Two Rivers Isle i'm tired of screwing up, tired of going down

set directly after this post.

Nothing was fucking fair, ever.  As soon as she had started to feel comfortable in the Plateau, she had gone and fucked everything up, and this time she didn't even know what she had done wrong.  She had stopped crying, her confusion replaced with fury.  Just who did Niamh think she was, playing gatekeeper?  Screech was her friend too.  

She trailed the edge of the forest next to the southernmost river of the isle with her nerves on edge, alerting at every rabbit and leaf that made noise.

Hope you don't mind him! Keeping this ~ super vague ~

And Tuathal just happened to be one of those rabbits, or one of those leaves - or probably neither, but he was a noise. His rendezvous with the Redhawks was as it was, and he found himself left to settle in the aftermath (whatever that was). Presently, he hunted, but hunting came hard when the bright glow of flames passed through the trees just stretches from where you roamed.

If he'd been more of a delinquent he'd have planned an ambush of some sibling-like nature, but as things were, he was Tuathal. The thought didn't even cross him, and instead, he tried to get to his sister as quick and as harmless as he could. Which was hard when the foliage made such a tangle, and he grunted and snapped through the twisting branches before getting fed up and simply calling, "Hey! Wait up!" to get her attention, not yet cluing into the prickling atmosphere that cracked around her.

THIS IS PERFECT...
srry for length

She gasped, heart caught in her throat.  Someone called out to her and his voice swam around in her mind as if it came from a million miles away.  Her hackles rose as her eyes widened, and her steely gaze fell on  ... Tuathal!  She wanted to melt and stiffen at the same time — what was he going to think of her for being such a baby?  Tears threatened to rise again although this time she didn't even understand why.  She swiped at her cheeks with one foreleg and cleared her throat in embarrassment.

Wh-hey, she mumbled, soothing her fur back into place.  What're you doing out here?

He shoved through the last leg of trees, a mutter to his breath and a clench to his teeth, until he shoved a bit too hard and found himself crashing through the tight swath of branches and stumbling to an unrefined sprawl on the ground before his sister, plant debris everywhere. Like the world couldn't give him a break. Decimated plant life clung to every inch of him, and he spat a few very unfortunate leaves from his mouth before swiping his tongue around to rid his teeth of the flavour of dirt. Ugh. At least this was someone he didn't have to impress

"Oh, just hunting," he replied, and raised his foot to pick at his ear, to get out whatever plant-gunk had gotten in there. Yuck. He didn't even want to think about that - so he didn't. His thoughts instead drifted over her question - or more, the tone of it - and the more he thought of it, the more unsettled her tone left him feeling, until his scratching slowed and he eased his leg entirely. "You sound different." He turned to face her, his eyes already shifted to peer through a furrowed squint. He had seen his sister at her worst, and try as she might to hide things from him, something was iffy today. "What's up?"

His luck pulled a tremulous smile from her, despite her mood.  Ceara moved to her brother's side and bent to nuzzle her nose behind the sturdy cup of Tuathal's ear.  I'm just stupid.  She pulled from her brother and lay next to him and began to groom his dirty legs.  

I'm just getting settled in the pack when this boy I had just started talking to just.. goes into a fucking coma.  And then his not-even-girlfriend who I was sort-of friends with too, she chases me out with her teeth when he wakes up.  He's not even coherent!  She bit back the tears again, her ears splayed as she pouted.  I just don't get why she gets to play gatekeeper when he's my friend, too.  She sniffed and cast her gaze to the ground.  

I was just starting to, I don't know, get settled.  I felt like.. I was doing something right.

Though his brow still fixed with a pensive furrow, Tuathal turned when Ceara reached to clean behind his ear - welcome to her help, and hoping to make the job easier for her. He watched the ground, but he considered his sister. Despite the tough exterior, Tuathal knew she had a heart not unlike his own. Easy to stab, when the guards were lowered. Easy to hurt. And o o o h boy, you N O T want to hurt her when he was around - and good thing she hadn't given this 'not-even-girlfriend' a name...

No. Tuathal closed his eyes and drew a deep breath, and exhaled, to settle into his practised pattern of internal cooling while she spoke. No, no. Ceara didn't need him flying off the handles right now. That would probably only make things worse. Not that he was ever going to be much of a help anyway. Tuathal had about a worm's breadth experience regarding friends and sort-of-friends and not-even-girlfriends - if even that. Actually, worms probably would've been more helpful, but he was here, and worms were not, and honestly, he didn't want worms helping his sister anyway. That was his job - so he would just need to listen, stay calm, and do his best.

So he paused. Considered. Turned his head to look as if he stirred deep in a vat of a vast many thoughts... when actually, his thought-helpers were simply screaming murder at the lack of pencils they could use to scrawl their sage advice across his mind. The canvas stayed blank, and so did his tongue. Okay, fine. Guess he'd be flying solo in this one - a g a i n - thanks brain.

"See, that's why I don't do friends," was basically his best. But - Ceara was his friend, and he caught himself and stuttered as he doubled back to try and correct himself before he made her think she was not, "Well, I mean you're my friend - my best - or, well, whatever - but - you're my sister, so you don't count." Oh geez, that didn't sound like it would help either. "Well, anyway - I mean, you do friends well. Like, really well. I don't really know what a coma is - " but if a just-friend and not a healer was allowed to visit the invalid on his sick-bed, the guy was past the point of contagion anyway, and didn't need a gatekeeper, right? - "but sick friends visit sick friends, right? Just because someone gets angry at you for doing something, doesn't mean that that something you did was wrong - " Right? His thought-helpers still couldn't find their pencils, so finally he just shrugged a conclusion to cover up the fact he just really hoped he was actually, you know. Helping.

He always knew how to make her feel better.  She watched tenderly as he tempered himself, quelled his temper and gave her some real, serious advice.  She got what he meant, she didn't count family either.  Tuathal was her other half and probably always would be; at least for now, that was how her young mind rationalized it.  She didn't yet understand how a real, solid relationship could change all of that but if she was lucky she would never have to.

He's like, unconscious.  She whacked him on the head and just, conk.  He's out.  She sighed, whiskers twitching.  But you're right.  I don't think I did anything wrong.. except, I kind of yelled at Raven a little bit.  She'd have to go apologize for that later.  If she would've known half the shit Screech had done maybe she wouldn't be so worried, but the thought of getting kicked out and booted straight to Omega came to mind.

I don't know.  I cried about it a little bit, she admitted, but mostly I'm just angry.  I think.. after I talk to Raven and make sure I'm not going to get kicked out on my ass, I'll confront her about it.