Dragoncrest Cliffs This island our prison, our home.

Over and over, Suzu was reassured she was now too large for any type of bird to grab. It had taken a lot of convincing, but even when a small hawk was seen, she noticed now that they were smaller than she’d imagined. 

The golden eagle had not returned; it would loom forever in her dreams like a phoenix. 

She scouted along the beach in low tide, sniffing through the new piles of driftwood. She’d begun selecting pieces of driftwood and had begun piling them in a large semi-circle, with the opening pointing away from the beach. With each stick she added, the walls grew higher. She thought someday, she might be able to put light sticks across the top, and drape seaweed across it to block out the light. Then, they might have an emergency shelter on the beach. 

She was reaching for another piece of driftwood when she heard an ear-piercing scream. A flurry of white feathers suddenly battered at her face, and she stumbled backwards to realize that a seagull had somehow managed to get its foot trapped between two pieces of driftwood.

Her heart raced. The gull snapped its beak in her direction and flapped its wings, eyeing her fiercely. Gulls only ate fish, she told herself. But its beak did look horribly pointy…

”I sorry,” She told the pitiful creature. Its foot looked firmly wedged between the two pieces of wood too heavy for her to move on her own. And even if she did move one of them- how much blood would there be? 

Not knowing what else to do, she began to dig away at the sand beneath one of the driftwood logs. Maybe, if she dug the sand out from under it, it might shift- and release the full.

requiem had not come home.
she had thought him lost but it still brought great pain to see that he truly was gone. erzulie felt set adrift, as much as she had felt after scarab and regin and val, scattered; sundered.
she took up the trail of her granddaughter, feeling a hitch in her hip as the cold air of the sea set into her traveling pelt. 
erzulie heard the shouting of a gull; she drew closer, spotting suzu ahead. the sight of the great bird, despite the fact it was not a taloned fowl, enraged the ruby.
she hurried along, prepared to end with teeth; good that she drew up, noting that the animal was trapped and the child meant to free her. 
erzulie was silent as she started to help, keeping an eye on them both.

The gull was silent as she dug. Every now and again she peered up at it, to see it eyeing her with great scrutiny. She found its face incredibly difficult to read, though when the bird caught sight of Erzulie approaching, those great white wings began to beat again, slapping against the wave-worn wood. 

Suzu flinched at the sudden flurry of movement from the bird, but her confidence returned when her Grandmaman began to help her dig. Erzulie’s paws could cut through the heavy sand much better than Suzu’s, so the progress hastened. 

She moved along the edge of the log, hoping to give it a small ditch to fall into and away from the other piece of driftwood, freeing the gull’s leg. Her heart raced; she felt impatient. She thought she could feel how scared the full was. She looked up at Erzulie and shook a bit of sand off her little muzzle before she asked. ”Fee bird?” she placed her paws on the piece of driftwood and tried to pull it toward herself, but it wouldn’t budge.

erzulie would rather have killed it. feathered; only its feathers deemed it the same. she wondered if it would feel good to grab it, snap its thin neck. instead she silently reached forward, her sea-hardened paw more able to drag the wood away from the bird's trapped foot.
she was still tense as the animal was freed; the ruby hovered close, ready to grab suzu up and take her away if the creature should threaten her with its heavy beak.
but her heart was relenting.
suzu cared for the beings of her world. it was a good thing.

When her mother's paw was placed on the wood, Suzu pressed down with both of hers, making an audible groan of effort as she did so. To her relief, the wood moved- and the seagull's foot was freed. She scampered behind her grandmother, who moved to shield her, and only peeked out when she heard its wingbeats grow softer. 

She emerged from Erzulie's side, hopping on top of the driftwood log, to look over at the gull, which had landed some 40 feet away, and had begun to preen its ruffled feathers. Still, it looked indignant, angry- but she supposed that for some birds, that was the only facial expression they had. Her tail waved, and she glanced at her mother with a small smile, before she made her best imitation of a gull's call- three shrill shrieks, hoping the bird might finally show some form of gratitude. 

The gull looked in the direction of the wolves, crouched, and began to beat its way into the air, winging away from them. 

Suzu giggled, and slid down off the driftwood log, pressing against Erzulie's leg like an affectionate kitten. "Bird need ta leawn manners." She commented.

suzu was sweet. erzulie was reminded anew of the delight she had to be a grandmother, to be given so many years unto this very moment, where she could free a seagull with her little relative.
suzu was given a surprised look, one that slid into plain affection and approval. the ruby laughed aloud, a generous sound. "indeed he do!" she told the girl, before lowering her muzzle to kiss the child just between her ears.
she too looked now toward the bird, gone into a speck amid the sky. "what would you have done had he pecked you, hmm?" erzulie asked of her sweet granddaughter, eyes shining with mirth and love.

Suzu flattened her ears and giggled, and reached to press her temple into her mother's chin but ended up bonking the underside of Erzulie's jaw with the top of her head instead. It didn't hurt the child at all- it's likely a fair fact that puppies (and children) have heads made of cast iron for the sole purpose of accidentally headbutting their parents in the jaw...but it did make quite a wonderful clack. "Sowwy," She said immediately, tilting her head back to lick at her mother's chin as though to soothe it. 

She looked up to the birds, unable to pick out the one they'd helped from the rest that circled against the sky. She wrinkled her nose and giggled at the suggestion. "I wouldaaaaa," She said, humming as she plotted. "I woulda tell 'im say wegwèt 'fow I leddim go." She said. An apology might suffice. "Granman," She inquired, "Do all birds eat feesh?" She asked.

the contact sent a jarring vibration through erzulie, but she only laughed somewhat and blew air across suzu's little muzzle. "some birds be eatin' fish. ot'ers eat bugs. ot'ers eat meat." she did not like to think of them now, of seabirds with foul sharp beaks and a haunting eye.
she loved to be called granman; it settled erzulie in a way that little else did. "we eat birds, you know, ti fi dous mwen an." she smiled. "but i t'ink i would rat'er eat fish"
therein lay a great irony.
erzulie looked outward to the sea with a content sigh.

Meat. The idea of it was upsetting. The image of the bird drifting up into the mist with Requiem in its claws still haunted her mind, though she wasn't sure if she'd actually seen it happen, or if she was simply putting an image in her mind herself. It was an exaggeration of reality, what she imagined; the eagle with wings as broad as the moon, its beak and claws long and hooked. And in them, her brother- tiny. 

The gulls seemed forgivable. But the eagle would forever be the villain in her eyes. 

"Fish be better anyway." She said. After all, there was less gore and mess with fish than there seemed to be with everything else. An idea struck her, and she snuggled next to her Grandmaman kittenishly; a child about to ask for a treat. "Grandmamaaaaa," She lilted, looking up with shining eyes. She fidgeted as she spoke. "You t'ink we can...You t'ink dere mebbe be...We free de bird, which is doing a good t'ing, so....Mebbe, when you do- when I do good t'ings, dere mebbe be...Mebbe I can 'ave a treat? You can fin'...Can you mebbe- be dere...Sea urchin?" Sea urchin eggs were a delicacy; something that she lacked the confidence and skill to scavenge for on her own- they were so prickly, and she didn't want to draw her own blood. But they were her absolute favourite, despite how tricky they were to open.

erzulie had not been there for it, but she wondered if they had all suffered in their own way. it was a great failure, one she had internalized. it lay beneath her breast with regin's disappearance.
her ears twitched, bringing the woman back into the present, and bit by bit her smile of amusement unfurled across her face. suzu was the picture of inquisitiveness and erzulie did have a soft spot for the child they had watched round the proverbial clock, for fear she would not survive.
"i t'ink yes," she said after a moment. "i like urchin eggs. i like to get dem for your granman rosalyn." a thought touched her. "i have dem, as a treatie for you today. but maybe ano'ter, i teach you how dey be harvested, oui?" she brushed a breath across suzu's ears, seeking to tickle.

Treats, she knew, were something that would be given when they were deserved, and weren't to be asked for...But sometimes, the girl couldn't help herself, especially when in the presence of her grandparents. Her mother was not strict, but her grandmothers...They were certainly willing to treat her, and her siblings, and shower them with seemingly whatever it was they ask for, so long as they asked politely. Suzu giggled with glee and did a happy little shimmy when Erzulie agreed. 

"Rosalyn," The child murmured the name softly. It amused her, still, that her grandmothers had names too, aside from simply being Grandmaman and Grandman, or even Maman, as they were to her mother, aunts and uncles. She loved their names. "Yesss! Oh t'ank, oh t'ank you, Grandmaman!" She said, giggling and batting a foot at her Grandmother's face when her breath tickled the fluff in her ears. She would delightedly follow her grandmother to where the sea urchins had been stashed, and enjoy a little taste of it for having learned so much about sea birds.