Northstar Vale itiktuk ❊

it had been torment, the past several days. no amount of work had driven agana from the heart of kukutux, nor the pain lodged there deeply by remembering her face.

the duck climbed the ridges along the easterly side of courtfall in a desperate bid for the attention of their elf-ranger regent.

and when she found the angelic being, kukutux threw herself panting and tear-stained upon the snowy earth. "i can no longer bear to be alone!" she sobbed to @Andraste, all wilted feathers and rivulets of saltwater, blurred jadestone gaze seeking, desperate.

"be aakauraga to me," kukutux rushed on, too weary to search for the proper term. "help me to find a husband. i am so lonely. i must have children." something, someone, to fill her aching bosom which beat only for agana.

"give me to anyone, but give me now," was her last whimpering hiss before she hung low her delicate head and cried out her tears for the lost touch of new love.

Sculpted;
only the lines of her gaunt skeleton held fast, this day. The torments of her body had relaxed themselves into hard mold of her lover's hold; refiguring and reforming from cold wax into a porcelain melt down the meridian of her figure. So when the faithful fowl draped herself all dreary desperation, the fée fair lapsed for a heartbeat at such a display before her. She knew not of her argent cousin's plight, nor that of Kukutux  ('til now, of course), too entwined within all that had been her own trappings. Significantly removed from the tidings which the duck so lamented, as it were; a happening that she could not have ever fathomed unto herself. But! it did not mean she did not feel compassion, concern  —

“Our Court will be aflourish with whelps, of course,”  the fairylight wisped slow, searching; her mind slumping from the sweet morning hours to squint blearily over this afternoon’s pleas of I am lonelys and husband and that clicking language. Her comprehension was rheumy, at best, for now. Still ...  “Unless, you have become promised to another, ‘ere?”

blinkng to sweep her tearwet cheeks; kukutux gazed upon into the elven face and shook her head dismally. "you must do it. you set my bride-price. you tell him what he must pay you as my family, and then i am his."

the duck was angering now, her wrath kindled at the prospect of explaining yet again what she wished. these people were so very backward, chaotic — she bit the inside of her jawline until blood sprang to silent tongue.

only then did she speak again, spurred by pain and the prospect of andraste continuing in what kukutux assumed to be ignorance: "my ways are not practiced here. i must have children to keep ... to teach what i know."

to keep mother alive, father sister grandfather,

hunter of seals 

bitter twist to her mouth; the girl called upon quiet and lay her gaze toward the earth once more.

Whilst the duck bit into her own blood, the fée was still working this very moment and all its utterances throughout mind of half-thought. She did not yet scent the ire that curled from Quidalmë’s breath, nor felt the curdling in her spirit; her ruined brow had come to be writ with the study of all this, and ... in the end, she supposes that admonishing such wishes to see one’s traditions play out in the Vale was not something that could be done. It was, she thinks, very much like the culture of the burnished Vísivai and his pearldraped Fëafelmë  –  it would be done by they, whether she wish it or no.

“May it be so,”  mondmädchen wisps, low and level.  “If I grant unto you this ... selling you so speak of, then I only ask, Kukutux, that you would pass ze teachings of your people to our own. I have seen your drying ze herbs, your curing ze meats, your ... drying ze pelts.”  A mild pause. Then:  “That you seem to leave no part of plant nor quarry without use, I would wish this also.”

Would not dare pry, only grant;
and hope her offering would be enough to ease what suffering that she could not discern.

oh she was so weary, so very very embattled and besieged and tired. to give up the ghost right at this moment seemed a relief to the duck.

a trade. her knowledge for a match. jadestone eyes grew pensive; she nodded. the things andraste asked she could give. not all knowledge was something kukutux had practiced in the teekons. 

and it would be good to teach her ways to courtfall, even if her new sister married her to a man from another clan.

"i will teach you," she murmured. "it is an honor to give back."

“It will be good to learn, for a change. To provide for my own people,”  a soft tundrian's hum.  “To grow.”

The more vaulted the boughs, the further the roots would reach;
and his words of whiskey returned now; not for the first, second, or third time did the knived ears wreathe with an insistent, infuriating flush that too soon began to bud beneath shorn cheeks. Each smile and every ache would be theirs, yes; but now was not at all appropriate for the quail to see the blossoming—
she had fair fallen to the shores of the gray havens amidst life and death at Bees' praise; fairylight could not now again let herself be either rended mute into rapture or  (perchance, worse!)  glimmer before tearful Quidalmë of her own unfathomable fortunes; and so near had she been of lapsing into either.

She supposes that now she has an answer for the inkling, though. Still, for the tribeswoman's sake:

“What, exactly, would a bride-price entail? A ... lease of neutral terrain? An accord? Ah,”  inexperience. A pause. Then, a pale shake of her marred brow; she could not dare send the mantled argent off in some exchange of buck fat.  “I will honor this custom, if you so wish it. But, you are worth far more than ... ah, than a brace of beavers.”

And held much more value than whomever the highest bidder would be ... but the spindly fée remained silent, for now, as a precious plot of her own began to take to seed within her half-addled head.

kukutux had no scheming of her own; she could only trust that andraste would make for her a good match. in many ways, the duck was relieved.

but there were few men here, the most virile of all consort to the queen. knowing her greatest chances lay outside courtfall frightened kukutux, the potential of being uprooted yet again.

she bore all this stoically however, looking to andraste when the snowsylph's voice sounded again. "whatever you believe i am worth," came her soft rejoinder. "my father asked for three seal pelts, two quail, and a fine ermine skin. the hunter of seals brought it all, and the orange flowers which grow in summer. for my mother," kukutux whispered, jadestone eyes gone to mist beneath the haze of memories rising swift and sharp within her breast.

"but i am not ... i was already a wife. i do not think so great a price is necessary." a blink; she let her gaze fall to earth again, icarus beneath the gentle weight of elven moonglow.

Undómiel attended the duck's recounting with listing eyes and hearkening ears; and all that she wished to comment upon instead took up mere settlement within her mind. It seems as though such bride-prices were not of moral value  (as she had so sought to promise her feathered friend)  but rather, of stock, of trade, of inventory. Business, then; inexperience inexperience inexperience; soulchased.

Ultimately:
"I would not wish to send you into an insecure realm, and so I must ... seek counsel before levying out such a descision."  Easthollow, Rusalka, she knew not; Kaistleoki, had the summerquake been their ruin? Uaine, she thinks not; Diaspora  –  bah! Irritance; for already a singular pack had leapt to the forefront of her mind; and already too had she chosen near-instinctive whose counsel to rely on;
he who knew too the truth of her last name, of this, and all that she had inadvertently left upon the avaricious clawfoot of southerly spire, ne'er to claim as her own again. Could not.

Perhaps, then, Kukutux might not be sold at all;
but be some gift of owed penance.

Wearied; suddenly weighted;
fluted ears flicker at the notion of once-wifehood, and for all that their cultures and customs may have lain upon very different foundations, Andraste cannot help but ask out of favor for something perchance more lighter—

"What is it like, to have a husband?"
To belong truly to someone?

Foolish, starlit girl.

she must forget agana. she must forget kalika. cupid, andraste, melkor — each of them she had met. each of them that might have been forever held in her closest heart. grief threatened to hang its salt pearls upon downcast lashes, but her royal's question bid them back for now.

"it was good to have someone to tend," the duck began, muting her emotions beneath the careful choice of accented words. "he was kind to me. it was easy to think of the future with nu — with the seal hunter," kukutux stumbled, dread creeping across her features in a momentary blur.

she had almost said his name.

press on.

"some men are cruel, and rough in the sleeping place. he was not. i never dreaded when he summoned me," kukutux recounted in a shy purl. "it was ... it made me happy to prepare the meals that he enjoyed. it made me happy to speak of the children i would have given him."  an ache, wistful, razored. she stopped. "i hope that you enjoy such things with your chosen," the chagrined little wolfess mumbled, seeking to end the conversation or at long least turn it aside.