounds of her mind. "but I am alone, Rannoch." here she paused, once, before speaking again. "my younger siblings have vanished. my father's mate is destroyed by grief, I made my brother leave, I hurt Aditya, and he left me." the pack teetered on the edge of starvation, she knew not if or when Sunny would return, and she'd spit poison at a potential ally. the words were quiet, said with a numbness that made clear she hadn't come close to processing all that had happened.

Rannoch seemed unwilling to believe the entirety of her swift and sudden loneliness. it would be so easy to latch onto the truth without question, and yet; "but what if I've pushed them too far away?" She'd known that she'd hurt Aditya when she had, and yet Sunny's reaction to his hurt had been unexpected. had she hurt others, without her knowledge? molten gaze rose to meet Rannoch's, searching, as if the answers may be written somewhere in his.

---

she was silent as he spoke, gaze molten. perhaps her desire to lead, to stand somewhere near to where her father had, and fierce love for adventure and travel would only ever serve to oppose each other. it seemed wrong to put herself first when she'd only ever felt like she was letting people - Aditya - down. she was selfish, now and again, but in the worst ways. perhaps she could learn to be selfish in ways that wouldn't hurt, wouldn't have her feel like a failure. 

"It's been a day. I chose a direction and walked - I had to move, somewhere." fangs scratched at the wounds already spread across the inside of her cheek as she regarded him, ears flicking back a moment. "I know that if I left, now, it would feel too much like running."  she admitted this softly, auds roving back around to fixate on Rannoch