Haunted Wood we set fires in the snow.

vengeance's den is a void, home only to stale scents and decay that will soon devolve to nothing. on her way past the looming entrance, the girl pauses. she does not expect to go long unchallenged; when that careful period of grace elapses, there will be little she can do. she can, and will, fight tooth and nail to cement her position should need be, but she needs to know her allies, and those that will prove to be only enemies. 

it is for this reason that she calls for @Valour — two mornings have come and gone since that night, and she has not seen any sign of him. he's near, she knows, by the scents she'd been following. there are other conversations to be had, yes, but Valour ranks fairly high on the shortlist and so it is him she seeks now.

To say that Vengeance's death had caused problems in his plans was an understatement but that was not where his brain lay today. Valour had woken up from his dreams tormenting him, images of his dead father's body laying half rotten by the waterfall and replaced with Vengeance's. His mentor was dead, the man who was to thank for him not being dead or ending up somewhere where he'd be a weak little whiny pup like others he had seen. He couldn't figure out why he felt so badly about it, why the traces of Vengeance's scent he pissed over to get rid of them and make a statement made him want to shed a tear. The man hadn't exactly done much for him except torture him and leave him to his own desires all day, it wasn't like he had been a father yet...hadn't he always desired the man's attention and praise as if he had been one? He continued along the borders, noticing how Clay's scent was already gone from the borders. What was his reason for staying here now? He heard someone approaching behind him and turned to see Hela "Come to beat me again? I'd be careful, looks like Vengeance almost killed you too" the words were cold as ice and had little actual emotion, he just wasn't fond of having interaction with her.

anger, short and quick. not at his prod at her state, but at him. "my challenge was never personal. you made it that way, not me." she snaps, gimlet stare set on his. her tail remains even, stance easy, as if she is greeting an equal; this is not about a superior proving rank, but a personal disagreement she seeks to rectify now, before it decays any further. she'd been quite alright with brooding before she's fought Vengeance, but not anymore; not when brooding, anger, can just as quickly turn to a hateful challenge. gaze searches him, seeking that fragment of closeness they'd once shared; the grouse hunt, that day in the snow before it'd gone so very wrong. she is not vengeance, and amidst all the tensions, she can not deny her desire for a friend.

He gawked at her his stare full of disbelief for a moment before he turned, looking away his expression going hard again as his lips curled into a snarl. "Not personal? I saved you. Gave you a safe home. You thanked me by stealing my rank and killing my mentor" he was exasperated and honestly wounded. Above all else he was now being told that even this, even losing his rank and losing his mentor to the girl he could've let die, was his fault.  "I tried to..be nice. Vengeance said that friends are bad but..we made a great team so I figured maybe if I stole Vengeance's spot one day I'd bring you to the top with me but...I was dumb. Clearly that wasn't ever gonna happen" he ranted the anger and hurt out in a quick burst and then just stood there, expression cold but eyes holding a vulnerability that spoke to the emotions he was trying so hard not to let her see.

"you did," she admitted, "but being grateful did not mean I was going to stay in my place." she shifts, watching as he turns away. he's hurt, obviously, but incredibly thick to believe that she should be made complacent because he'd led her here. 

he elaborates, and it is clear he's struggling to hide his feelings. hers are warped, messy too, but she's just as unwilling to share them now. "vengeance is dead," she says bluntly, though the words still sound unreal, distant. "we can be whatever we want. so are you are with me, or against me?" he mentions bringing her to the top alongside him, and she fervently hopes he realizes that it could go either way. but she won't bribe him with promises; she needs to know where he tands.

It burns him to be given the chance to be at the top in this way. To be looked at and given recognition by the girl who had murdered the man he wanted to hear it from. Yet he wasn't dumb, he'd learned his lesson in impulsivity and what happens when you don't think things through so what he says instead is this "I won't stay in mine either. Never planned to submit to anyone in the long term. I'm not going to challenge you...if you do the same favor I was going to hand you. Make me your equal. No more fighting against each other. We can be a team" the words were risky in themselves but he stared her down. It didn't matter to him whether she accepted it or not because he had made it clear, in time he would be at the top of this pack where he belonged.

his request is bold, blunt, and leaves her silent a long moment. to reject him right now would to cement him as her enemy. if he remains within the Nightwalkers, he'll be a constant threat. if she chases him out, or he himself leaves, he's all too likely to seek some sort of vengeance (hahaha but also rip , his anger having simmered for certainly long enough. if she accepts—it'll be a striking sign of weakness, with no guarantee that he won't simply turn on her once they are of equal standing. and not one, but two pups barely shy of adulthood leading the pack—she knows how others view her already. 

"you said we could have been friends. a—a good team. be it, then, support me, and if you're right I'll promote you alongside me. not before you prove we can be." gaze is just as resolved as his, auds pressed forward. she will not get rid of threats by giving them power. but an ally, a friend—she wants dearly for more of those alongside her.

Like the child he was, a part of him was not entirely pleased with the fact that she found a way to not exactly deny him but to leave him with more work to do and still on the short end of the stick. The other part of his brain, the part that was forced to mature faster because of how things went in Nightwalkers, figured that it would have taken more time for him to reach the top of the pack himself anyway and with Hela as his friend and Warlord he figured he could be better off than anyone else. Swallowing down his pride and suffering a small blow to his ego he nodded "Equals though...how do I know you'll really hold your end of the deal?" he asked her while staring at her with some doubt though he shook his head "Either way, I don't intend to stay at the bottom too long" he left the declaration at that and went silent. After all that was said he had to admit that she had done something that he couldn't have pulled off without having at least another six or so months to train. "So friendship. you know how it works? Cuz I had one but...I'm not sure it'll work like that with us"  it was meant to be more of a joke than anything else but he thought of Clay and how soft the boy had been, how Valour had been the one in control and Clay had needed protection.

"how do I know you will?" she challenges, "if I promote you, you could turn on me." a stalemate, then, where the best option was to do something she'd done very little of and liked even less; trust. 

he seems to accept the idea, however, more or less, and so she eases somewhat. "we'll have each other's backs," she offers, remembering hazy memories of Scylla and their exploits. they'd fought, quarreled, but when it came down to it were closer than she'd ever been with another wolf. "the rest, we'll figure out." it is a good enough start, and a much better situation than the one she'd walked into.

It was tempting for him to point out that he could have already turned on her many times over, especially here and now where he was certain if he attacked she would go down easier due to her wounds. Instead he kept his jaws shut tightly and nodded, simply admitting that she was right. He could. She offered having one another's backs and he supposed that was already a step up from what they had going here already "You got a deal then if we can make it work" he said and then his expression changed softening slightly "I guess I should offer a congratulations then, since we're trying friendship" he didn't sound entirely pleased to be saying it but his tail gave a slow wag behind him "I'm glad that it was you who did it since I didn't take the chance. Someone probably would have. Black Hat or Vanity or Tzila" but it had been a child who took down the Warlord. If he wasn't so butthurt about not being the one to do it he probably would have laughed at the memory of the fearsome man who got killed by a little girl.

an eerie smile curves her muzzle when he finishes talking. "but they didn't" none of them had dared; Vengeance was unmovable, omnipresent, powerful. had been. her features settle then, back to seriousness with discontent mixed in. "when I challenged him, I didn't mean to kill him. but then, in the middle of it, I realized it was him or me. and I'm not done yet." 

that was a detail she had not, and did not plan, on revealing to anyone else. perhaps it was a nugget of trust in the new him and the new tentative alliance they had; perhaps she knew she had the tell someone, just once. with that, she surveys him once more before nodding curtly, spinning on her heel in the direction of the borders.