Moonstone Quarry kajurujuk ≉

@Merrit <3

kukutux avoided the glen.

whether or not she was aware, the deaths of those she had loved had twisted into a knot of haunting within her breast.

her season had not yet arrived. kukutux blinked through falling snow and inhaled, wandering among the moonstones as she thought of what else moonspear might lose.

Thanks for starting! <3

Merrit spent most of his days around the borders, securing, guarding, protecting, but he felt like he had very little purpose these days, apart from keeping Legion safe, to keep Kallik safe. His arcing hope to care for Easthollow pigeonholed now onto this one last child. And how long until he, too, died just like the rest?

He had decided to visit Hydra. Packs had since settled in the flatlands, and obscured his path to her, elongating his travels and pushing him North. Merrit found himself descending into a peculiar land, with sheer walls and pools he feared to encroach upon. They were still, unfragmented by waves or ripples. Perfect surfaces, to reflect to him a face he did not wish to look upon.

So his eyes stayed on the space before him, where snow fell like fairy dust, and thought, for a moment, he saw a shape through the white. He lent out a chuff, to test himself. To see if she was a mirage, a spectre, or if she were a mortal. Just like him.

of course! <3

no spectre, as would be evinced by the way kukutux looked up, jadestone eyes flying wide as she stepped back. the man that had appeared was young but massive, in variances of grey and with an intelligent look. a young hunter? or perhaps he was trader. "i greet you," the duck said softly, stepping forward.

in this place, she was emissary of moonspear and must be such. "i came to look at the stones," she said gently, though she could hardly keep her curious, wary stare from the great wolf. "have you travelled far?"

She seemed startled when she met him. He supposed he couldn't blame her. "I'm sorry for surprising you," he said, his voice soft, but not a whisper. His dipped his head to her greeting, as he had done countless times before - but there was a weight to the gesture these days that wanted to keep his crown bowed toward the ground.

The stones. His aunt had been fascinated by the earth. Perhaps it was a tradition of the North, to be so. But he did not comment on these; she did not seem interested in the rocks anymore. Her gaze probed him deeply, betraying the depths of understanding that seemed beyond her years. He shifted so that his forelegs rubbed against each other. "That depends," he said. Legion was not so far from here anymore - but they had travelled a long way to make that true, "are you from one of the packs around here?" he asked. He knew that wolves could not be trusted, but if she were from Moonspear, that would, at least, curb his inherent mistrust.

the akkunak was careful. "in moonspear, i am marriage-sister to hydra." she dipped her head to his apology but said nothing more on that, for he had mended it with his politeness.

if the wind changed she would be granted his scent; until then, the duck was only curious. and yet she knew he would not give his origin until he heard hers. some song from the direction of the sea; kukutux glanced that way, wondering if from this distance the salt breeze might carry.

Marriage-sister.

He had never heard the phrase, but it conveyed her meaning and put her in her proper place. Merrit felt his guard lower, and perhaps it showed in the softening of his brow.

"We are allies, then," he said, and took a small step forward. His words suggested a smile, though neutrality maintained his composure. "I am Merrit Stark, of Easthollow. I lived with Moonspear, once," had she been there too, at that time? He studied her as well as she studied him, but any recognition failed. "To Hydra, I am Theseus."

His nostrils flared when a breeze carried over her. Moonspear and brine. How close was he to the sea? The compulsive fret nestled in the back of his mind, but intruded no further.

stark. easthollow. these were not names known to the duck, but he was familiar with the mountain. this lessened her tension further; there was a warmer look that came to play in her gaze. "a traveller with two names. you must have many stories, merrit-theseus," kukutux murmured softly with a curve to her lips.

"i only have possession of one name. kukutux." she was compelled then to let lashes veil her greenstone eyes, to lower herself in the deferential manner of a woman to a man. he could be kin, for all that she knew, for merrit had not elaborated on how he knew hydra — or why the blackbear knew him by a second title.

He felt her smile would have been contagious if he had been any other. As it was her playful warmth ebbed out and froze just before it reached him, and what he offered was something pained and uncertain.

"Kukutux," he repeated. He had heard like syllables from Clary when she had spoken of the wolves she had met in the North. Never the name exactly, but the language was familiar. Perhaps they were kindred, in more ways that one. "I suppose I do have many stories, but I find they make for ballads more than a joyful refrain," and he thought to comment further, perhaps inviting her in to agree that this was the norm for every wolf - but instead he turned his head, and with a softness to his confusion asked, "Why do you submit to me?"

"in my land it is custom to respect hunters. men receive such for the fact that it is men who often die in the hunt." a somber subject to be sure. she looked up, a soft look crossing her countenance.

"what is ballad?" kukutux inquired, lifting her head once more. she wondered if this large warrior held the long tales inside himself, things that were not pleasant but must be handed down all the same.

He bowed his head at her words, a silent show of respect. "I understand," he said, though his upbringing had been far different from hers, "I... suppose I am not used to that way. Where I am from, men and women bowed to my mother, and she would have given her life for us, if such was required to keep us safe." It was why the Mother Stone was most valued of all.

"A ballad?" he repeated, caught of guard by her interest and inquiry. "Well, I - I've never much defined..." he shook his head with the slightest quaver, "they are songs that tell a story, about someone famous, or someone heroic, or some love that has been lost. They are ... mournful. Sad." He thought, perhaps, it might be socially fitting to offer to share one with her - but not even mother had known that side of him, that wrote lines with the stars and the midday wind as he patrolled the boundaries of their home.

"it is same with hydra," kukutux smiled gently. "she is blackbear. fierce in her own right. but i am happy to follow the ways of my first people." there was something inside merrit's voice that called to her; the duck wished to understand it.

"we would call you unikkautte," the duck shared. "one who tells stories. but not every story is a fun tale for children. many of them are sung at the back of the throat and tell of tragedies that shaped the world." she studied him. his great strength was not at odds with this talk of 'ballads;' he was a warrior who carried those memories inside himself.

A shadow of a smile ghosted the man's face. "Indeed," he said, with a fondness he did not conceal. Hydra was a force unto herself, and someone he feared and aspired to be like. Few men had ever managed to reach such a place in his life, and Merrit wondered how strange it must feel to Kukutox to operate beneath a woman of such valour as Hydra, yet remain consigned in mind and spirit to the perception of women as something else, something... well, not lesser, nor weaker, but different. And yet, he also thought she must be quite strong to keep such beliefs about her in a culture that so slapped against them, and Merrit found he admired that.

"Unikkautte."  He tried to repeat, and no doubt butchered. He had never grasped the Northern tongue as well as Nanook or Clary had. But then, mother had never spoken it much around him.

These words Kukutux shared, they resonated with him, and Merrit found that her gentle spirit blossomed a sense of willing vulnerability within himself. "I have found that a great many tragedies seem to have shaped the wolves of these Wilds," he said. She reminded him of his aunt in some ways, of his mother in others. By all of heaven, how he missed them both. "My mother passed, some weeks ago," his voice softened; he had not shared this with many others outside of Legion, and his own. "I have been working on a ballad for her." And this, he had shared with no one.

"you are not so bad," she laughed softly. despite how the clipped tones had not come easily to him, merrit had name a good attempt. maybe it spoke to the source of good things in him. 

he had lost his mother. kukutux softened at once into inviting warmth, expression shifting to one that spoke of her understanding. "my mother has also gone to the dancing lights. the first pain is hardest." her greenstone eyes searched him, then fell away with a gentle comprehension. 

"i would hear your ballad." her turn now to trip over the word, rounder and less pointed than her own; this one rolled roundly beneath the roof of her mouth and stayed frontward. a quick deprecating grin. "if you wish to let me hear." for kukutux sensed such things were close to the silver heart of this merrit, and she would not pull them away unless he wished to give.

I know this is old, but I'd love to either continue or finish this up! Because I loved this thread, even though I had lost all muse for Merrit!

Her laughter strengthed the smile he'd first shown her, and Merrit found he readily enjoyed her company. He hoped he would have further chances to try her mother tongue. And he wondered what other languages he might find sprawled throughout these Wilds.

Merrit received her words of understanding, and her own loss, with a gentle tip of his head. An apology, though he knew he had nothing to say sorry for, and so, he did not seek to apologize. "Indeed," he said in simple agreement. The dancing lights. Nanook had shared a similar sentiment, but Valette. "Mother never spoke of the afterlife. I... don't know where she is now."

And he frowned while saying so.

But Kukutux' stumble over his common word brought back his ghosted smile. "You are not so bad yourself," he teased with a chuckle, even if his heart wilted at her request.

"I wish to... but not tonight." The words he had were still too raw, too fresh. Too personal. He had not even told Kallik. He had not even told the stars. Merrit shook his head and an apologetic look stole through his eyes again, "there are yet words I have to find, but I must find them on my own. But I will return, and then, I will sing her ballad for you. And, perhaps you might even find some solace there... for your own mother."

He hoped this would not offend her. Kukutux seemed a woman he might like to call a friend.

omg i would love to continue it <33333333

kukutux gave a gentle nod. she took pleasure in his company, as much as a mated woman might allow of herself. and this was a great sum indeed. his mother, she wandered, and this furrowed the duck's smoothsnow brow despite their gaiety.

"i make the finding of small things that my mother would have loved to see. i put them high among the mountain stones. if she hears, if she sees, her spirit will be pleased." an altar, but the moonbow had no word for it.

"it is a man with much wisdom who waits to say the words of his inner spirit," the duck remarked, her gaze soft and warm upon merrit. he had gained much esteem in her eyes, and she hoped that she would hear this song that he held.

when he had found its sound.

aaah yay!! :D <3

Things mother would have loved to see. And were these? Greyback, her family thriving. The pups she bore each year. One by one, picked away. Where was Leta now, where were West and Newt? They'd left nothing tangible to be remembered by. Only memories, which faded. The stones were all that remained. Even they had come down to crush her.

"I don't know what I'd collect for her," Merrit admitted, "what... sort of things did your mother enjoy?" Perhaps he wasn't thinking concrete enough. Mother had been a hunter, after all. Maybe in hearing the offerings of another, he would know what kind of things he might bring forward to remember her.

Merrit found he grew shy before Kukutux' warmth, or perhaps... softer. "Wise?" He gave her a look from the corner of his eyes. "No. I've done many foolish things," too many to name, and he did not wish to burden her with a list of these. But Kukutux was the first friend he'd found in a while, and someone matured, knowing of the world. He loved Kallik, but there were things he did not share with him. Now, he found himself freely sharing, "in Easthollow we have a Stone Circle. Every wolf is represented by a stone. My mother is..." his mouth flinched, "buried... beneath the Matriarch. Her mate, beneath its husband stone, the Patriarch." It felt nice to speak these things, his culture, he realized, to such listening ears. He couldn't remember doing so before.

"My father left when I was a child. We remember him by the Stone of Lost Souls." He had only started the trail of stone which led away from the circle when the earthquake had struck. Maybe for the best. Merrit did not want any of his family coming back to see what had become of their home. "That is the stone I chose as my Patron," he confessed to her, with a turn of his eyes away from hers, "There are many lost souls... not many, I find, to hope for them."

they were speaking of mothers now, and kukutux felt the cords of her heart-place tangle in a painful briared clutch. it was the word of the woman who had passed on which filled her thoughts in that remembered voice. very often the duck considered it was the last living vestige of her anaa which remained.

merrit's ways did not seem so different from her own. she brought to imagination these plinths the man described, for mother's mate. and though she did not know the word of patriarch or matriarch, kukutux felt as though she gleaned their meaning from the reverence in her companion's voice. 

"we all do some things without making a thought first. it is our way. but you have set your path up a mountain, merrit." how did he hope to gather souls? the duck did not take him to be a spirit-talker, but —

it was only his youth. he wore power in all lines of him, a rockbear with eyes that saw many things.

"you have the wish to make a home for them?"

disjointed;

"my mother had the liking of the soft grass that grows beside the sea. in the sand. we had the saying that eagles spoke to her." kukutux drew a breath through her nostrils, steadying herself. "bring things to your holy place that speak to you with your mother's voice."

As a child, he had thought himself the rock that would steady his mother and his sisters, especially after father left. He had set his feet up a mountain then, and had not stopped their perilous climb, from Easthollow to Moonspear and back again. So he smiled a pained grin of this secret knowing that he was too far up now to find any easy way down.

"I do," he said, and then he thought, "but if not a home, then I wish to be a man who brings light and not darkness, who heals and not wounds. Sometimes those who are lost do not wish to be found - but I believe all who are lost need someone who will show them the world is not all wicked. That there is kindness, that there is hope." That was what Clary had been to him. "My brother -- uh - sorry, cousin, Kallik, journeys with me also. He too has lost everything, though... I suppose we have not lost each other."

Despite his vexation with the sea, Merrit found what Kukutux shared of her mother to be beautiful. Internally, he pushed aside the anger he held towards the raging ocean and put this knowledge in its place. A far better thing to think on. "I will think on you and your mother next time I near the sea," he promised her, "I do not think I will find anything for my mother there, but... she always loved watching the bison in our land." He remembered her tanning their skins, remembered how she had treasured them, in life and in death. "Perhaps I must start there."

kukutux wondered if she reminded merrit of this mother. in some way. he had not spoken of a wife, nor children, but of memories. strong recollections that made a path between this world and the next. he said gently the things that he held desirous in his heart: to lead, to bring light, to show that there was rightness against the evil which walked upon this world.

she found herself rapt, attentive. she wished that this powerful man might go into the land and make a village. it would be beautiful, for in him merrit held the confident drive of snow-struck ambition. not for the sake of his own glory, but for the good of those who would follow.

sedna, please give blessings to his path.

he would think of her mother. kukutux blinked, and on the end of her lash suddenly hovered a small tear, one easily unseen if he had not been looking upon her. gone in the next moment. "i am honoured by you, merrit." and it was the truth.

bison. her brow furrowed; she gave a small laugh, one that hesitated as kukutux asked, "what is bison?" to the rest, a nod; he knew the beginning of this trail and it alone would provide such messages.