Torn between his skewed sense of moral duty and the need to rekindle with his mother, the Crownore was bitter. Fuming still, even after the heartfelt reunion with Anóre—Erys was proving time and time again to be nothing but a fucking burden. A man with all bark and no bite to back himself up. Getting himself in trouble that Emýr felt obligated to rescue him from. 

During the nights, as the gaunt man slept not too far off from where the dark prince had settled, Emýr would try to convince himself to leave. To disappear into the night and travel far enough way that the man wouldn't find him, or would either wilt away trying. Mulling over it with a sneer that seemed permanent, a war waged inside of him. The age old struggle of good against bad, of what's right versus what is wrong. 

A cracked, skewed moral compass that could never seem to decide which to settle on. To be cruel and heartless was easy—and it should have been second nature to a man as haunted and troubled. But then the guilt settles, the reminder that he'd promised himself long ago that he wouldn't allow himself to become his father.

It's torture, and the answer is inevitably the same, and the path is drawn always back to Erys. Steps fueled with ire guide him after small prints in the snow, then the dirt. Following a trail he shouldn't, but could not turn away from. Because as much as he hated it, Erys was his to look after. 

Obligated to make sure the man lives. Even though he makes it fucking impossible. 

There's a snarl, sounds of a struggle that make him surge forward, crushing underbrush beneath the urgency of his sprint. Jaded eyes narrowing, tunnel-vision of red honed on the rogue that had Erys face down in the dirt. Helpless, defeated. 

Something ugly stirs inside his chest, something foul. His, his, his. And those fucking hands and teeth and spit were all over what is his. 

There is no time to mull, there is no time to debate. And there is no hesitation as Emýr leapt forward to crash himself into the side of the assailant. Barreling the rogue onto his side, a guttural snarl pulled from the depths of his lungs. The struggle is a flurry of snapping jaws, gnashing teeth—but he does not stop, and will not stop until the body beneath him goes still and he stands within a pool of blood that is not his.

A life stolen, a soul snuffed. Torn to shreds by a Crownore as was their right, their legacy. The age-old bloodlust sings through his veins, white-hot and violent, as his breaths are ragged with hardly contained rage. Even then, as the wolf beneath him gurgle on it's own blood, even as those eyes start to glaze over with lifelessness...that lust it not satisfied. It is all encompassing; a curse that Emýr tries time and time again to outrun. Metallic ichor ooze down his throat, coats his teeth, coats his fur, and suddenly, he feels like his father.

It destroys him, as much as it makes him feel reborn.

Ears pin flat against his skull at the shaky, breathless voice of Erys. Pupils dilate, fueled by a temper forged in flame. 
I did not need your help. I did not ask for it. 

"Help?" His voice is rough and it is violent. It is cruel, and he cannot help it. The thunder in his ears grows louder, deafening, maddening. He turns to face the man with a bloodied snarl, a snap of teeth just inches away from a slender throat that would give so easily beneath his hand. "You think that this is help? That I wanted that man to die beneath my blade?" He is being unjust and unfair. And yet, he presses forward. Crowding Erys' space, feeling like his father incarnate.

He feels like sinking his teeth into that pretty brown fur, of feeling the flesh tear away from muscle. It would be so, so easy...

"You are nothing but a problem, a burden!" The roar of his voice sends birds scattering from their perches. Another press forward, so he may back Erys against tree bark and trunk. "A fucking con. Do not mistake my mercy for help. I do not want you," he lies. "I do not need you." Another lie.

"It would have been a favor to us all, if I let that man take what he wanted." And yet, he didn't. He couldn't.

You killed him because you liked the way it felt.

Wasn't that just the bitter, cruel truth he's been running from this entire time? Spoken by a man who disgusts him, as much as he enthralls him. Spit with venom that leeches beneath his skin to settle and rot. It serves to enrage him all the further as his metaphorical hands reel Erys closer, only to then slam him back against the tree trunk with enough force to knock wind from those weak lungs. Adonis was the one who craved the kill, who lavished in the glow that came after. And he isn't like his father. He isn't, he isn't, he—

In his peripheral lay the dead rogue. Mangled, bloodied. Those dead eyes leering at him. Something wicked curls in his gut.

Is he?

"You know nothing!" Emýr bellowed with rage and fire. "Fucking nothing! I should rip the tongue from your jaws!" His anger threatens to consume him whole, and red threatens to blot out his vision. He trembles in his attempt to fight it, but it's a battle he'd never won before. The possessive, cruel part of him writhes like a worm beneath his skin. A parasite, ready to assimilate the host. He doesn't want Erys, he doesn't need him to bend. So why does he wish for him to break beneath his palms?

The shoves are weak, useless. He couldn't escape, as the Crownore simply would not allow it. Not now, not when they've gotten tangled into this mess and not when something white-hot inside of him craves to either kill or claim. He isn't himself, or at least that's what he tells himself, as he lunged forward to sink the blade of his teeth into that frail neck. Jaws squeezing that throat with just enough pressure not to crush, but to constrict. The wheeze beneath his teeth and the frantic pulse beneath his tongue drive him wild. Feral.

Erys was not his. But he could not be anyone else's. Emýr would carve his mark upon his skin to serve as a grim reminder.