Arrow Lake trauern

a pall had fallen over diaspora, and beneath it they mourned stigmata.
mahler wanted nothing more than to roam, to collect relics of his kill-brother's life, and return them to his grave, but he alone was now responsible for that which they had built here. there was to be no rest for him, not now, and after a sleepless night spent in vigil over the ironstar's burial mound, mahler brought himself with dragging steps to @Ketzia's den.
she and takiyok would suffer the most, mothers to a legacy that stigmata would never see. his jaw shuddered once; he cleared his throat and lowered himself upon the threshold of the little goddess, whispering her name into the lightening dark of early dawn.
what he would say, the gargoyle could not be sure, but for now he lay his swimming head across his forepaws, awaiting the sound of her voice.

Ugh, my heart.
The cries that had echoed across the mountain had told her all she needed to know. Her children had looked at her expectantly—but how was she to tell them that the father they had only begun to get to know would not return to them that night, nor any other?

The scent of blood had solidified her resolve at not moving them from the den to seek out what could only be a crimson masterpiece wrought by the reaper, and so she had lured them to play within one of the shallower streams that broke away from the lake, trying her best to keep her thoughts at bay as a certain numbness settled over her.

When she had thoroughly exhausted her trio, only then did she usher them back, and as night fell and they slept soundly, the pale dove remained near the entrance of the whelping den, taking in the very first night that Stigmata had not sat guard over his family in the very spot she was now rooted to.

It was perhaps the longest night she had withstood, and her heart shook with the unconfirmed knowing that the General had fallen. Her nose would brace to the ground, every so often, as if she could steal a hint of his scent from the many nights he had lain there—alive and well, if not unfathomably tired.

She closed her eyes and inhaled—lashes fluttered over jaded eyes, and while she heard the approach of another, she knew without looking up that it was Mahler seeking her out. When she finally did glance up, she swayed on unsteady paws closer to him, the faint light of dawn highlighting the pain etched upon his features.

<3

ketzia. she had not slept, it seemed, and who could, save for the ironic slumber that had come to the children left behind by the argent serpent. his lips began to move in rote   monotone, asking after her well being, but mahler fell silent.
she had loved him, and he was dead. she had borne his cubs, and he was dead. the gargoyle need not ask her how she felt. but, if allowed, mahler reached to the she-wolf now, offering the brush of himself in reassurance, for as much as he needed to glean from her.
settling upon his haunches, he watched silently as the thin glow over the distant spires began to brighten. ”vhat vill you do, ketzia?”

He reached for her and she fell to him—the only wolf of the mountain in which she could trust his strength and assurance. Stigmata was gone from this world and she could feel the harsh clench of her throat as a guttural sob was buried, her nose seeking the dark fur of his neck, as if she were but a child and his embrace could take the pain and realization of that away.

There were a myriad of emotions that played in her breast—her mind far too clouded in grief to pick apart the logic of any of it. Fear, for her children and for herself. They were to build a home here, but it had become quite clear her children’s presence was met with ire from the Centurion. Did she challenge her? Push herself to rise as the matriarch of the pack, rather than what appeared to be as Stigmata’s little fling? Takiyok’s battle prowess would be fierce, but could it be as fierce as the mother bear, protecting her cubs?

Would it stop the cold stares given to her children? Would it ever make up for the ignorance and disdain Takiyok had placed upon her and Stigmata’s love?

“You are my sole friend and confidant in these ranks, Mahler. Stigmata… Thorn. Anyone I’ve held close is gone.” The smoky lull of her tone was eerily quiet as she still her form, murmuring in to the nape of the man’s fur as she tried to gather her thoughts.

Pulling back, her emerald eyes gleaming with the sorrow that wracked her very core, she met his gaze, holding him to her with the glance and imploring him. “What would you do, Mahler, if it were you and your children?”

She paused then, feeling the quake of grief once more press over her like the heaviest shadow. Mahler had lost his kill-brother. His best friend. “What will you do, Mahler?”

buoyed by the gentle pressure of her seeking muzzle, the movement of her lips against his nape, mahler was malleable to ketzia's need. but when she spoke of his children, stone flowed into the lines of his body. he had not protected his children, but run from the malady that had consumed their small bodies. it was a shame he held within his deepest heart, one against he would guard the remainder of his life.
"i vould go on, raise them to remember their father," he murmured softly against the bulb of one creamy ear, drawing her close against him. it was good to touch, he decided, to be touched, though he feared giving himself too freely would lead to improper allusions being drawn from his openness.
he did not pull away from ketzia, however; he sighed a great sound and blinked away the faint threat of tears. "i vill make diaspora a testament to vhat he vas, to who he vas. to who i am," he added, an afterthought falling droplike into the space between them.

Affection remained a fickle beast indeed. The warmth of his breath to her ear as he whispered to her almost as a lover would, the fueled reminder that touches such if these would never come from the man who had brought them all together. Would it have been too easy to lose her grief and numb herself in the throes of passion, the minuscule touches in which she brushed against his throat and cheek as he spoke to her, inspiring her. And yet she knew the guilt of it all despite born of innocence and longing to simply forget would only lead to further shadow their very hearts for what they had lost. 

Instead, she succumbed to the numbing pain, her proud form slouching closer to the ground as if gravity was the only answer to her unspoken prayers. ”I don’t think I know who I am anymore,” she whispered. 

Ketzia. A widow. A mother. A scorned lover who had aches to be higher on her beloveds list of priorities. A once fierce woman and sure leader who had become subdued by the shadows of those she did not trust. For her children, she would do better.

he descended with ketzia, unwilling to be parted from her in such an hour. and while he intended only to soothe her, mahler had grown aware of his own desolation, his inability to isolate himself more.
the gargoyle lay beside the little mother, turning so that she might tuck herself into the crook of his frame if she so chose, and watched her with a soft anguish to his stern expression.
”vhen my vife died, i lost my sense of self as vell,” he admitted, tearing back a veil that had become sodden to its secrets. ”i vandered and i searched and nothing came to me, until i let go of her.”
”it vill take some time, ketzia, but sometimes ve are passed through fire to harden us for vhat is to come.”

He withered with her—not in a fall to the ground but to catch her, as she had always hoped someone would do after years of having to remain strong. She missed the cheeky girl that had initially joined the ranks of Diaspora, and she blankly wondered if that girl had died along with her mate.

He spoke, continuing to soothe her as she curled in to his side, embracing his warmth, his comfort. The sun began to paint the mountains in daylight, and she stared at it bleakly—how did everything still look the same when everything had changed?

He spoke of a wife, and she pulled her gaze toward him, nose tipping up to graze the underside of his dark chin in quiet comfort. She could tell him she was sorry—but the ministrations in her touch would portray that, or so she hoped. She had not known the man had been mated once before.

She wanted to argue—to admonish and remind not just him but herself the unfairness of it all, as she and Stigmata had only just found one another. The last testament to their love for one another now lie in the den, sleeping, not far from them. And she would do everything in her power to salvage that. They were the reason she would forge through fire after fire.

Curling closer, the ivory sylph tucked herself to him, her muzzle burying to his chest as she cried silently—the rise and fall of her chest the only indication of the miserable sobs she barely swallowed, so as to not wake her children. “Takiyok and I. We did this, didn’t we, Mahler? He was pulled in too many directions… He was…” She trailed off, one paw swiping up to rub at the side of her muzzle as she attempted to compose herself. She did not even know the cause of his death—but the General, in his formidable glory, would not have fallen had he not been so distracted. Of that she was sure.

his eyes closed; he gratefully leant into ketzia's touch, allowing himself to lower the exhaustively alert  upholding of his inner veils. she had given much to him this morning, and mahler would repay it by becoming less of himself somehow. her sorrow had changed to be for himself, and in that he felt selfish, for he had come to share in her own grief.
ketzia shuddered; he grunted, lying his muzzle across the ruff that smelled of earth, of milk, and now of salt. until her words came again he held fast, and drew back only to seek the teary glint of her eyes with his own.
"no," mahler muttered, with an emphatic nature only reined by his unwillingness to wake the slumbering babes not far from them. "it vas stigmata's decision to be father to both your litters, and it vas a beast of prey that killed him." for she had not joined them in the bloody place, she did not know. 
relieved that she had not seen the man she loved in such a state, mahler turned toward the dawn again. "he vould be proud to see them continue to thrive, and you as vell, ketzia."

She quieted at his assurance, but she did not believe him—a beast of prey had taken her mate from her, as accidents happened. And yet how had he been in a place for it to do so? Stigmata’s prowess was what had built Diaspora—she could not believe a freak accident had been the sole reason her mate would no longer tread the mountains he had claimed.

Blowing out a breath, Ketzia gave pause as she heard a gentle rustle in the den. She paused, silence enveloping her, and she found near relief at the idea that a distraction could come to her in the form of one of her babes, awake and ready for the day.

Until she had to explain to them that this day, and those that followed, would be far different than anything they had experienced.

When no one shuffled out to meet them, and she did not hear the stir of tiny paws upon the dirt, she glanced upward, jewelled gaze attempting to hold Mahler’s own lilac, meeting his sorrow with her own. “And how will they thrive when their pack does not accept them, Mahler?” She could trust her pack mates to not harm her children—physically, perhaps. But the emotional damage was already weaving over them. The silence from her other pack mates as they were avoided. The withering glares.

Her voice, before quivering with a grief she had yet to fully understand, hardened slightly. “I will not stand for it.”

ketzia brought the fate of her children to him again, and mahler felt irritation rise in his breast. but he stifled it, for it was natural that she should fear for them, especially in the wake of their father's death. yet, despite the fact that stigmata had sired them, he was not the only father in diaspora.
"i vould not allow harm to come to them," he murmured in a gravelled way. "stigmata vas their father, but i too can teach them things, if you vill let me." she was atremble with the verve of motherhood, lovely in it; he could no more stand against her than he could disagree that takiyok's coldness would take a large toll from the last children born in diaspora.
but she was not alone, not now. the ironstar might have departed this mortal coil, but mahler remained, and would make penance for his brother's sins in the years to come, gladly and in the fullness of his heart.

Mahler’s word was all she had left in that moment—as jaded as the world had begun to carve into her thoughts, the trembling mother tilted her muzzle up, brushing softly against the underside of the stygian wolf—her only ally in that very moment. She had little choice but to trust him, and as the hollow pain of a world without Stigmata continued to settle upon her heart, the she-wolf remained coiled against him, seeking comfort in the darkest of times and quivering anew with guilt, anger, and heartache for all that had transpired.