Shadow Mountain i knew what would happen, 'cause honey the vermin survive

Night falls over the land, but Zephyr doesn't hesitate to start his trek across the mountains. He's determined to get home as soon as he can, to get his news sharing over with and deal with the emotions that will follow. Not his own — but those of his family, of Rosalie and Electra. Dealing with the emotions of others has never been a skill of his; most days he can't even tolerate the existence of his own. So the thought of shouldering their grief is more than a little daunting. It torments him as he walks, keeps his attention wrapped around the razor-sharp line of thought, spinning around and around over the possibilities of how he might handle it and leaving him flayed. I won't deal with it, he tells himself with every other step, all deadened nerves and dry gummy eyes — and with the next, he wonders what he will say, what he will do, how he will act. The cycle is vicious, and all-consuming for the moment.

It was late.

Why was he still out instead of sleeping? Fuck if he knew.

Sleeplessness was something he didn’t deal with. Restlessness was a foreign sensation.

And yet, he roamed, all slouched, sloping shoulders and heavy footfalls through the night.

His wandering was interrupted by the smell of something cold. The moving, living scent of stone, rock, and dust.

Frosty.

He followed him, his scent, the almost imperceptible sound of quick moving paws and kicking stone and clicking nails. And when he finally caught sight of him, dozed, quiet, and quick?

“The fuck you still doing out so late, Frosty?” He called. His expression wasn’t amused. But then again, it rarely was, all heavy brow and bored, watching eyes and curled lip.

A familiar voice cuts through the darkness, slicing into his thoughts with a cold abruptness. He turns his head only slightly before the startle reaction kicks in, muscles tensing and then abruptly tossing him away from the apparent danger —
Out of the frying pan and directly into the fire. He falls for a moment, then hits stone, first on one side and then on the other when he rebounds against the opposite wall of the crevice. The crack of his head echos once, twice over the rocky terrain, red painting the stone on the second round. He goes limp against the uneven meeting of dirt and rocks beneath him. Warm blood wells through his fur quickly, pouring into his eyes within seconds, and he curses softly past the ringing in his ears. The sky stretches over him like a deep blue void, freedom lurking just out of reach for the small wolf. Of course it'd be fucking Daighre to put him in this situation.

The other startled.

Violently.

So violently, in fact, that he was launched off his feet entirely. He fell. Disappeared down into some unlucky crevice. What followed was a loud, resounding crack, skull meeting stone not once but twice.

He stalked forward, ears pressed forward, and when he peered down over the lip and into the crevice, and met the other’s grey eyes looking up to him—

He huffed. Snorted. Looked away. Before, finally, looking back.

“What the fuck did you do that for, Frosty?”

He yawned. Licked his lips. Made a show of settling back against his haunches, neck craning and head tilting as he peered down at him at the bottom of the fall. Blood dripped down his face, into his eyes, messy and bloody the way head wounds always were.

Daighre makes his way over to taunt him, but Zephyr pays no attention to the words. He's bleeding too much, and trapped — those things take priority. Immediately the wraith sets to work testing ways he might escape his current predicament, blood dripping and splattering around him all the while. He can feel himself getting dizzier as the ringing fades from his ears and the blood continues to flow, vision blurring slightly. It feels like his time is running out, somehow. So his focus centers on his escape, and little else.

He expected many things, in that moment.

Mostly though, he expected a reaction. A reaction. Any reaction. Not just—silence, interrupted only by the sound of panicked, desperate nails clicking against stone and the slow, steady drip of blood on the ground.

“Frosty.” He called. Snapped. Same thing, really.

“You want some fucking help?”

More words cut through the air, but it takes a moment for him to realize he should care about these ones. He pauses, silent. And then — Yes, Quiet, stiff, reluctant. Please. He hates every moment of it. And he hates Daighre — more than he's ever hated anyone, in this moment.

‘Please.’

The word ran over him like someone’s muzzle brushing backwards through his fur. Which was to say, wrong.

He bared his teeth. Sneered, with his upper lip peeled back and the bridge of his muzzle furrowing. His hackles bristled.

He rose to his feet. Stepped closer towards the edge. Planted his paws as he loomed and glowered over the edge. And upon seeing him, small, quiet, and not right, on the far side of the crevice’s bottom?

“Oi.” Dumbass. “Come closer. Stand still.”

There's another pause, between his own answer and the response that follows. Zephyr is oblivious to Daighre's annoyance — and he wouldn't care even if he knew about it. He follows the instructions given without a second thought or a even a glance upward, bracing himself for contact he doesn't want. Actually, it's the last thing he wants right now. He's starting to feel pretty nauseous — but then again, he wouldn't be all that sad if he puked on that pretty blonde coat. Daighre definitely deserves it.

He listened.

Shuffled close like it would be the death of him, too much fur and not enough meat and bone, and his body tense and uncomfortable, prepared.

It somehow, inexplicably, made Daighre feel all the more worse.

“Don’t fucking bite me.” He grumbled. And with that said and done—

Balanced himself on the ledge and planted his paws, jaws parted and body leaning forward and down.

He doesn't respond, but he takes the words to heart, clamping his jaws shut as Daighre reaches for him. The feeling of the other male's teeth in his scruff instantly sets his heart racing, skin crawling frantically, but he fights the feeling long enough to allow himself to be lifted. The moment his feet touch the ground, the fight-or-flight response consumes him. An abrupt half-whine rips itself from him as he darts several feet away, silver fur fluffing out, all bristles and desperate snarls tinged with a hint of whine. A caged animal, for a moment, before he calms enough to speak.
Thanks. I'm leaving, He manages to choke out, voice wavering slightly with barely-contained rage. With that, he turns, stalking forward several paces — and immediately passes out from blood loss, crumpling to the ground in a pile of bloody silver fur.

He placed him on his feet, and Daighre watched—listened—as he darted away, a poorly smothered whine hanging in the air like he’d been bitten. And Daighre watched as he stepped several paces more, and—

Collapsed.

A heap of bird-thin bones, too long tail, and blood-soaked pale grey fur.

God fucking damnit.

He stalked forward. Stopped. Loomed over his crumpled form.

“Oi.” He barked. Sneered. Nudged him none too gently with a single paw. “Frosty. Short stack.” Dumbass. “Who’ve you been staying with?” Because he sure as fuck didn’t smell like he had been living alone, and he couldn’t just leave him there, as much as he wanted to.

Zephyr doesn't actually know the word concussion, though he's had many in his short life. Nor does he know that losing a lot of blood in a short time causes weakness, such as what he's experiencing now.
In fact, he doesn't know much of anything right now. He's completely out of it, and he barely registers the words. Only the nudge rouses him, and even then it's slight — calling him not to the present, but to a distant past left far behind him. Something he'd never normally reveal even a hint of to Daighre. Stop it, Kratos, He mumbles, shifting, shoving at the figure half-heartedly with one paw. He just wants to rest for a little while.

His first initial thought, when Frosty rouses, no matter how brief or dazed it is, is, who the fuck is Kratos? His next thought is something far, far more unpleasant.

So, he focuses on waking him up again.

“Shit for brains.” Yet another none too gentle nudge to the ribs. “Get up.” Or else.