Redtail Rise sanguine

making this private so it can wait until after things resolve, but I can also always make it read only if need be! Just had inspiration and knew they’d need a thread eventually! ;v;

In the days that followed her return, and after time spent hunting in the bordering lands, Redd avoided @Mountain Boulder. She waited for her shame to fade into acceptance but instead it remained, heightened by the very fact that it prevented her from facing him.

She could not know that they had done it for her sake. She only saw their reluctance in greeting her. And she only saw, in her moment of reclamation, Ulfhedinn’s immediate rebuff. She could not have fought him. Even knowing this, Redd regretted. She had not known then how this rejection would feel. It was sharper, and cut far deeper, than any teeth she might have faced.

She did not know if she could submit to him again. To him or to Mulherin, both settled above her. She had not realized what Wealda was to her until it was gone.

Night had fallen and she hunted. She had no peace of mind for rest.

they did! ty for making them one <3

blood star kept from him, and mountain boulder did not follow.

he did not like that she had surrendered her title. he wished to be huntlead, to remain huntlead. perhaps to die in the role. it was what he had earned beneath red woman.

wealda was the place of an alpha female. he accepted that truth as absolute.

now as he saw blood star, he called softly to her, tail swinging some times behind his hips.

but he did not approach.

She sensed an approach and heard his call.  It was an entreatment, nothing commanding or unfriendly about it, but she still paused only where she was.

The anger was what surprised her the most.  Redd was a fractured thing.  Redd had lost a mate, most of her closest confidants, and now her place here.  When she had been Wealda these things did not matter.  They could not touch her through the armor responsibility provided.  Wealda was so much bigger than heartache.

She understood.  A wolf who left, a wolf who did not fight, did not deserve to stand.  She had lost their trust on her own actions.  The anger persisted despite any understanding.  For the first time she did not think only of the pack.  Ulfhedinn and Berserker had earned this, and regardless of who won, deserved their rank.

Redd growled, attempting to release some of this ire while warning him of its presence.  When she turned towards him and caught his gaze, however, her own could not help but drop.  There was a pleading in her eyes.

Who am I, if the rise does not need me?

she was angry. he understood this. he did not. they had waited for her to reach out and take back wealda. she had not demanded it to be her own. 

red woman had held the rank through will and teeth. thorn caller had vied for it on grounds of loyalty.

where did blood star want to fit?

his yellow eyes were soft, fatherly in this silence shared only between the two of them. all were needed. but all chose a place and carved it into the shape of their own heart. 

where were blood star's tools?

if we get to a point where ranks matter we can pause and see how the other thread shakes out <3

He simply watched in silence.  Redd knew what it was she wanted.  She also knew it was not what she could have.  She did not want to fight him.  She did not want to lie, to posture, to make a show of violence that she did not intend to follow through on.  I was Wealda before.  It should have been enough.  Yet it was not.

Again she stood in the place her sister had stood before her.  Masquerade’s words made more sense to her now and she saw, in her sister’s departure, the thing she had known she could not build here.  Respect without violence.  Redd did not fear violence in protecting their claim, but engaging in it now was meaningless.  She did not want to force them to submit to her.  She wanted them to choose it.

She could not find words and, even if she had, Redd did not know if they would be understood.  Frustration filled her and lifted the fur along her shoulders in a ridge.  They had chosen; she would not force compliance.  With a lash of her tail she turned and stalked away, her fur and teeth still set on edge.  She would hunt.  Until things were clearer she could at least provide.

sounds good <3

mountain boulder could see her irritation and comprehended it, though he had no words to say his understanding. once she had held the role. but she had not taken it when she had come back. red woman had grabbed up her mantle. there was no question, and it was this image which burnt itself into the remembered and formative memories of the rise.

mountain boulder had chosen her. he had proclaimed her; she had protected the rights of himself and new snow. she had stood for their children. even in abject weakness upon their borders, he would have followed again had she not hesitated to assume what was already her own to have.

hesitation led to months of squabble. night eye challenging the huntlead at once was their way, their very birthright. 

some melancholy existed in mountain boulder as he watched blood star go. she had not invited him to hunt, and so he trailed at a distance, watchful for game or for any sign she did not want him even that near.

He followed.

Irritation grew.  With it, strangely, melancholy.

There was only one path, then.  If she had lost their trust.  If she was not strong enough to claim her title from them.  If she was no longer prepared to accept a role where she submitted.  She was now the young usurper, the interloper unworthy of seizing something from a wolf more established and physically powerful than she.

She had to disperse.

Redd slowed as the realization struck her and left her feeling sick.  It was natural.  Young wolves did this all the time.  It was as much a part of the order of things as their claiming of her place, and again, it had happened before.  Masquerade had walked this path before her.

In months she might recover enough to fight them fairly.  She did not want to wait, nor did she want to displace them from a place they clearly deserved.

Finally peace settled across her, and when she met Ulfhedinn’s gaze, it was with sorrowful acceptance.  She would call Ruckus, but no others would follow.  She did not foresee herself dividing the pack when it was only she who was divided.

The decision was made.  She did not try to drive him off again.  But she now made for the borders, knowing Ruckus would join her there.

<3

once tasted, wealda transformed one into itself. wounded. sick. recovering. the rise was redtail blood, and redtails moved upon it.

and redtails left it, and redtails returned.

redtails set the mettle of their pack. teeth defended rank. she herself had dominated thorn caller before them all.

but pride was also their birthright. thorn caller had not been able to hold pride. he wondered if that was what he read in the lines of their sister now.

he drew further back the longer blood star walked. their eyes met, and he saw in them a sorrow remembered.

the great man slowed, his form halting at last. he did not assume what she meant to do, but he saw her stride and recalled her frustration.

the hours would spell her decision. again and again his patrol, until he knew it to be true.

this time, he felt rather bereft. mountain boulder thought of the bleeding woodland to which he had not dispersed himself and his family. choose, blood star had instructed. and he had chosen the rise. 

the rise, perhaps, the land itself. the memory of what had been rather than what could be.

but flux taxed his tongue as if it were grit. 

mountain boulder at last sat to wait for a long, long while.