Blackfeather Woods life is nothing without the pain

Looking over Kendra had given him a purpose of sorts and Cicero was glad that they had had their encounter. As he sifted through a package of herbs he had found just outside of Blackfeather Woods Cicero thought back to it, for he had been in a similar position when she had come across him. He looked over his shoulder, almost as though expecting Kendra to come pouncing from the shadows once more, but no one was there this time; no one was looking on from the shadows.

Cicero still stayed at @Damien 's den, even though he was no longer in any real danger. The plants had returned and with them, the prey. He still looked thinner than he did before, and would need some time to get to his full health, but was in no immediate danger any longer, so long as there was no second plague of locusts here this year.

He was not far from Damien's den today when he unwrapped the package of herbs and sifted through them. He shifted aside from poison ivy, his nose prickling with the familiar itch or its blisters, before he picked out a small piece of Jimson Weed. Dangerous, he knew, but he was in the safe confines of Blackfeather Woods and so he started to chew on a leaf he plucked off the plant, and waited for the pleasant tingle of pain to catch him right before his head would begin to swim.

Life was looking up more every day. With the plants in recovery and the forest slowly coming to it's former abundance once more, Blackfeater Woods was back on track and growing stronger. Damien's physique showed just what that meant, he'd been gaining weight again just like everyone else, and his muscle was taking shape once more. He did not look like the wolf he was once, but he sure looked tougher.

Ruling Blackfeather Woods was not what he'd always imagined. In fact, Damien didn't even have a clear picture of what it was to be leader before he got there; he had always been on top, at least in his opinion, but ruling was nothing like it.

Except for the occasional border visit, Damien kept to the heart of Blackfeather Woods most of the times, going around, watching from the shadows. He had a feeling that Kendra was up to something, she had been acting strangely lately. Of course, she had lost her dad, but not even when Pietro died did she act in such a mysterious way. She was... Different. Damien felt guilty for how poorly he had handled the situation, getting nowhere close to the affection that Cicero seemed to give her. But Damien had promised something, and he was there to keep it.

"Do you know where Kendra is, by any chance?" asked the young shadow the second he crossed paths with Cicero. He ignored the fact that his brother had just eaten a toxic plant, and the bundle of herbs at the paws did not mean much to him. He was looking for Kendra, and his mind was known to not be very good at focusing on more than one thing at once.

The world around them was starting to grow once more, a thing Cicero found most favourable. He had not enjoyed being cooped up in Damien’s den, unable to move for some time, with no plants to make him feel alive to boot. To once more chew upon the blessings that Mephala had sent to them, to feel alive — Cicero knew that he had had good reason to stay alive, then.

It was no surprise with how close to Damien’s den he still was, not having gone far, that he would find his brother nearby. Cicero licked his lips as he ignored the remainder of the plant for now, mismatched eyes focusing on his brother. ”Brother,” he greeted and he reached out to nose through the fur along Damien’s neck briefly before withdrawing as Damien, to the point as always, asked where Kendra was at.

He squinted his eyes ever so briefly as his stomach revolted against the foreign intruder, sending a sting of sharp pain through his body. This was the moment Cicero usually regretted, in part; the pain felt the strongest, at times almost unbearable. But he knew it would soon be better, and he also knew that he would soon come to long back for that first, sharpest sting of pain when it became number and number — or was he the one that became number? — and would eventually die down into a comfortable lull when his head would become more absent.

After a short pause in which he processed that jolt of pain Cicero said: ”Cicero has not seen her today.” He licked his lips, picking some more remainders of juice off them while he wondered, ”What does Damien need her for?” His feet felt unsteady, but he managed to remain on them for the moment. He wondered if Damien would enjoy it as much as he would. The pain, at first, but ultimately the numb relief, if only for a little while.

Sorry it's a bit short!

Distracted, Damien didn't notice Cicero react to the jolt of pain that attacked his stomach. He was glancing around, looking for the young figure of his sister, until Cicero's voice brought him back to the conversation. Damien looked at his brother just in time to see him lick something off his lips, and that was enough to sparkle Damien's curiosity. As far as he knew wolves were not herbivores. "What are you eating?" he squinted, and his pale eyes sought out the bundle of plants that his brother had dropped just a few moments before. It was useless, of course, for although he saw them he could not it in his non-existent plant database.

no prob <3

Cicero could not help but grin a grin that turned into a grimace as Damien asked him about what he had been eating, rather than continue about the subject of Kendra. Though Cicero wanted to know why Damien sought Kendra, he knew he'd get the answer when he would; not when he asked.

As for Damien's question, it was a delicate one. Cicero always assumed that Damien knew about these things, but did he? Especially in the frail state the famine had put Cicero in, it was not the best of ideas right now. His tongue ran along the insides of his teeth in thought before he eventually said, "Something to keep the pain away." Perhaps it was the other way around, in truth, but it was a way for Cicero to keep the pain away; the pain on the inside, as well as the beast.

It was common knowledge that Cicero had a strange liking of plants, the poisonous and toxic kind especially, but no one seemed to know what uses the prince of madness gave to those when he was alone. Damien himself knew nothing about it, and he had next to zero experience with plants at all, so when his brother told him he was medicating himself he believed his word. But, what pain was he trying to keep away?

"Are you hurt?" asked the shadow prince with a squint, "You do look terrible," he added, having noticed the way he grimaced before. Damien worried about his brother, there was no one else who could do that for him now, not after every wolf who ever acted as a parent to them was gone.

A smirk ran along Cicero's face as Damien asked him if he were okay, because he looked terrible. Perhaps he should've been insulted, but, truthfully, he knew that he looked awful. Cicero's appearance had always been an acquired taste, he so guessed, but since the famine he had looked unhealthily thin. His eye sockets were sunken low, his cheekbones jutting from the sides of his face, and his ribs showing so clearly that they could be counted. Even his hipbones stuck out to prove the malnutrition he had faced this summer. Cicero could only hope that there would be no more setbacks until winter so that he would be able to get his strengths back before it grew cold.

"A famine does that to one," he said with a squint of his mismatched eyes. His head was beginning to swim, and he swayed unsteadily from left to right on his paws as he looked at Damien. "How is leadership treating Damien? Is it as good as drugging someone using their own child as bait and then torturing them for a prolonged time?" He grinned as he referred back to Grimnir. There was no denying that Damien had to have enjoyed that. It felt as though they were but children at the time, so young were they then.

More every second did Damien notice something was off with Cicero. Hardly keeping himself in balance, the mismatched eyes started looking grimmer by the second, and Damien started entering in panic. His appearance did not help, as his sharply emaciated figure made him look like he was on the edge of death still.

The words that came out of his voice made little sense. Damien could remember the Grimnir deal, he did so with so much anger it was unlikely he would ever forget, but what did that have to do with being the leader? "What?" he barked confused, and pushed past his brother to take a closer look at the herbs he had dropped a few moments before. He sniffed at them, not recognizing any familiar scent, but getting the feel that they were far from medicinal. He turned back to Cicero then, "Did you drug yourself?" he asked starting to feel the anger and desperation grow in him, and pushed Cicero's thin figure back in a rough effort to help him down before issuing a call for whoever was around that could help him figure out what was going on. @Kendra, @Potema and @Kove came to mind, those being the closest thing to caregivers that the pack had at the time. Damien was of little use to Cicero in such state.

Please only one of you guys join (Kendra, Potema or Kove), I don't want to drag more people into this than it's necessary because I'm going to be very slow on posts for a few days

Somehow, Cicero hadn't calculated in that Damien might panic like he did. Somehow, he thought that everyone already knew about what he did. It wasn't like this was the first time. He had walked around with that infected foot for who knew how long. But then, he hadn't calculated in the fact that Damien was no medic. When Damien started to panic, Cicero said, "Relax, brother," but before he had a chance to say anything more, he saw that Damien reached towards him.

In his mind, this all went in slow motion, and so when Cicero parted teeth to try and grab a piece of Damien in play, he in fact only loosely managed to grab one of Damien's ears before he tumbled to the ground. He was an easy target, and as he looked up from his laying position and saw Damien lift his nose he said "Wait —" but the tones of Damien's howl already overshadowed his words and it was too late. After the howl, Cicero's mismatched eyes focussed bleerily on Damien while his stomach contracted with pain and he said, "Cicero knows what he's doing. It will pass." He had tried this out before, had tested these very herbs before he knew what they did at all, even.

Potema arrived, blinking curiously at her brothers. She was aware of Cicero's herbal experiements; she had confronted him about it before, after all. It had taken her awhile to simply allow her brother to go on with this, but she did trust him to take care of himself. What surprised her about Damien's summoning was the fear behind his howl. Had he not known what Cicero was doing? Or was Cic' finally pushing himself too far? What's going on?

The words came muffled to Damien's ears. Cicero was trying to calm his brother down, but the shadow prince was beyond calming when he realized Cicero had, not only eaten poisonous plants, but also done it in a weak physical state with no apparent reason at all. To him, this looked like a suicide attempt, and he did not like it a bit.

But it seemed that he was the only one that wasn't aware of his brother's recreational activities, for as soon as their sister came to scene she didn't look shocked at all by the fact that Cicero was on the edge of death.

"He's trying to kill himself!" barked Damien in alarm, and urged his sister with his eyes to take a closer look and do something about it. "Don't just stand there, do something!"

Cicero let out a strained sigh when Potema arrived on the scene. Everything moved in slow motion to him, and he didn't even know how long or short it'd been that he and Damien had stood there before she arrived. He turned his head towards her, feeling as though he did it slowly but in fact moving it with a sharp incline. A smile that was playful and nearly goofy in a way split his face as he looked between his brother and sister. "Cicero has everything under control," he said, words directed mostly at Damien, for it looked from Potema's face that she wasn't concerned one bit, knowing that he knew his dosages. "It will pass on its own eventually."

She blinked calmly at Damien's distress. While Cicero liked to live on the wild side of life, treading dangerously close to death, she knew that he was in control. But she gave into Damien's request, examining the remains of the leaves that littered Cicero's feet. She shrugged at the familiar scent. Jimson Weed. Nothing harmful in this dose, just... What would be the right way to put this? Mind-altering. The goofy grin on Cicero's face was one she hadn't seen in a long time, but he was fine. Lucid, perhaps, but fine. He isn't hurting himself, Damien. Calm down... She had tried stronger herbs (and fungi) before. Jimson Weed wasn't that bad.

Both his siblings seemed to find no threat in Cicero's erratic behavior, but Damien could still not comprehend how much danger his brother was setting himself into by eating these herbs. Cicero protested that it would pass eventually and Potema tried to explain that the quantity in which Cicero had ingested the Jimson Weed would mean no harm to him, but Damien was far too concerned already to even hear everything they said. At least they had managed to sooth the panic.

"Why do you do this?" he asked, looking at his brother with mixed concern and disappointment, and ignoring Potema who had been of no use to his intentions at all. The prospect of losing Cicero was terrifying to Damien, who had lost way too many people already and could not cope with one more absent relative in his life.

Potema was quick to confirm Cicero's words. Damien had the same desperation in his eyes, worry — fear, even — but Cicero felt nothing as he looked at it. He loved Damien dearly, but that did not mean that he cared for Damien's sorrows. How could he, if he did not even care for his own? He was not so sure whether that made him more broken or more fixed than any of the other wolves he met, to feel so little, even despite carrying a moral compass of some sort around, one at times bigger than that of his siblings.

"Science, brother — Experiments," Cicero said to Damien, looking his brother in the eye as he felt no shame to admit such things. "What effects do herbs have, how much can the body of a wolf take? These are all questions that can not be answered so sufficiently as by oneself." Even feeding another the poisons would not be sufficient. One never knew how another felt, truly, not even if they were to tell one in the most elaborate of ways.

There was little cause for concern. She had seen Cicero do worse things to himself before. Compared to the poison ivy, deliberately infecting his wounds, this was child's play. Harmless. Had Damien not seen Cicero when he was like that?

She sighed. Cicero's methods were unorthodox at best, but they made sense to her, in a strange way. She didn't know what to say; her brothers were closer to each other than they were to her. She stepped to the side, letting the two talk it out.

Now, after his siblings had tried explaining to him, and assuring him that Cicero would probably suffer no serious damage from fooling around with toxic plants like this, Damien could only think how on Sithis' name did he not know this had been going on forever? Somehow, Damien felt like he was responsible for his siblings as the older one of them, but slowly he had come to realize that he had literally no control over them, and that feeling unsettled him.

"Make it stop," he ordered, having turned to his sister with harsh eyes. Damien could not just stand there and see his own brother, the only one he really cared about harm himself and do nothing, and neither could Potema. He did not have the knowledge or abilities to do it himself, so the witch would have to obey. His eyes, cold and ruthless, were daring her to refuse carrying out his command.

Usually he was alone when he was like this, feeling he was too unpredictable in such moods. Yet somehow he felt better now that he was with Damien through it. The pain combined with the desire that still lingered within him for Damien, both things that gave him pleasure, excited him, drove him. His head felt heavy and yet so light and he was not sure whether to be amused or endeared to see his brother think he could command his siblings. Cicero had since long learned that control lay only in the things one could make another do to yourself, to a certain degree.

Cicero unsteadily walked towards Damien then and leaned into his shoulder, breathing in his scent and feeling desire fill him as part of his face was buried in his brother's fur along his neck and shoulder, teeth nipping roughly along Damien's neck.

She was instantly thrust back into the situation as Damien's pale eyes fixated on her, hard and cold as ice. He issued a command, something that was natural to the elder sibling since his birth, and which had grown to be second nature to him. Obviously, he didn't want his order to be denied, least of all by his own sister. 

But she couldn't be cowed this easily, especially by someone she watched grow up. I cannot do anything, She hissed, just as briskly as Damien had. The only way for him to sober up is for the drug to run its course through his body and prevent him from consuming anymore, She stepped back as Cicero moved forward towards their brother, but the way he embraced Damien was more of a lover than a sibling. She was unaware of any feelings Cicero had for Damien beyond their brotherly bonds, only attributing this behavior to the jimson weed and not his deeper conciousness. She blinked in surprise, but let it happen. Damien would shrug him off, wouldn't he?

He felt his blood boil when his sister refused to carry out his command, melting down his cold stare as a frustrated growl started forming in his chest. Damien simply could not understand that there was truly nothing Potema could do to help Cicero in his current state of panic and rage, but he believed her to have some kind of magic anyway, which served as a base to the belief that she would be able to bring Cicero back. Fear clouded his mind, the prospect of a poison killing his brother being the main object of thought.

Perhaps it hadn't been the best moment for Cicero to attempt an approach. His nipping Damien's ear, for as loving as it was, was met with the growl that had been meant for their sister now stirred away towards him, and an unnecessary and uncontrolled snapping of bared fangs at his face.

Two steps were taken back, with which Damien tried to regain his calm before hurting his brother seriously. That was the last thing he needed in that moment. And his eyes sought his sister with guilt. Guilt that might have come from his impulsive action, or for the way their brother had approached him. It had not been the first time his brother touched him like that.

He did not flinch back even as the growl surfaced in warning and teeth snapped in his direction. Teeth grazes the frays of his nose, sending a pleasant sensation of pain through his face, however numbed down it currently was with all the other sensations he was feeling. Damien was the one that stepped back rather than Cicero, then. Their sister was momentarily forgotten as he licked his lips and grinned. "Ever the tease," he teased his brother, knowing that this was his weak spot.

"Maybe the best way yet to stop it..." Cicero murmured, locking eye contact with Damien, "Is to join Cicero." He did not have more herbs laying around for the moment, but he had some locked away nearby.

Damien's reaction to her defiance wasn't surprising, but his reaction to Cicero's intoxicated advancements were. It wasn't disgust, or even a hint of amusement at their brother's flopflop personality under the influence. It was guilt. For what Potema couldn't understand — She met Damien's eyes with confusion. She had never seen Cicero this affectionate towards anyone before. Not even their own mother. She had initially connected his actions with the jimson weed, but Damien's reaction told otherwise. I do not think that is a good idea, Cic',

Looking both to Potema and Cicero Damien took a couple steps back. He had been taken by surprise, and things had been exposed to Potema. Damien could see it in her eyes, she was suspicious, and Damien simply did not know how to react to that. So with a stare charged with trouble, Damien turned and walked away from his Siblings. "Just bring him back," he ordered Potema, though, with guilt and embarrassment mixed up in his voice. Then he disappeared in the shadows, still worried, still fearful, but unable to withstand his brother's behavior, unable to come up with a way to justify his brother's approach to him to Potema. He could not allow the world to see a weakness in him embodied in Cicero.

It was easier avoiding the feelings.

Damien was cold as was to be expected, and Cicero rumbled a huff in response to his prude behaviour. When he slipped away from underneath Cicero, Cicero stumbled and fell to the ground, staying there a moment as he lifted his head to see his brother walk away. Then he looked up at Potema, licked his lips as he tried to right himself, and decided to lay down his head instead. "Cicero can rest here," he mumbled, though not particularly in Potema's direction, squinting his eyes at the tugs of pain that kept him in reality when all he wanted to do was sleep.

> >'''

She was merely a bystander, watching as Cicero stumbled around, eventually collapsing onto the ground. Damien had disappeared, frustrating Potema. If he was so concerned about him, wouldn't he have stayed? Did he just expect her to fix everything?

She gently pressed her lips to Cicero's head, Just sleep, She rested beside him, laying her head across his shoulders and back. There really wasn't much he could do, but make sure he knew where he was when he woke, and give him water if he needed it. For now, she closed her eyes, waiting for her intoxicated brother to wake from his stupor.