Duskfire Glacier mountain bone

while he let @Moondancer lead them out the grotto, he had made the choice to head to the east. toward what called to him. the jagged ice pick that danced to the heavens. the glacier that supplied water to the caribou that he feasted upon.
where wounded showed up at his doorstep. where war had broken out. the wind felt sharper against the shadow of his coat, but the light of the moon was there to balance him. snowangel, rather.
he led her upward if she followed; up to the tallest peaks. where there were dens hollowed out and abandoned. filled with dust and old belongings. to aid her if she needed, he'd hold out a paw for her to latch onto. or even nudge her behind with his snout upon a particularly steep ledge.
where he was taking her?
he stopped at the mouth of the stone crag: it's entrance dramatic at the mouth. his den. his home. he hesitated before it, walking closer, brushing against moondancer's side.
inside, it was the same as he left it. bed of caribou and musk oxen hides. trinkets from satori. from gjalla. from tikigak. it smelled of him, of a time that he could no longer grab hold of. it was a mere fantasy drowned in memorabilia.
he looked back toward his moondancer, reddened eyes overwhelmed by what was left behind, and said nothing. maybe she could fill the silence for them.

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The moondancer had led the first few steps of the way, her tail flagging high behind her, but when her shadowman moved to take them eastward, she permitted this, letting their pelts mingle as they went. She followed behind her shadowman, upwards, upwards, and upwards still. Towards the peak of the glacier. Dens laid here, engraved in stone, carved into the mountains. He helped her on the rise, and for that, she was grateful. Nodded to him, calm and steady in her composure still. The light to his darkness.
When they stopped, they stood before cave-mouth. He brushed against her, and the woman planted her nose to his pelt, breathing him in before making an entrance of her own. Hides laid upon the stone floor, treasures scattered about. There laid scents within this place. Scents of women that she did not know. The moondancer met the gaze scent towards her. That gaze that swelled with a longing for the past, forlorn in their redding and the silence that he carried. She moved towards him. Pressed himself to him, and spoke: You need not stay here, yahaayík̲áa, my man of shadow, and it came to him in gentle radiance. Her voice a hushed whisper amongst the cave. We take what is valuable, and we find place for us. Us only, protective. Possessive.
She pulled away from Uktark, moving towards the hides. The trinkets that laid strewn. Bending her neck, she pulled at the caribou hide, bringing it towards her man and rearing her head so that it may drape around him. It was looking upon him, now, dressed in pelt and dark in figure, that she continued. You need not tell me any-thing, her eyes were kind, trusting, as they settled upon his face. But I will listen, to every-thing.
Dísal'eix̲ pressed her nose to his own. A quiet intimacy.

the shadows gathered around him. old friends, ghosts of companions that relied on him. they felt him up, placing spiritual palms to his chest, his neck. a ritual of suffocation.
but his moondancer's touch was real. real, and it brought him back to this cave. alone, with her. her touch against his warhewn body. a priestess blessing the knight. he did not move when she pressed the hide over his shoulders; it slid across him like a memory he did not invite, heavy with the ghosts of women who had laid claim here before.
it was incredibly intimate how he let her touch her. not a soul had been so close to him like this since his issumatar.
her voice, her gentleness, her certainty— us only— it brushed against something deep, something he had long since buried beneath ice and iron.
still he said nothing.
he only watched her, the pale of her fur glowing like a shard of moon caught inside the mountain. she was warmth where he was cold, softness where he had only ever been shaped sharp. her trust sat in the space between them, a fragile thing he did not know how to hold.
when she touched her nose to his, he leaned into it— not much, barely a breath— but enough.
a glance back towards his lodge. where he'd met with blackfell for war. where he instructed his men to march upon the saatsine. narrowed eyes built tension in his brow. and when he spoke it was earthrich and broken.
there are things you won’t like about me.

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There was a great conflict within him. She watched as memories flickered behind his hardened gaze like shadows cast upon cave-wall, twitching like embers, cold and harsh. His brows, strewn together. But he did not stop her touch. Did not push away her closeness. And when he spoke, it held an impossible weight, a nerve raw, exposed, vulnerable to her, and only her. And it was in this single heartbeat that she chose to be here with him, that she would give him her all, so that they may carry this impossible weight together.
Whether I like it or not, she begun, her voice hardly above a whisper. You are still mine. I am still yours, and in this moment, there were no others. Two spirits, light and dark, intertwined in some way. Their closeness was hardly for nought. A great pain was held within him. A great pain that some deep, quiet part of her mirrored. I want to know you, Uktark, she guided her nose to the furs of his neck. Reveal yourself to me. Hushed tones.
She found herself intrigued by the danger. The pain. She wished to understand it, to feel what he felt, to know what he knew. She wished for him to think the same of her. To see the lingering fury behind her gaze. The calmness that she exhibited despite. To be with eachother so wholly. A wish that, in this moment, would go unsaid, but would not be unknown for very long.

uktark did not shift when she pressed into him. did not flinch when her breath warmed the fur along his throat. his gaze held forward, fixed on nothing and on everything—on memories burned into ice, on ghosts that still clung to the stone of this place. the weight of it sat on him like a pelt still damp with old blood.
her words brushed against him, soft where his world had only ever known hard edges. he let them settle. let them fill the quiet between them. but silence was still his first language, and grief was its dialect.
at length, his breath left him in a slow, rough exhale.
tartok, he said, voice gravel and shadow. is way of life.
the truth of it hung in the cold air.
he did not lift his head. did not straighten. he only let the next words break from somewhere deeper, from bone and loss.
mate gave it to me, a pause, a shift of muscle beneath her touch, before she died.
the memory tightened the line of his jaw.
he closed his eyes briefly, as if bracing against something sharp. perhaps it was the pain in his heart.
i lose everything to become it. a beat. closer to a confession than he had ever allowed. to become sangilak.
[indent[uktark’s gaze swept the hollow, the furs, the stone, the empty spaces where other scents used to live.
this was home.

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The moondancer did not speak, as harsh and jagged words fell upon her snowkissed ears. He was right. She did not like this. Did not like the pain in which he felt, the loneliness in which he knew. Did not like the fact that he had once loved another. But still, she stayed. Remained here, with him. Perhaps as a future lover. Perhaps, even more so, as a current friend. Perhaps simply as someone who had chosen him, and perhaps that was all that either of them really needed. To be chosen, wholly and truly, for who they were, despite their flaws and their pasts. Their mistakes and their shortcomings.
And it can be home again, she murmured. Her tone was that of comfort, of a warm winter sun against freshly fallen snow. It does not have to be a home with me, if you want not for it, but it is a home I will help rebuild, should you so wish it, words came in poetic melody. Carried on the air that swept around the cavern, that carried the whispers of a past once lived within these very stone walls. It was now that she looked up at him, her gaze meeting his own, nose tilting to trail along his tightened jaw. This was not a move of romance. This was not the beginning of a courtship. Rather, this was a comfort. A grief shared, a heartbreak halved. Grief may be easier, should we grieve together, her words, soft as winter-plume. Plush, like bed-pelts.
Sangilak... she murmured, now. Tell me, what is the meaning? For it sounded so distantly familiar in some odd way.

she offered warmth and work and rebuilding. the generosity in her voice was soft as new snow, but it struck something flinty in him all the same. he did not pull away from her touch along his jaw. he accepted it, let it ease the stiffness etched into him—but he did not yield to the picture she tried to paint.
women should not shoulder a man’s ghosts. they should not labor to drag his past into something livable.
her kindness was not lost on him.
but it was not hers to spend.
her voice asked of sangilak. he answered with a murmur, low and brief, the word carrying more history than tone.
war survivor, he said. a beat. old fighter.
he looked then to the caches, the trinkets, the hides she had fussed over. he did not want her gathering them. did not want her bending herself to his past as though it were her duty. his stance shifted closer, a quiet, protective presence settling around her. he would provide. he would feed. he would care.
she need not work in such a way.
her earlier words lingered in the space between them, the offer of rebuilding, of staying. he turned from the cave mouth, tail brushing lightly against her flank—a signal, not a dismissal.
he did not want to stay. not yet. the walls still smelled of ghosts.
uktark stepped out into the cold, snow whispering beneath him, and glanced back only once.
come, he rumbled, a simple invitation. not home. not now.
his gaze swept the wide white between the trees.
travel. see taiga.

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He moved past her offering. Did not reject it, not verbally, at least, but did not accept either. Told her the meaning of the title, carrying ghosts and scars and all that was a lingering darkness. His tail swept across her, inviting her forwards, and she stood at her own pace. A testament: she offered herself so fully, followed him so loyally, all because it was her will. Her want. She did not need him, as he did not need her, and yet, together still did they belong.
The moondancer followed shadowman, wordless in her travel. Down the ledges, the slopes, returning to the base of the glacier all in due time. A quiet hum of acknowledgement left her as they went. Moved to follow beside him when there was more room on the path. When they had reached the bottom of the glacier, she would once more push her nose to his pelt, a quiet sign of trust. A permission, an acceptance, for him to lead their travels.
Throughout the taiga they would go, light and darkness in their balance. When they found a quiet moment, bundled in warmth and feasting, she would reveal more of herself. Share her mothers' tongue, her stories and her tales, as she so yearned for. But, for the time being, she moved in silence. A moon that orbited the man before her. Protecting him in her own, gentle manner.
A heart for him to rely on.

another one thank u... another one thank u...

her touch at the base of the glacier—a nose pressed to his pelt—drew a slow exhale from him, not quite soft, but steadier than before. he accepted the gesture without turning, without breaking stride, a quiet acknowledgment threaded through the sweep of his tail as it brushed her hock.
when the forest opened, when the snow deepened and the world stretched wide before them, he paused only long enough to look back at her. a brief meeting of eyes. dark to bright. shadow to moon.
his shoulder shifted toward her, the faintest tilt—permission to walk close, to match him step for step.
uktark did not speak.
not even when the wind dipped and the taiga settled around them like a great, sleeping beast.