«Return of the Shadow Sire»

« for @Burke »



Ah, the silence. There had been always silence, and since the passing of the Twirling Death from the Sky, even more silence permeating the land where wretched souls like him, felt perfectly at ease. The quiet could drive a man insane. Quite literally.
That is what Slade called home. 

As always, it was the darkness that came like a thief. Then the woods thickened. The air grew heavy with that familiar sense of dread, a creeping that could feel as though eyes had saw to the very depths of your soul.
Bushes holding thorns that may or may not move on their own. A scuttling that sounded as if it's owner had more than the 4 legged limit.
Peace of Chaos. 
Beauty. 

And here, the spot he has laid his fiery gaze on the mistress of deceit herself, was were he stood. The mark she had entrusted on his shoulder was still there, though after the test of time, it visibly faded.
Yet it remained. 

He noticed the marks reluctance to abandon him, no matter how many fights he had gotten into, baths he had taken, New scars he had made. The mark remained. Some brain in his head. A reminder as to who he had once danced with. A queen of sin. A gorgeous nightmare.

He was internally told to return. A feeling, an insight and intuition. Something told him to return. To stay, he had no idea. But to return. No reason why. Only return. 

So he did. The true King of Despair. And the howl he sent said no less. It was a song, a symphony of composers as loyal as death. Murder. Deceit. Lies. Lust. Gore. Greed. Savagery. And hidden farther inside, a note of Sorrow. 

Then, he waited.

Rubs hands, so excited for this!!

Burke was just having a moment of rest with all the chaos around him. The tornado had done quite some damage, and was still flooding half of Black Feather's western flank. The stench and gasses were sure to kill all plants that grew there, maybe even trees. It would take a long time before their woods had fully recovered. The Dark King hated that the winds had made holes in the canopy of the dark forest. They would grow back, in time. The tank of a male lifted his head when he heard a howl. His heart stopped for a moment. A fellow brother! The one that had the same mark as him. Old memories flooded through Burke, how he just joined Black Feather himself, and how he looked up at the Brotherhood. How he secretly wanted Meldresi for himself.

Sithis, Look at him now. He was The Dark King of these woods and The Dark Priestess was his mate. Burke got to his feet, getting into a trot, a regal trot. The immense tank of a male appeared from the shadows, stepping over the strong scenting borders. His borders. They scented of him too. "I hope you know that you have been labeled as a traitor, Brother," he spoke, though Burke was grinning. When Slade left, for some reason, Burke hadn't been a brother yet. Now he was a Priest, and a Spy. The King of the Brotherhood. Things had changed indeed. Burke held his head high, used to his position in the upper rank. He had been a Beta for Black Feather a long time. "Slade. I must say that it is a surprise."

«dear Christ, same, same. »



Slade examined the massive brute before him, and was not only amused, but pleased at the appearance of the last recruit he remembered. And remembered fondly. A swift sniff and gaze was all the equally large man needed to achieve in the happenings of this once unrivaled kingdom.

"Burke, the title Traitor is something I am neither uncommon with, nor displeased about. Like many of names I am handed, it is what it's name is, exactly. A title."

A grin that would strike a small child afflicted with death from the cause of unbridled fear now shown towards Slades counterpart. It was indeed tinged with sliver of warmth from an unforgotten friendship. 

"As much surprise to you, as to I. From what I have seen, I cannot help but be proud of your achievement. Congratulations, Brother. " 

With the term on the opposite side of the table, Slade dipped his crown to the wood sheathed brute. His stance kept neutral to the older Hessian, he neither posed nor desired a quarrel with one of his respected mets, but he would not bow before a trust of respect was returned. 

"How fare your rule on the land of lies, friend?"

A twinkle of interest swirled in the volcanic stare of the ebony beast, but it was genuine.

Burke kept his stance as it was before, he had no problem displaying his dominance since he had the right to. But it wasn't in Slade's face. Burke respected the dark wolf, it was a time when Black Feather Wolves were actually dark and crazy. Burke loved that time. Meldresi was much darker too, her children had made her much softer. Not that Burke minded because it softened her just enough to love him too. Love, such a weird aspect in Dark Brotherhood. "Just like Dark King is also a title," he returned. He knew that he couldn't be too nice to the other wolf. They had codes and rules. But damn, he was glad to see him!

That creepy smile was just as he remembered returned on Slade's face. In that aspect they really could have been brothers since Burke made the same creepy sinister smile. The one Slade pulled was really exceptional, but Burke had his own creepy smile. It sure made that red colored pup of RHC run away in fear. "Flattery won't get you anywhere, but I do thank you. I feel very accomplished with what I achieved," he returned. Meldresi never took on a mate before, and he had been the first and the only one that would ever have her love. Only that little thing gave Burke a lot of confidence. Plus that he had gotten out of the Beta role, and stepped up into the Alpha one.

"Slade... If I am really honest...," he started and shook his head with a certain disgust. "There was a big storm, you must have noticed how much debris there is. The swamps flooded half of the territory." he spoke, he couldn't really hide it, Slade only would have to walk a bit further along the borders to see the mess. Burke realized how he missed hanging out with his fellow brothers, they had all left them. Why did Slade leave?! He should have been there. What was more important than the brotherhood?! He wasn't going to tell him that the Brotherhood only consisted of Meldresi and him. That would make them sound pathetic.

"Over all, I must say we are still running. Meldresi's young with Bane will be adults in the end of this summer. So they will fill up the Brotherhood nicely. They see me more as their father than Bane since he left. Kove left too, to be with his albino girlfriend Scarlett. Grimnir is still here though, and still not a dark brother. Guess what? He has a mate." The tank of a male had to chuckle for a very brief moment. Because he realized how much Grim had changed, actually. Burke then slowly pulled his smile in a proud grin. "You know who also got a mate?," he then asked. "I got Meldresi." Burke still felt like she was a catch. The best and most delicious female ever. God she was such a divine creature. Then his face fell a bit. He missed her.

Burke's face hardened a bit. Time for catching up memories was over. Burke needed some answers. "So you have returned. Why? What was more important than us?," he questioned. "Why did you leave?"

Slade gave Burke the impression that he was silently listening all while tallying the naive brutes fatal mistakes. Tsk, tsk, tsk. 
Surely he had better sense than what he was defining himself, especially as a member of the Dark Brotherhood. Even the sense being an Alpha, surely something would have twinkled in that deliciously removable skull of his?

"Just a title, indeed."

In truth Slade kept himself in the mentality of a Dark King, and he had seen himself as such, on and off of these lands. The title was something he was worthy of. How dare this mongrel impersonate? 
All is well. 

He thought Slade was flattering him? Pity. He should have spent more time with the wood sheathed lupine. Then again, he would have known to shut his maw a long time ago. Keep him talking, the more info he would receive. Burke wasn't exactly holding his tongue, and that proved to the Slade the downfall of the pack, before the new Alpha even faltered his speech.

The storm had been a very good hand in his departure, and the Shadow Sire nodded, giving Burke an impression that he as engaged in the conversation. 
With a raised brow, he rumbled a question, a gilded sentence.

"Have you not the numbers to expand or move?"

It was a waste of breath to ask, for Slade already knew the answer. If Burke had been more comfortable with his pack as it ran, he would not have said anything about the landscape, dwindling numbers, or the names of who had taken their leave. The landscape had probably impacted the population of already scarce prey, and like all sensible wolves, they left. They could have even had plans of their own. 
Like him. 
It was a test, more or less, for the older male. One to see which side of darkness Burke was truly on. 

Then he spoke of mates. The list of other wolves who's existence hadn't made him any closer to caring for them, in the first place. They had yet to earn it. And futility ran its course, because they had not. Suddenly, the onyx ears sparked at the name of the Queen. 
Impossible. 
Burke was her chosen mate? 
This babbling fool? A puppet pulling strings while she secreted away in her web? 
Impossible his absence timeframe. He could not have been gone that long. 

Appraised and impressed place it's image on Slades diabolical face, his thickly silked serpentine tail thumping the ground in congrats. 
That face. It was there, and most could lose the chance to catch it, if they were not careful. But he was. Always. Careful and as observant as a viper before it stuck an innocent mouse. 
Something had happened to the Queen. 
So this was why he was here. Interesting.

"I was notified of my brother skulking land near SwiftWater Creek, his pitiful excuse was looking for a pack. A simple trip I took, going to say hello to him, whilst ending his life. You remember the swine I told you I had loathed for his weakness. On my way home, I was ambushed by that murderous storm while dragging my brothers corpse, and I had to leave it behind in the flood waters. I planned to give his hide as a tribute to Meldresi, and as an offering to Sithis, but the only proof I have now is the memory of the battle, and this scar."

Slade regally took his banner from his left flank, revealing a viscous gleaming scar he had received from a recent bear attack. 
Lying was a beautiful art, and he was a master weaver in the piece. 

"I have just found the dark clouds, and immediately made way back, without hesitation in my stride."

Now, more of a dangerous topic, since his alibi was laid on a flawlessly shining platter.

"Now tell me, Burke, New King of the Darkness, what has happened to your Queen?"

Burke gave him all the information he wanted to give him for now, so when he asked the question Burke moved into the story Slade gave him as an excuse why he left. They had more than enough members, but they chose to say here because it was Black Feather Woods. They actually had more than enough prey since quite some deer had drowned and drifted past their lands. Burke was smart enough to store the carcasses in the colder parts of Mephala's Web. They would be fine, Burke even believed this would work well on the relationship of the whole pack. 

Burke was very skeptical about Slade's story. He was still a traitor. He knew Meldresi might want him back but he wasn't going to make it easy on the venomous snake. Burke had only met Slade briefly and even though he was a Brother to him if he left the brotherhood without a word how would Burke know he wouldn't do it again. Slade had been away for six months if not more. It wasn't just a few weeks the Dark Brother had been away. A lot had changed, including that he was a leader now. Though somehow Burke wished he did have Meldresi next to him. Then he could have been the silent listener. Meldresi knew the dark wolf before him far better.

The grey tank of a male wasn't sure if his 'gift' for Meldresi was because he wanted her for herself or because he actually worshipped the dark queen, who technically stepped down from that title. He wasn't sure what he liked most from those two options. "You went away six months to kills someone, very impressive," he returned, keeping his pale eyes on Slade. "You could have told us you were leaving, it would have made this process a whole lot easier," he pointed out, keeping his tone neutral. His docked tail was held up. Something in his story wasn't adding up. Then came that dreaded question because Meldresi had been missing, Burke hated ever moment of it. "She is currently at our sister pack with Brother Kove," he returned casually, like it was the most normal thing ever. Slade may have a streak in being a good liar but Burke wasn't going to admit to him that Meldresi had been missing. It was a wild guess from Burke side. A wild guess that sounded plausible. In the time that Slade might have traveled to the Valley Meldresi could have returned to Black Feather. "You are still a traitor, Brother Slade," he pointed out.

Slade barked out a genuine laugh.
Not for him getting a questioning stare of his story, nor for the reminder of his status as a deceitful piece of shit, but because the one who was supposed to be alpha of this pack had allowed such a word as 'sisterpack'  to leave his maw. 
Then Slade moved in for the kill.

"Burke, my Brother, what is this nonsense you speak? A Sisterpack? There is no such thing in the shadows of BlackFeather, and if there is, I may have taken the wrong turn to reach the place I once defended as home. If BlackFeather had a sisterpack, there would be no Brotherhood. Such is in the will of Sithis, that the Brotherhood remain pure and solitary in its form of prosper, and that form is without ties to weaknesses, such as an alliance."

A fiery hell burned in the stare of Slades gems, almost underworld in its like. 
This male tried to take him for a fool. 

"How do you think I kept alive through my rogue debauchery, Burke? I am a Nightmare. I use other's lies against themselves, and slowly whittling away their own psychological feeling of safety. Meldresi had no inclusion of alliance, for she hordes those with  dark gift to her cove of assassins. US, Burke. So if you dare believe in any chance of me taking her willingly LEAVING her family, her pack, her everything for a field trip to a 'SisterPack' that she was against even as I was on her side as a fellow leader, and the one of the first three Dark Brothers ever betrothed in the Family of the Brotherhood, then my friend, you are fatally mistaken. "

Slades bear-like ruff fur, longer than the rest of his pelt besides his banner, swayed from the tension of the muscles underneath the ethereal pelt of shadow, nearly making his appear as though midnight hued wisps were emanating from his shoulder, a cape of furred darkness.

The deep baritones the male spoke in dropped to a dangerous low, the sound the former Alpha of the Nightmares used to warn his company of their swiftly closing passageway to his reasoning, and the sound others who weren't as lucky swore was the voice of a wrath-fueled demon, the last voice they heard before perishing from the wounds he had inflicted them with, personally. 

"Burke, as much as you would like to be skeptical of me, I dare you to look into my eyes, and give the exact number of fucks that I give, because I guarantee you would give up from such a fruitless search. I am not here to join this pack. Especially if the shit you have dutifully informed me is in fact, true. I seek no forgiveness for my sins. I wear them as warmly as my own skin. What I do is what I do best, and that is leaving no survivors."

A sense-disabilitied small rodent scurried just in front of Slade, before realizing its mistake too late. Without taking his eyes off of Burke, Slade placed a massive webbed ebony paw on the skull of the retreating rat, and crushed it, without blinking. 

"Burke, I called you Brother not from the sense of the Brotherhood, but for the sliver of closeness I managed to weave between you and I. It is not just a title in my eyes. You can have Alpha. You can have Dark King. You can have Father. But you will have Brother, and because of me, that title will actually bear a meaning. Do you understand me?"

The scruff on the Shadow Sires back began to recede, his cape of hide lowering closer to his flexing thickly toned back. His voice had then changed considerably, as of that second. It softened. If he hadn't have been focused, he would have laughed at such are occurrence.  

"I am your traitor, your liar, your deciever, your conniver, your backstabbing Brother. But that is what I am. Your Brother. And I am here to do what will make what is plaguing this land, you, the pack, Meldresi, right again, whether I am or not a member of this damned pack."

Burke kept his calm demeanor when Slade was telling him that a sister pack wasn't something Black Feather would do, but he hadn't been there the last 6 months. The were working on it to have this Bearclaw become a sister pack to Black Feather. It had been Meldresi's idea, Burke was curious how it would work out to be honest since he hadn't heard much from Kove. Maybe he could be right that Meldresi was there in Bearclaw. Anyways, he wasn't going to argue with Slade about this topic. 

Burke listened to Slade about Meldresi. He would have to give this dark monster a chance wouldn't he? Burke had to accept that he could not leave Black Feather, Slade on the other hand was the free roaming dog here. His mark was still there, faded but there. Burke hated to shove away his pride and let others help him. Burke kept his pale eyes on the man and let out a long sigh. All Slade's words were getting to him. And he desperately wanted Meldresi back, if there is anyone who could find his mate it was Slade.

"Then go and do your thing," he spoke. As much as a monster Slade wanted to do for the sake of the Brotherhood. The pack needed to be righted again. He and Meldresi had been too focussed on their three spiderlings instead of the brotherhood. They would have to pray for forgiveness to Sithis in making the Brotherhood be so... lacking. Burke blamed the unloyal dogs they thought were worthy of the Dark Brotherhood. "Though I wasn't kidding about this Bearclaw Pack, lead by Brother Kove. It is located in Rising sun."

Burke's pale eyes fell on his brother, the traitor and liar. Burke reminded himself that he was just the seem breed as Slade. If his spy plan didn't work then the might ask Slade if he wanted to kill the annoying good doer wolf that called him his son. Perfect. Maybe as a rewards for bringing Meldresi home, he would give him a hunt able target.

The ember orbs cooled their murderous smoldering momentarily. 
This man has still not answered his question. 
And answer it, he will.

"Is that truly what befell upon Meldresi, Burke? She waltzed to another pack? If not to stay, then what for?"

Slade was genuinely curious. Well, no, he wasn't. Again with the lies. 
But the look he gave Burke appeared as such. 
Genuine curiosity.

Burke looked at the dark male. It could be that she went to Kove to learn him about being a priest. Plus, and this he wasn't certain about, Meldresi seemed to get along with Kove's mate really well. At least that is what the pale tiny thing implied when she was on their territory. "She isn't staying at his pack," Burke instantly replied. "She wants to be by my side." Burke truly believed this since Meldresi mated him. She had never mated another wolf. They were true to each other and he had all the trust in her. 

"I think she also wanted special herbs, which were also located in that region I believe," he returned to the Dark Brother. "Is that all the info you require?," he asked.

«Last post from me. Awesome thread, and I'm sure one of many more awesomer ones to come. W_^V»



Slade categorized the first two replies as 'wasted breath' and tossed them aside. The third had simply made him mentally shake his head at the sinful priestess. 
Foolish female.
Volcanic gems studied the deep brown short tailed wolf in front of him silently for a few more ominous seconds, until he said precisely 

"...it is not, but I will save the rest for a more suitable time. "

With that, the Dark King swiveled soundlessly on his hind le, and disappeared into the arising mist of the foreboding forest. 
He knew for him to receive the answers closest to truth, they would have to come from the Queen of Lies, herself.

Definitely! XD Burke wants Meldresi home.

Burke didn't reply, as long as the next time was after he got Meldresi back. Though the visit of the Dark Brother made Burke realise he needed to step up his game with his pack mates. He would have to make them more dark, more.. vicious. The heavy set male marked the borders just because he liked to before leaving and thinking more of his plans to make the recent new members more... eager to bite. 

Burke's mind rattled on, he was sure that after some training those girls could be more evil. Girls were meaner than boys after all, that was usually he case. 

End thread.