Ankyra Sound The Insomniac

Predating this thread to the night before leaving to raid Duskfire. AW... perhaps @Caiaphas!

The poor bastard couldn't sleep. He tossed and turned all night on the damp ground in his quarters. The walls were closing in... at least it felt like they were. The small den was usually comfortable, but in times like these, simple comforts could not be found. Terrible thoughts rattled around inside the raggedy wolf's shaken mind. Tomorrow could be his last day. Funny how short lived life could be. What a cruel joke.

War. A three letter word with the power to topple empires. A three letter word that sent shivers down the skeletal wolf's spine. How honored he had been to learn his Queen wanted him on the battlefield. Maybe, he had proven his worth, but the poor wolf didn't know how in this short of time. But war is a numbers game, and the bastard knew he could be an effective pawn. Fear... no, terror gripped at Reek's chest as he laid on the damp floor, eyes wide and heart pounding. He needed to breath. He needed to leave. If only for a little while.

He rose quietly, careful not to wake the other males. They mustn't know. The mangy wolf was determined not to show the weakness of fear, no matter how much he felt. He slipped out into the night and made his way down toward the beach. The sound was such a beautiful place. It was worth it, all of it, just to marvel at the sea's soft elegance. The moon hung high in the sky over the sea, it's reflection rippling in the water, moving up and down, up and down, and up and down again. It looked so... organic. Like a sleeping behemoth breathing slowly. In and out, in and out, and in and out again.

The bastard collapsed into the waves, letting each and every one crash over top of him. The ragged was wolf was submerged in bouts of threes. One after the other, after the other, and then a gap. Then the process repeats. Like some sort of strange baptism. So cold. Reek tried to silence his racing mind by only focusing on the water, but silence did not come. Fear kept it's grip tight... absolutely refusing to let go.

i'm dumb and didn't read your thread before responding to your pm!

like reek, caiaphas stood awake alone on the shore, her only comfort the nipping wind that riffled past her muzzle. she had spent many nights on the shorefront, drawing to reclusive silence as the sound of the sea's roars consumed her -- the ocean's raw power overwhelming.

as she looked down the strand she saw a wolf moving along the swash line -- she would have left reek well alone if she was not concerned he was leaving before their march in the morning. slinking a great distance behind him the wraith watched skeptically, though her worries of his abandonment resides as he saw the ocean embrace him.

she drew towards him, watching sulkily as the water consumed him. while fear fluttered in her heart, words did not -- and in silence she watched him as each wave passed by his lanky form to her feet.

The water crashed over the bastard violently, wave after wave. Reek sat in the shore break for what felt like hours, but time moves painfully slow when gripped by terror. The drowned rat rose to his feet and a familiar scent filled his nostrils. He turned, and there she was... always watching. Darkly silent.

"Can't sleep either?" Mumbled the tired wolf. He tried to twist his muzzle into a smile to welcome his queen but the smile never came. It would have been forced anyway. But this wasn't the time for smiles... or jokes. "Caiaphas?" He murmured in a tired haze, calling his queen by name for the first time. "May I be perfectly honest with you?" The wretch paused for a moment as he walked out of the water and toward the Siren Queen. "I'm absolutely terrified of what's to come."

she watched him for some time before he noticed her. during that length caipahas thought back on atlas, who had been sucked out sea like the brutal pop of a tree during a hurricane. she had thought often since witnessing his figure helpless in the water that if there was any order to the world it was only the order of death.

as reek pulled towards her, a sopping skeleton (his wet fur held down all the more articulated his threadbare frame) she pulled her ears forwards in interest. she always expected honesty with her subordinates, yet his utterance surprised her.

"you'd be stupid not to be." she growled in reply, casting her feral gaze across the tumultuous water. "as it is, we cannot allow enemies to live so close to us and steal our members with impunity." she sighed -- the prospect of death did not entirely scare her, and she was selfish in that she would have subjected a million lives to get what she wanted. "the goddesses will deliver justice, to whomever that may be."

She was always so ready. A quiet composure under her unhinged exterior. A fire burned in her eyes that looked as if it would never be extinguished. Respect had to be earned from ragged wolf, true respect, but she had a way about her. Her command of the situation was impeccable... and respect was freely given.

We cannot allow enemies to live so close to us. She had a point. Letting them live wouldn't be pragmatic. The gaunt wolf cared little for the lives of the Duskfire wolves, but only for his own. Walking into a battlefield is... well, counterintuitive to survival.

"You're right," he tiredly stammered as he drooped into the sand. "They have to be taken out." His eyelids hung heavy and he yawned wide. "I'm only telling you this because I consider you, not only my leader, but my friend," he softly muttered in a droll monotone. "I'm not exactly the honest type." Why the bastard was showing his weakness, he had no idea. Maybe, it was because he was tired. But, the burden was too much to bare alone.

the siren queen had not expected the gangly wolf's sudden admission -- she turned to him with surprise writ across her sharp muzzle. she thought for a moment, parsing his last phrase. 'i am not exactly the honest type'.

the coywolf smiled a peculiar smile -- neither was she.

"the sound is a family." she spoke again, a heavy gaze cast towards the ocean as reek yawned besides her. he looked exhausted, his energy sapped by insidious anxiety. "come what may tomorrow, we will still be that." she wasn't exactly the type to be consumed by sentiment, and in this moment it showed -- though she found herself smiling inwardly at the dark male's openness.

Family. The word bounced around the bastard's skull like a pingpong ball thrown into a brick wall. He had never had much of a family, given his status. Though the culture of the Sound was a tough adjustment for the skeletal wolf, he had been met with unmatched kindness by the sirens who had taken him in. Even though he was only an unimportant drudge, the overly sentimental wolf was touched by the thought.

"F-family?" Stammered the bastard with tired glee as he picked himself up from the sand. The gaunt wolf looked as if he could take flight due to the rapid helicoptering of his tail behind him, and his mouth twisted into a giddy, crooked grin. "I'm honored to be a part of yours my Queen," he confessed with vigor, tired eyes widening. "I've never been part of a family before."

"My heart lies here with the Sound," he added, pressing his paw into the sand before him. "And, I'll fight tooth and claw for it... for my family." The bastard's pride was short lived as his head quickly sunk and his tail stood motionless. His movement's were awkward, he had no weight behind him... he was useless in a fight. His body had betrayed him. Where the mind and spirit were willing, the flesh was frail and weak. "Though, I don't know how much usefulness I'll have in battle," he mumbled somberly as he motioned to his body with his front paw.

it was easy for caiaphas to look past gender, having neither the upbringing nor the stiff culture the nereides often bore. it was a shameful lapse of consistency, but a flaw none-the-less -- the siren queen was well-known for her deviance from the themiscyra sect. as reek stood beside her, overwhelmed by the notion of community, caiaphas looked onto the sea -- she much preferred the stoic fierceness the ocean harbored than the soft and effluent touch of sensible emotion.

she listened as the gaunt male prattled besides her, an angular ear pressed in his direction. she was not one to be garrulous, nor one to expose vulnerability by confessing her feelings -- "good." the siren queen uttered in monosyllabic finality, her shortness expressing she did not expect the male to launch into some verbal conquest about his emotions. "rest then, and tomorrow we march."

Squeezing emotion out of his enigmatic queen was akin to pressing a lump of coal to extract honey... utterly impossible. The Siren Queen had walled herself into an imperturbable prison of indifference. The bastard knew these walls well, but his were crumbling faster than a castle made of sand, swallowed by the sea... consumed by it's raw power. The sea of stress was a rough one, and the ragged wolf's figurative castle was nothing more than a mound of unshapely dirt at this point, leaving him raw and open. In this moment Reek held his heart for all to see, to touch, to break. A brief and fleeting moment of weakness.

Good. Curt, quick, and final. "It is," he replied in a whisper with his ears and head down as an act of respect. Even though the conversation was brief, confiding in someone else eased the bastard's rocking mind, and at least he could be himself around the coywolf... unlike some other residents of the sound. Maybe, just maybe, he could get some much needed sleep. Though fear still tugged at Reek's heart, the waves of sheer panic had subsided, thus leaving only the manageably dull drone of dread.

"Caiaphas, before you go," the bastard chirped while placing a paw gingerly on his queen's shoulder. "Μπορείτε φίλος. Θα ακολουθήσουν." The language of the sea flopped out of the bastard's mouth like a live trout. Grammar and pronunciation flew out the window as Reek tried his best to speak in the tongue of the coast. In his time with the sirens he had picked up on some basic vocabulary, though the grammatical structure was still a mystery to him... which would be painfully obvious to anyone who heard.