Raven's Watch calm before the torrent comes

Tonight, he watched the sky.

Uncertainty had cloaked him for a spell, though well guarded and hidden beneath his features. They had begun to amass a following much greater and powerful than ever before and the growing pains of such were not entirely lost on him. Solpallur was uncomfortable with the undertaking—all these new faces, all these wolves rallying to a cause that he did not believe they understood. Whether or not they answered their own hringja or were interested in their own self-preservation he did not know, and had not yet sussed out. He would, in time, but for now and some time both he had withdrawn to the higher climes of the mountain.

From there, he had rested and healed from his trials and tribulations, to curb and quell his own acrimony and all that it dared to taint. His hock had mended where the wolf from the nearby pack had seized it and tore the flesh, leaving nothing more than a bare, toothy row of skin where hair would fill back in; he thought of the pain it had caused less and less and with it, the anger had faded too. A misguided effort, a miscalculation on his part—he disliked that he could have risked potentially worse injury, that he had underestimated the survival instinct of another.

It mattered not, however, as his gaze drifted across the night sky and it’s constellations.

He knew this pattern well, being among the first he had been taught. Winter was nearly upon them. The mountainside had become slick with snow and ice just as unforgiving as the duo that commanded the terrain. The ravens had gone to roost more often, though their trinkets were scattered about on the plateau-esque ridge he was seated upon. He had begun to gather the bones they brought him here, arranging them into a crude pile on which they had come to add to. Small bones, nothing more, nothing substantial to hem them in and deign it a cairn yet.

@Stjornuati would be coming to him soon, he knew that—the ravens had brought him tufts of his brother’s pallid coat. His travels were halted now, though snow had yet to truly blanket the lowlands, and Solpallur inferred that information would be forthcoming. He needn’t summon him there either, for his brother would always find him, would know him better than any other. So he waited, scrying what he could from the astral as darkness and silence both enveloped him whole.

It was an amusing thing to him, that the ravens carried their fur between the two brothers, as if the avians knew the bond the two shared and kept them informed, in a way, of the other's wellbeing. If only they could carry with them tellings of the emotional turmoil that consumed Stjornuati's inner self in this moment, a stormcloud hanging over the golden man's head as he started the climb for the summit of the watch, all the while keeping an eye out for his pale-feathered friend.

It was not until he reached the one of the higher tiers of the Watch that he found his other half, a low chuff loosed from his chest as he drew close in final approach, butting his head against his brothers side before taking the seat next to him. A heavy sight left him then, looking out upon the stars that held so many secrets yet, ones that he wished he could glean an answer to all this nonsense from.

A solitary raven called from a nearby roost in the minutes that passed, but Solpallur did not hear it the way he should have. They made plenty of sounds, their ruckus commonplace. It was a different call that fell on deaf ears, one that would have told him that Stjornuati made his way up the stony path to him had he not been so entranced with the night sky.

It held memories for him that were drawn out by the taste of bitter cold air, though so far it hadn’t been cold enough to suit him. Not cold enough to frost his back as he stayed stock-still and glossy-eyed, watching the glittering night sky with its low hanging moon well behind him. The sky here was not quite the same as he recalled it in the deep parts of the north. Their travels had been long.

And now, what had become a temporary reprieve along their travels had turn to something more concrete.

The chuff drew him out of any sort of knowledge he could have gleaned from memories etched across that sky, his head turning to receive sight and awareness of the present as Stjornuati pressed against him. He rumbled a loose greeting, not quite as annoyed as it sounded. The nights were long, he could read and scry all he wanted to later, if the clouds did not move in. It was his brother he attended to instead, picking up on the stressors that lined his pointed face.

“Þú ert órótt,” he assessed. “Ferðir þínar?”

How he wished it was as simple as his travels that troubled him, his dark eyes not moving from the sky as his brother's presence emanated a calm that Stjornuati basked and relished in. Nei, He answered after a time, another deep breath pulled into to expand his lungs, the thin quality of the air making him work harder for such inhalation.

Það er systir okkar. Hún svíkur okkur með hjálp drengsins. Stjornuauti knew that even though Solpallur kept to the Watch's heights, he would know of who he spoke, as he had shared with him the gaining of the northern male, the one of Tartok. Ég hef bundið þá báða við Vaktina í bili.

A darkness spread across his features as Stjornuati spoke; the notion of betrayal burned at him hotly. Though his face was ever stuck in a mode of displeasure, there was no murkiness to cross his features. It was crystal clear, much like the rumble that sounded deep in his chest.

Valmúa.

“Þú veist að þeir munu ekki,” he grumbled. “Valmúa hefur alltaf gert eins og hún vill.” And the boy from Tartok? Solpallur didn’t know him enough to speak on him, but it did not surprise him that the ósterkligr njósn would follow her and her wily ways.

“Kannski ætti ég að kenna honum lexíu.” It was a dark statement, deep and pitch as his coat, finished with a click of his teeth. But he knew the best way to strike at his half-sibling was to strip her of her pawns, and what not a better way than to introduce himself properly and test the mettle of one of his brethren?

Even as hið ónefnda, inciting the wrath of one would be to incite the wrath of both, thus he was not surprised when his brother rumbled and rowled at the news Stjornuati delivered, nor the words that would follow. It was true that their sister had always had a will of her own, but he had never expected her to work against them, work against something the two of them sought to build. Then again, Valmua had always been one to destroy a sand castle, rather than help someone else build it. Or perhaps his mood now colored his memories. Either way.

A huff of laughter left him, a darkness glinting in his eyes as he looked out upon the land that they sought to claim for themselves. Það væri kennslustund sem hann myndi aldrei gleyma. Better he learn now than later, when the stakes would be higher and their patience thinner. Einnig verður að kenna Valmua kennslustund. The question of how lingered in the air, a matter Stjornuati was open to suggestion over.

Bad news was not all Stjornuati had to share with him, however. Rökkvi fylgdi símtalinu til okkar. A glance to his soul-bound brother, a grin upon his maw. Rokkvi would be loyal where Valmua had not been; a fact that the paler male took solace in.

“Ég skynjaði hann,” he murmured in response to the statement of Rökkvi. This too left Solpallur with mixed emotions; it was bad enough to have one sibling turn up, but two? He did not understand the purpose their hringja had put before them, or why it tied them to the duo that had long departed them. Though the statement was simply, he did not need to express to Stjornuati that he had not gone to receive him.

“Margir fylgja okkur núna,” he went on, feeling uncertainty pierce him as he let his gaze return to the night sky. “Þetta er óvenjulegt fyrir okkur. Við erum örlagarík, en er þetta verk af hringja?” His ears splayed against the crown of his head; how unbecoming of him to have doubts.

But these wolves in their company were not the first to follow them.

“Veturinn kemur og kannski þessir úlfar ætla að spara aðeins sjálfir.”

<3

It was no surprise to the star-eater that his other half had sensed their blood-brother; the two of them had always been in tune and whether that meant something preternatural or something deeper than that, there had never been any question. Such was the nature of their bond of souls, forged in the deepest, coldest reaches of the north. They were closer than blood, closer than lovers, understanding and complimenting one another in ways so intricate that to attempt to detangle them would only bind them tighter.

His eyes, too, traced the stars that his brother read, a calm taking hold of his soul, tranquility wrapping 'round him tightly as it had nont in days. Solpallur's presence was a boon upon his own, a fireside warmth extending to embrace the golden kissed wolf. Where his brother's certainty wavered, Stjornuati found his own strengthened, bolstered even in this gentle reverie granted up higH on their spire.

That word. Their.

He inhaled, the breath cold and sharp and heavy in his lungs, for it was not just air that filled him but pride.

Þau gera. His voice was firm, a surity filling him that had not quite been there before. Það verður eins og það hefur alltaf verið. Þeir sem eru ekki tryggir og sterkir munu ekki endast lengi. Back at the Keep, they'd have been driven out into the cold. Here, the only difference would be the climate, for even in the dead of winter, Stjornuati would not risk a disloyal wolf.

Speaking of disloyal... Ég er að tala við Valmúa. Hringdu eða ekki, ef hún reynir að svíkja okkur aftur munum við senda hana í burtu og skipa henni að snúa ekki aftur. Stjornuati did not relish in the idea, but the fire-clad girl had cast her loyalty aside for no more than a yearling that she had attempted to wrap around her finger. Ætlarðu að sjá um leikfangið hennar?