Noctisardor Bypass i vow to love the fire always.

maybe @Mahler? but all welcome. as usual, there is no obligation! <3 as a note ( mostly to myself so i don't forget ) i'm going to say this is his last thread on his first 'spiritual' journey before heading back to blackwater.

despite that something bids ingram to turn around and go straight to blackwater, something deeper in his bones told him to make this his final stop on this first spiritual journey. he has timed it enough just so that, should weather not hold him up, he would return in time to align with the listener's command.

he spent so much time pretending his path did not exist, that it was not important. fragheda; killer of commanders. that existed and he bore it's physical reminders upon the flesh of his muzzle.

that he was, in his efforts to spite praimfaya in all and every way, just like her sets uncomfortably in his stomach: like a rock sunk at the bottom of a pool.

he keeps his distance from their borders, ceasing the trudge through the snow; breath snaking out from betwixt his lips in small plumes of stream. even as ingram tips his head back and howls; alerting the wolves of rivenwood to his presence. he is prepared to leave and quickly if this showed any signs of going south. still, even with the looming of uncertainty of what this meeting might bring, it feels needed all the same.

note to self, set before raids

it would be a spryer mahler who greeted worripa at the border. and it would be a taller, more introspective young man who arrived back at rivenwood.
based on the scents of far places that wreathed from the young man, mahler did not expect that he had returned to stay. "velcome," he said all the same, studying the face of the figure he had only known by the name praimfaya had given.
"your sister is heda now. she is recently dispersed; she vent to duskfire glacier." perhaps that was why he had come back.
mahler was not sure what to make of worripa's return.

ingram is not sure what to expect.

and seconds before he hears the footfalls of mahler; the familiar voice thick with his accent, the keeper considers turning and moving on. there was nothing but a past he had strove to forget here, anyway. and when they learned of his matricide no doubt they would scratch him from their memories like the betrayed did with photographs.

but mahler does not know of it and greets him with a 'welcome'.

heda. fitting. ingram drawls on a breath. to steal praimfaya's most coveted title from her. i'm not here to stay, ingram tells mahler, figuring if he's about to spill his biggest secret he might as well start off with honesty.

if worripa had not come for heda, then perhaps he had come for a goodbye. the lines of mahler's face softened. he was only a boy after all, with a mother presumed dead and a sister who was not here to hear it.
"have you traveled far?" the graf asked, stepping forward to take the scents on the boy's coat. he felt that the answer must be in the affirmative.
it heartened him to see that both worripa and heda had decided to make their own way in the world. mahler waited, warm with curiosity and a vaguely paternal affection.

a bit. ingram responds, in response to mahler's question. he had, indeed, travelled far from the islands of blackwater ...but his directive was clear: protect the druids at all and any cost. he is their iron guardian and while this was a visit of his own making he is their keeper always. i do not mind the travel. he admits after a small pause.

this was one of the last chapters he had to close on his past; sure that once he confessed to the fact that he'd committed matricide it would be closed and locked away forever.

exactly how he wanted it.

of course, there was still heda ...but perhaps someone would tell her.

mahler, ingram draws on a breath, fixing the man he had always suspected might be his father in his seaglass gaze; ready to rip away the last remaining tethers of what once was so he could focus fully on his future with the druids. i killed her. he could not bring himself to call her 'mother'. praimfaya. it is blunt, this confession but it was better to get it out all at once rather than drag it out.

for a long moment mahler only watched worripa. he found the words almost laughable. why would the boy return with such a claim? and if it were true, why would he return at all? 
"vhat do you mean?" he asked heavily, amethyst stare boring into the boy.
mahler had nothing else to add, only a thousand sensations beginning to build within him: the foremost was a deepening frustration for why this of all things was being brought back to the bypass.

i mean, ingram begins; feathering into the truth of the story as opposed to his vague version that made him sound more fierce. he angles his muzzle ever-so-slightly so that mahler had view of his scars, left by praimfaya out of pride. it burns at ingram's heart, if only because he resented her. still did; and she had been proud of him. it was twisted and backwords.

but nothing about their relationship had exactly been normal.

i found her in arrow lake, the significance of the place: that it was the graveyard of his his immediate bloodline is lost to him. she was sick and injured and all but on death's bed. if i hadn't found her, i doubt she'd have made it through the day. she knew she was dying.

we fought. i won, but only because she was a rattling breath away from death anyway; ingram might inflate the truth but he doesn't try to full himself. she left me these scars...kill marks, she called them — and i ended her life. the truth makes it sound like a kindness, giving her the death she wanted: of glory in battle as opposed to the wasting death ...and when he looks at it in detail ( he tries not to ) perhaps that was exactly what it'd been. a mercy. a last wish granted by the resentful son.

worripa began to speak and mahler felt his stomach sicken.
he would not presume to know what rituals praimfaya had from her lands. she had called herself many things, commander among them. but the image of her fighting with this ungrown boy did not sit well with mahler.
he grieved her in that moment, deeply and fully.
and then his rage was for worripa. the gargoyle kept it in check, save for the flare of his nostrils. "if she vas suffering, it is good that such pain is over. never tell heda," he ordered. "she vould not forgive you."
mahler wanted the boy to leave. he did not want to see worripa again. praimfaya was dead. there was no place in rivenwood for matricide. it was only the presence of the kill-marks which stayed his revenge now. he knew them. she had worn the same.

ingram lowers his chin, bearing the brunt of mahler's anger. it is expected. he tenses, waiting for an attack that never comes. this is a chapter he must close, he knows; and feels the pages turning to that close, eager to be sealed up and never to be re-opened. i won't. he offers in response to not telling heda. likely, he would not even seek her out.

goodbye, mahler. ingram offers for the sake of needing to say something; eager to continue on his path of discovery before returning home to the cruel islands of blackwater and the druids where he feels most at home.

last post from me! feel free to reply once more or archive as is. <3

<3 ;;

mahler watched the rivenwood-born boy leave.

and when the young wolf had finally faded from sight, his heart broke within him.

"goodbye, vorippa."