Ravensblood Forest i've melted icecaps with my bones

@Aurëwen

He was no psychic or mind reader but years of observing and monitoring others made reading  the emotions painted on one's features seem as easy and natural as breathing. He wasn't one to pry, especially not in family squabbles, but a heavy weight had fallen on the champion's chest since his pale friend had reunited with her broken family.

He'd thought she'd be happier than before but it appeared as if her mood had took a turn for the worst and while he did not wish to know the reasoning behind this, he did wish to help ease whatever troubles she was facing. So, without much knowledge on what the pastel sylph was going through or any idea on how he was to help her, Sanguinus set off with the intention of lifting her spirits.

"Care for some company?" he asked as her form began to materialize in the distance, telltale scars slowly becoming clearer with ever step. It pained him to see her so visibly upset and emotionally exhausted, especially when he envisioned her beaming with joy like the time he first met her. Perhaps with a bit of luck he might help to turn the tide and lift a worry off her chest or, at least at the bare minimum, act as a shoulder to lean on should she need it.

Once she’d tended to Verx and had staved the infection as best as she could, the herbalist had let him know precisely where she’d be should her warrior need her — and then she’d gone, leaving him to finish what greens he could ruminate over, as they’d surely resist the contamination from within. Aurëwen still couldn’t place her mood, and perhaps she wouldn’t for days, weeks to come, but she would be found knelt at a little stream, washing away herbal remnants from her paws, her maw.

So when the true Sanguinus first spoke, her head canted dove-like in his direction; at once, she wanted to rush to him and embrace him and tell him all that’d happened since his vanishment. She hoped it’d been to gather one of her children, that day she’d gone to actually protect them... but then, maybe not. What almost left her parted lips was, Surprised anyone wants to be in my company, at this point.

But she’d been selfish enough, even in the name of necessity, hadn’t she? Aure couldn’t possibly say that. She couldn’t... make this about her, right?

There came the quiet sigh of indecision; of company that she was both undeserving and hesitant to have, and she turned from the red-ruffed champion, taking further interest in ridding the loam from her paws.

“Because of their unwavering position, I left Diaspora after challenging its general and their ludicrous views, and did not tell ze children until just after. I did not think. I went to drive my desecrator off before he could reach us, rather than staying, hiding ze children, or telling you all what was to happen. I did not think.” And then her voice became a pathetic croak, at a moment where she was truly quivering and vulnerable and didn’t deserve to be, because she did not think.

Aurëwen snarled at her reflection, miraculously trembling in the stream’s current, withdrawing her forepaws with little frustrated flicks to dry them. “My children distrust me. As does their father. I have said my sorrys — but how can I fix ze family I’ve broken?” A hot film of tears veiled her eyes in gauzy guilt, and she bowed her head from his sights. I am no amazing mother, much less a mother. I deserve none of them. Not even the one who’d guarded them.

He lied silent as the naiad spoke, ears flickering at the words which left her mouth almost cruelly, as if she were tearing herself apart on the inside. It pained him to see her this way and without much hesitance the weathered champion set his course forward until he came to rest beside the distressing mother, attention set on her reflection in the calm waters. He remained quiet for a moment before his lips parted and the words began to pour out in a honest, raw tone.

"Aure" he began, silently stealing a glance at the teary eyed woman. "I do not regret my decision to follow you or to protect your children - I would do it many times again without hesitation should you ask." He paused to suck in a breath, fur tangling in the summer breeze as he thought over the words that'd left her mouth. He didn't have much experience with families, if any at all, and he felt it wrong to offer advice on a topic he was not familiar with.

That wasn't to say however, that he did not have anything to say at all. "Broken things may mend in time, you only need patience." He found time healed many wounds, and if it did not, then it was always meant to be broken in the first place. Either way, should her relationship with her family heal or not - "I will be here for you. Always." He needed that to be known, for he knew what it was like to walk alone on a path of self punishment and he did not want her to face the same pain he'd gone through.

His truthful admittance and irrevocable loyalty was what nearly did the silver in. I don’t deserve it. This. My family. After all she’d done, were they her family? Vercingetorix? Their — no, his — children? He’d tried to find and fight for a paradise for his family, and she had just... just... stolen after him, every bit the impulsive fool Stigmata had proven her to be.

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d touched another this way: seeking just comfort, security, relief. But one moment, Aure was wading through her sorrows and all that she could’ve done so much differently; backpedaling on all that she’d only just explained and mended when tending to her beloved.

In the next, though, she was wilting into the sable crook that was Sanguinus. Through the scarlet of him and her own shame, the herbalist was blinded to the truthful verdict of no, it wasn’t entirely her fault and yes, they are your family. She couldn’t see through her tears that  (especially new)  parents only did what they thought was right in a specific moment and worked with the time they were given. 

Aure couldn’t see any of it, just as she couldn’t see her stars with both eyes anymore; always looking into the world just as half-blind as the creature she’d become so long before the Dread’s return.

So all she could really do was burrow further into the stature of her champion and cry,
and cry,
and cry.

last post to start another thread hopefully??