Nova Peak Oh, I've got reservations about so many things.

@Astraeus

Somewhere along the line, Stag had learned Astraeus had returned to range. It was not his nature to pry on the boy's details for his absence, but after allowing sufficient time for the bahy youth to settle, Stag set out to find him.

He came upon Astraeus' fresh-laid scent in the damp loam and trailed after it. A sprinkling of rain misted the slopes, turning the distant ridges a grizzled grey with their serrated shaps blurred to soft silvery edges. Stag kept to the cover of trees for the most part, shaking out his ruff as drizzles of raindew accumulated in his fur.

Maybe asking his father to search for him was implausible to some degree, but what would he do for Phaedra? Phaedra; snowdrop and heather, breath of argent sylph, a wondress without an eye scar. Phaedra; who while he envied, no longer had the room in the hew'd canyons of hsi heathland of a heart, to hate. Why were they estranged again? He hardly remembers.

And so under the sudden drifts of the rain, the dirk searches for his milk-kin, hoping that she had changed in her heart as well. Instead, he found...Bagh was it? Pelage dewy and slick like the ice he was whittled from. Feather-light step; a chirrup of his breast, he'd found the broken-blighted boy he was scouring for. 

The last time Stag had seen Astraeus, he'd been a fresh-faced cub. Round cheeks, bright eyes.

The juvenile before him had lost that cherubic charm -- replaced with a hardness that was not quite solely from the presence of that jagged scar.

Stag inhaled, studying the boy for but a moment. How to speak to him, when he'd scarcely ever interacted with him at all? Most of his time had been spent with Phaedra or Wylla -- and now he was forced to reflect on how that might have made others feel. Others, like Astraeus.

"What happened?" Stag asked, feeling they might be best starting on rather open terms.

“Oh. Well,” he was startled at the inquiry, as no one had probed him for anything of his say. Not that he was ever concerned. “I was kidnapped. Not much other than I was forced to steal or be their next meal, but they must've gotten tired because — because I had no idea there was a fourth.” Astraeus cants his head to focus Stag's attention on his eye. he says nothing of the bloodstains plotted on the rocky sand of the lake, are the waterlogged corpse that wades in the water now — “Kinda made this useless now, everything is blurry. But that's alright! We're family right? So surely someone would notice at some point. No. No, they didn't. To them, I practically never left. I know that unless your part of the inner circle, you're disposable. I know not to trust everyone which can ensure a bit of my survival, which definitely makes up for not being able to see out of one eye.”

Pause, but wait, he has to be more dramatic, of course. Or else this writer wouldn't be doing their job, yessir. “You should tell someone to patrol a bit more, never know when someone can waltz on the rise and take someone. So. Can I go? I thought you were inviting me to eat something.”

sorry for my small doo doo post; slips a meme in every post casually

NOT doo doo <3

Stag was not a boy -- or even a man -- who wore his emotions visibly -- yet the longer Astraeus spoke, the more distraught he visibly became.

First, to hear of this poor boy's miserable flight outside of Sagtannet --

And second, for the grievious way Astraeus thumbed blame so handily on the shoulders of Sagtannet.

Stag's expression melded from grief to subtle outrage: his lip curled unpleasantly. He felt the urge to let that tongue fly, to lash this boy with words until he was cowed -- any measure of quiet then would be no victory. Stag sheathed the blade quickly, exhaling long and suddenly into the cold air.

"You are right." Stag conceded, his shoulders falling away from a lean frame. "Would you like to patrol with me then? We can stop at the cache along the way, if you are hungry."

Somehow, Stag's request didn't feel like one he could decline, or else his hypocrisy would be aired out.
Astraeus' best version of agreement was a clenched jaw and a mocking nod. He wouldn't meet Stag halfway anyways, so he'd follow the thistledown'd manboy to the caches first.

Not one for starting conversations, he allows the silence to sail before curiosity eventually egged him on, “When did you even come here?” his tone influence by the impression Stag was some newcomer who'd stuck around long enough to remain by Wylla's good side long enough to stay here.

Stag was relieved to see the boy at least grudgingly concede to tagging along. Stag didn't have the natural-born command of Mahler or Wylla, and if Astraeus refused he'd probably just let him. Enableist, or pacifist -- maybe Stag was somewhere in the middle.

Surprised by the boy's question, Stag turned and looked at Astraeus quietly before answering. "I was born here, like you." Stag knew Astraeus wouldn't take the here literally - since neither of them had been born on these godforsaken rocks. "It was called Diaspora then, and it was lead by my father." Stag would have done away with mentioning Stigmata was dead, were it not for the suspicion he had that Astraeus may ask after who this father was. "Stigmata. He was killed when I was young -- younger than you. Shortly after, all of my siblings disappeared -- and a few months later, my mother went to found a pack with her brother. I stayed behind."

Diaspora, the boy thinks it is not of german writ so it had probably not possess the german vernacular that Sagtannet ("sawtooth" in norwegian) or maybe Mahler had not taught him this yet. He continues to haphazardly tune in and out of Stag's memoir while planting his nose down for the littered caches around the territory.
— and he does not like to think about the likenesses between him and Stag as he goes one because that would invalidate all the self pity and reasoning that he deserved more than anyone else, or even prove if they were going by statistics Stag suffered more than he.

He finds fetid traces of fat and blood under a fir. Stopping to dig up its contents he murmur loud enough for his senior to hear, “How did you meet Mahler?” because he could care less about what came before.

The blatant hypocrisy fails to become apparent.

Stag, if nothing else, could be patient. He followed the boy as he set out among the firs, tracing some subtle scent until he came upon an old carcass. While Astraeus ate, Stag considered his past -- never once feeling bitter.

"Mahler was my father's kill-brother." Stag surmised in many ways, Mahler was his surrogate father. "I have never not known him. Even in my earliest memories he was there." Stag felt this conversation was becoming lopsided. All about him. Was this Astraeus' design and purpose? To deflect the attention elsewhere?

Common courtesy dictated he at least try to make the boy feel included. "You don't have to talk if you don't want to, you know." Stag started, feeling they might be kindred in more ways than simple loss. "We could just hunt and be. You know, just.. be." Two hunters joined in the cause, without thinking, or heavy thoughts to weigh their soul down.