Noctisardor Bypass [r] fevered

merrick — goodness;
he was talking to himself again in a bald muttering that clashed and fell to the darkened floor of the cave. the bearwolf entered without hesitation.
aventus in his unsaid unheard thoughts might believe silvertip to have been a fel omen. and merrick did not know that his son possessed such sentiment. 
his own was as follows: there they were tested and the parts of ursus found wanting were chipped away. this was not his doing nor his choice. he was the mouthpiece for the bear spirit and that allowed fanned the flame inside his tattered skin.
that and perhaps —
"aunt @Laurel!" he hissed in a faux scolding tone, dashing after the movement up ahead. the end of her tail perhaps, bobbing desperately just ahead.
"i know you're not alone."
merrick drove on through the deepening black of the cave.
"i know you've got another brat with you, auntie. but i caught the other one —"
merry, cheerful, delighted laughter ringing out.
"— i got him."
he pounced now, aiming blindly, forepaws extended to strike and to hopefully knock against whatever body he found in the lightless passageway.
and then teeth would sear. woe betide laurel and poor unknown @Indra III.

Hope its OK to throw Indra in first heh...

She couldn't hear anything except the pounding of her own heart in her ears, her own wet breaths as she ran as hard as she could, the pounding of her feet against the ground; but it was more the shock of each stride that reverberated through her than the frenzied beat of her gallop.
As Indra raced to keep up with her mother and find her way in the darkening cave, the sounds of the chaos outside diminished. The last thing she thought she'd caught in her ears was Abel shouting — but it was so faint, and she was so stressed, that she had to let that fall away.
It felt like everything was moving too fast.
There was a voice, clear as day, echoing in the chasm behind them. It was not one she knew and it called for her mother — it said something about Abel too (—I got him.), which made her look wide-eyed to her mother's flank to see if she would hear it too, or stop.
Lungs burning now; Indra could taste something bitter rising along the back of her throat and when it met her tongue it was like copper, it made her want to spit. She coughed instead and began to lag behind.
Mmuh! She began to call out to Laurel, trying to make her voice work, but it was a rasping noise.
Out of the dark came fists without aim. One battered across Indra's lower back and she felt her knees buckle and grate across the cavern floor. Adrenaline shocked her system and she scrambled to be free and to run as teeth singed the air over her head.
Indra kicked and clawed to be free and to be with her mother. All the while she could not help thinking, why was this happening, why does he want you, he's got me; mom he's got me!!!

lmk if i interpreted anything wrong <3

Laurel kept rushing Indra along, even though she had no clue where she was headed. She dreaded every second that she might run into a dead end instead of a hopeful escape into the world beyond. Having Indra along sure slowed her down, and Laurel noticed that they were going slower and slower. When Indra faltered, Laurel stayed with her, knowing that she couldn't leave her child to the claws of her deranged nephew; even if it meant putting her own life in danger. In a hushed voice laced with panic Laurel tried to convince Indra to hurry up, even though she could tell that her baby was worn to the bone already. Come on honey, keep going, we have to hurry, we have to keep —

That was when Laurel heard Merrick say that he knew that Laurel was with her child, and worse, that he had Abel. Laurel stopped dead in her tracks, then swallowed and said to Indra in a hushed, though clearly panicked voice, He's lying, don't listen, just keep going. She didn't hear Abel's voice, after all. Besides, if she turned back now, Merrick would get them all. Laurel's heart ached, for even though Abel was a clumsy boy, she did love him. She felt torn apart between turning back and keeping going, but she had to tell herself that Merrick was lying. It was the only way she could save at least herself and her other child. She could not sacrifice Indra's health for potentially saving Abel; it was a fool's quest.

But Indra was slower and slower until finally — and somehow still very suddenly — Merrick was upon them and somehow got a hold of Indra. Laurel turned back immediately, but when she saw Merrick here, she just froze.

Brought back to the place where Iliksis had been upon them. Indra told her to fight, fight, fight, but Laurel's body just frozen in place. His face was mirrored in Merrick's for a flash of a moment while Laurel stood face to face to him as he hovered over Indra. She knew she had to be brave, but her feet resisted as the world seemed to slow down to a grinding halt and she just stared at the scene like a deer in headlights.

a small body, spinning in the blackness; merrick's teeth caught at nothing. the figure was not laurel and he growled in anticipation. the other child then, thrown into his path as an act of cowardice.
heart thrummed; kill and kill and kill the bearwolf snapped his teeth and would have grabbed the little worthless scrap had —
was it?
red fur vermillion and autumnal and his own stomach dropped out from beneath him as he towered over the struggling child. hard paw shot out and pressed into her ribcage, promising a snap if the spawnling continued her fight.
he did not look at laurel.
his single eye blazed down with anger and surprise and rage and a deepening satisfaction;
"she's her."
the bearwolf lifted his muzzle. "no wonder you left the other one." laughter like dry leaves.
"i came here to find you. to rip your throat out the way i should have the last time we met. you're the reason she's fucking gone. you're the reason i had to —" 
punish her
but now indra wasn't gone, was she? he looked down at the child, marvelling openly. "but then i came here. look what i found. maybe i'll reunite her with indra."
now, regardless of kicking legs or terror or cries, merrick made as if to scruff the girl and begin to drag her off.

Indra sucks in the dust of the cave and turns her head, one way, the other, writhing. Above her is the one eye and it glows like a streelight, swirling and lurid with fairground illuminations. An unwashed beast of a man: a shag with a lopsided grin.
The girl can barely breathe let alone call out to her mother. The filthy man is pressing against her ribs. He doesn't labour much over her puny quaking body. She's gritting her teeth. He's laughing.
The girl lets out a sob while the man talks. She pulls herself as far away from the fetid breath that unfurls from his lips. Indra opens her mouth to plead with him, or to beg for her mother; her mother who is right there and she's staring just like the man.
And then a tug, and Indra feels herself being dragged back. Her eyes widen like saucers. Reaching feebly to rake the earth. She can't even get enough air in her lungs to scream but the look upon her face telegraphs as much.

Time came to a grinding halt, at least for Laurel, as she watched the scene unfold in horror. Merrick's face lighting up when he saw Indra; the venomous words pouring from his mouth. All Laurel could do through it all was stand and stare and pray for another saviour, like the day that Vespers had saved her from Iliksis.

But you're all alone now, sweetheart. No one is going to rip his throat the way she did mine. No one is here, because you chased them all away, let them all die.

The frightened, out of breath expression in Indra's eyes. He's going to kill her, and it's all because you were too cowardly to stop it.

NO! Laurel screamed suddenly while Merrick started to drag Indra off; half to him, half to Iliksis.

She bounded after them with a sudden speed. Laurel wasn't sure what was happening to her. She felt out of control of her own body, red before her eyes, and with surprising speed she impacted onto Merrick, aiming for his face, aiming to cause pain, aiming to do whatever it took for him to let go of Indra.

If he would take away her reasons to live, she would go down in flames with him.

merrick was thrilled; he had come for laurel but had found a greater thing and a more direct way to shatter her.
and then she was upon him. his teeth tightened once upon her child and then merrick released, buffeted away from the girl and back into the darkness. pain illuminated the side of his face, blood rivuleting down his right cheek.
"there it is!" the bearwolf laughed. his unhinged guffawing filled the cave.
for now he had forgotten the child who wore the face of his mother;
run and i'll find you
and once more his virulence birthed a new hate and one that brought him forward. merrick reared, hoping to wrap his forelegs around laurel's shoulders, her nape, her throat.
his own teeth bit and tore and slashed; his single eye was wide, unblinking;
he expected her snaps to open new wounds along his muzzle, his mouth, but when merrick did not have his fangs full of laurel, he was laughing, endlessly cawing a raucous trail of boyish giggles into the unlit recesses of the place that he meant to be a tomb.

As the man pulled at her nape Indra scrambled her limbs, reaching through empty air as she reared back. One thrash of his shoulders and she'd be done. 
A scream pierces the air - then there is a slam, and release. Indra hits the dirt so suddenly that she feels her breastbone clip the cave floor; she's gasping, staggering away while chaos unfolds over her.
As she tries to run, laughter spills from behind her again. This time it is maddeningly clean - her first thought is a memory;
The older girls wandering within Rivenwood, talking, laughing. Indra slinking somewhere out of sight to steal a glance —
The man is grappling with something large and fierce and dark, and in that instant Indra does not see her beloved mother. She doesn't recognize what is happening. They are matched in some violent dance that ignites the last of her panic and all she can do is turn and run.
Her legs don't want to obey her, but they must. She throws herself to darkness and hopes somewhere along the way, she finds the light of freedom at the end.

He released Indra in an instant, and Laurel could not help but wonder if that was what he wanted all along. Oh dearest, always so naive — but Iliksis' words were drowned out by the clash of battle. Laurel was not sure what it was that drove her forward; if it was something — or someone, dearest? a mad chuckle — taking a hold of her, or if it was really just her own force, her own will to protect Indra, driving her forward. RUN! she screamed, snarled, while she set herself upon Merrick's face. The moment that his blood entered her mouth, everything changed. Iliksis' voice was drowned out by her own thoughts — Is this what they feel like when they kill? Is this why they can't stop hurting others? Am I going to become a monster like them? — but then she set herself further upon him, tearing into his cheek. Unable to stop. Nothing but a red haze filling her mind.

With blood streaking from his cheek Laurel made a grab for his right front leg; she could stop him from pursuing Indra if she could contain his leg, or make it hurt enough that he couldn't physically follow her. At least not at his full speed.

Everything was a blur of blood and anger (why was he doing this? how had she deserved this? why hadn't Mahler listened to her and attacked Ursus when the tables were turned and their numbers were greater?!) and an all-encompassing madness that grew with every drop of blood spilled. Laurel was not even sure if he was fighting back at all, or if he was just madly cackling and shouting and screaming and enjoying the pain in his own sick way. But even though she didn't know if she was attacking someone who wasn't fighting back, Laurel sank her teeth deep into his right paw, not planning to let go until she tore out some part of it to cripple him down from pursuing her daughter.

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indra was fleeing —
that's all you ever did mom all you ever did was run away
but merrick couldn't care at the present —
i found you once i'll find you again
laurel's teeth were beginning to splinter bone, and the agony of it was so very blinding that it was a marvel in itself, that fangtip should grind and grind down, a mortar and pestle-weight cracking kernels in a staccato pop-pop-pop, but it was not wheat nor corn it was;
merrick's two middle toes, stretching and twisting — the sound brought his ears up with a cruel and malicious and overwhelming interest —
they separated and blood geysered into the black air.
"oh you fucking bitch," merrick seethed in a voice flat and glittering with murder —
"you better hope i die or i'll make her pay for this."
indra would never make it past all of ursus.
the anguish; he seized its bleeding twisting ends, the part of him beginning to fray beneath the pain, and tied them together into rage;
like whiplash he was upon laurel again, and this time his yellowed teeth sank hot and deep and fervent into her shoulder, slashing tissue and fur into heated ridges beneath his tongue; swallowing her blood in harsh volcanic draughts;
now i'll kill you

Mature Content Warning

This thread has been marked as mature. By reading and/or participating in this thread, you acknowledge that you are of age or have permission from your parents to do so.

The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: violence / blood

She couldn't see if Indra was getting away or if she was cowering behind. Hopefully her daughter would listen and make a break for it. Hopefully she'd find a safe place. Laurel's mind drifted momentarily to where Indra might find herself if she ran all alone, but she knew that she'd find her way back here, to Rivenwood, eventually. She had to. These thoughts passed through her mind as she dug deep into the toes of the man she hated most in the world. Not me, dearest? Almost disappointed.

No.

Not even Iliksis could match the hatred that Laurel felt for Merrick. He had taken away the one wolf in the world that Laurel loved and cared for more than any other in the world — and that loved and cared for her in the same way. She wasn't going to let Merrick do that to her again. She wouldn't let him take Indra again.

Blood gushed up and she kept biting, biting, biting until there was a sudden sharp pain in her shoulder. She yowled in pain as he dug deep into her shoulderblade and released his foot at once, sending sprays of blood across both their pelts and into Laurel's screaming face. However much she wanted to stop him from pursuing Indra, from leaving her alone, from going away, Laurel knew —

The only way she could end this was to kill him.

Laurel didn't know how she bit through the pain. I'm a wonderful painkiller, dearest, once you set my bloodlust free. She didn't know if Iliksis was lying or if it was really him who was behind the steering wheel now, or somehow reinforcing her. She didn't know how she got so strong so suddenly. Loss of control had never felt as good as it did now.

Blood-splattered teeth sought for his sensitive throat, planning to end it all here and now.

laurel's scream was nectar. her violence came at the cost of his own empowerment. merrick tasted her hatred as well as her desperation; he sawed his narrow scarred head back and forth back and forth back and back and back — tearing open her skin, flaying his aunt down to the muscle of her shoulder;
laurel's scream was nectar but the feel of her teeth upon his throat was a sensation. "do it," he garbled out as her jaws crushed harder and harder
do it so i can be with her again
do it and none of this would matter any longer; not laurel not indra, merrick separated from ursus and flung skyward.
he felt his own blood trickling once more through his fur;
he felt it mat and collect along his chest;
draining from punctures along his neck.
merrick wanted to scream as the cold realization dawned over him, icemelt poured atop flames; her grip was too low, only mangling his skin;
she was even fucking incompetent in this, her salvation.
the bearwolf roared and jerked from her grasp, cutting himself deeper in a necklace of slashes that would scar the same. he beat savagely at her with his own fangs now, thrusting his rangy weight against laurel;
agony starved his limbs of feeling;
blood-loss starved his throat of breath;
but he was fervently and horribly hateful now, ready to die in the recesses of this cavern if it meant too that laurel would be without breath, that they would be at an end.
aunt and nephew, clashing with the violence of a thousand years.

Do it.

This caused confusion — did he want to die? was he just messing with her? — but Laurel kept her firm grim, not truly in control anymore. That's how it felt. Nothing could stop her now.

Laurel was not a skilled fighter. This was probably the first time she'd ever been in a real fight; every time before, Laurel had frozen in place, ran, or tried to intimidate others into leaving. Of course, she'd shed the blood of prey. It was different, though, to hold the throat of another wolf in her jaws. To hold the throat of her own nephew in her jaws. The last remnant of Indra that she had, but she knew that it was better to let him go. He'd torn Indra from her, after all.

The pain in her shoulder was no longer like a whip lashing and clawing at her flesh. It had become a numb feeling as it droned on and on. Blood dripped through her teeth and that was all that mattered in the moment. Merrick's blood. It wasn't working, though. He wasn't yielding. He should be dead by now. Laurel could feel that she was off, that her lack of experience and the weakness from the pain had made her miss her mark.

I'm sorry, Indra. Her own voice, this time. I'm sorry that I couldn't save you. I'm sorry that I'm killing the child you loved.

I'm sorry that I didn't kill him when he drew his first breath.

Finally teeth released and with a surprising precision Laurel grabbed onto his jugular at last. She could taste victory as she gripped this familiar place — it was almost like killing any regular animal — but her head was swimming from the pain and the blood loss. She was not as skilled as Merrick at being wounded; this was probably the worst she'd been wounded apart from when she was little and Jhala grabbed her by the throat.

Now it was her teeth around someone else's throat.

Just as her teeth closed firmly around his jugular — to kill, to tear it out and send his blood spouting across the floor of the cave as he would gurgle and choke on the blood of all of his innocent victims — she could feel her consciousness waning. Laurel couldn't tell as her vision faded to black whether she had done it. If she managed. If she finally avenged Indra. If she released the tormented soul of Merrick from the world. She didn't know if she had tore through his jugular, or if she'd passed out before she managed.

The last thing she thought, though, before she passed out —

I hope I wake up next to his corpse, or never at all.

And then, icy cold words from Iliksis, low, threatening —

Don't worry dearest.

It's not your time yet. I have plans for you yet. You won't die.

I won't let you.

the raid will be concluding here! thank you to everyone! also referencing

merrick did not know how long he had lain there.
his fur tore and matted as he wrenched himself away from laurel, blood coating them together. the bearwolf stepped forward, catching himself on his right foreleg as he fought for balance. 
a low unngh of pain sounded through the cave like a hiss as wretched agony shot through his full form — merrick vomited at once but stayed upright, slamming his left shoulder into the dark wall to keep himself that way.
laurel was unseen in the dark, but the scent of her blood was heavy and promising.
merrick licked it from his jaws and chuckled. the fluttering of his heart told the man that he was in trouble, but the welling of triumph ate through the anguish.
one foot next foot next foot last foot first foot
over and over, weaving and staggering and blacking out for moments at a time.
but eventually light welled larger and larger, and he caught indra's scent, goatish with fear.
merrick blinked his single eye and gathered his strength.
the call that came for @Aventus, @Arielle, @Val, @Stryx, @Bernadette, and Æsilfír (@Chacal) was all but wolfish; it was a strained and ragged cry;
find @Indra III
bring her back
leave
a three-step process during which he would need to rely upon his son and the bruin-heart.
and dealer's choice to ash whether or not she to wanted to drag off her little prize.
merrick quickened his pace, vision blurred.