Dragoncrest Cliffs a small graceless child

no posting order! <3

shoulder to shoulder, erzulie walked with @Jorunn through the lovely and wild lands of the coast. she drank everything with new eyes, and smiled often. both to her lover, sometimes to herself.
when she had found the trail of the tanzanite, she exhaled reassuringly and crooned a low polite yet motherly note to @Chacal. this was a talk for grown women.
she brushed jorunn's face with her muzzle as they waited.

some part of her still worried, in tired winding ways. but she knew rosalyn would not speak to sooth. the truth was the truth and the ruby woman was of sound enough mind still. especially for that conversation.

so she moved forward with erzulie at a shoulder.

the sounds of the sea soothed.

erzulie summoned her gold marked daughter. jorunn waited, prepared to offer a greeting of warmth when the tanzanite arrived.

Chacal pieced her world back together, even while certain pieces of it felt so far away. Safe, happy, but far. She knew she should be grateful to even know where her sons were. For Requiem to have been found alive was no minor miracle at all, either. And yet she still struggled a bit, knowing that they'd chosen to spend their youth with another pack...At least, though, they would have Ashlar to care for them. Augur, too, she figured. 

          When she found her mother, she was shoulder to shoulder with Jorunn, and both had a warmth in their features which caused Chacal to smile. She knew as soon as Erzulie turned her gaze upon Rosalyn, the same warmth and tenderness would still appear, and that Rosalyn too looked upon her wife and Jorunn approvingly. Chacal swept forward to greet them both lovingly, and heaved a deep sigh- a content one. The sigh of a mother whose children were all accounted for, and the sigh of a daughter who was happy that her own parents were happy as well.

"chacal," the ruby purled, returning her daughter's warm greeting. it boded well for their meeting, she thought. "de role of tanzanite fits you well." and it did: chacal had settled into it with the pride and confidence of a seawoman.
now erzulie glanced to jorunn before she went on. "we be comin' to talk to you, about de spring." she thought her eldest might assume from there, but continued all the same. "jorunn wants to be a mot'er. an' i would like dat to happen for her, wid your blessin'." now she could not keep the small smile from her face, looking between them once more.

she welcomed chacal near. warm and open. this was different than the conversation with rosalyn. even if the topic was still much the same.

perhaps her sudden worries and hesitation might bloom into something kinder under the hands of chacal.

a soft nod given to her lover for her to carry on. she smiled, even if nerves wound around her tightly. i have never been mother before, she whispered softly. but lenora taught me that i would like to be.

even if the girl was gone now, even if her heart ached deeply.

Spring. Chacal smiled, and her heart twinged, in a happy way. Erzulie, it seemed, was offering herself as support to Jorunn, which was implied without her directly stating so. Jorunn seemed to have some concerns that showed, but there was a nervousness there that Chacal felt she understood, and she nodded. Pregnancy, for the first time, could be daunting. She remembered the fears she'd had, the hopes she'd had too high, and the struggles she had faced- but she had persisted, with the love and help of her family. Jorunn, so dedicated to the pack and so loved in return, would not find herself wanting. 

"You 'ave been a wonderful influence on Lenora,
nurturing de 'eart of an explorer.
You 'ave also 'elped much with Aminthe an' Quennell before her,
So I give you my blessing to 'ave more." 

She said smilingly. She wondered what Rosalyn made of this- though she assumed easily that her mother already knew, and had taken no issues with this.

chacal offered jorunn a great praise. erzulie filled with love and with pride, that her daughter should accept the woman so easily. 
"thank you, cherie," the ruby murmured with a sweet tilt to her eye. she wanted to ask if she would be a grandmother again, but suspected so.
a grandmother twice over, if mireille joined her sister in the family way.
"rosalyn says she will raise dem as part of de pack. she said it would not be fair." this was the moment to say such things. chacal was her daughter, and the pirate was the final piece of all this. they were united in love for her, and so all would know her words.

she felt warm and bashful under praise.

some part of her fretted, but raising children to go out into the world was no less noble than raising them to support home, was it? regardless she was given a blessing from the gold dusted tanzanite.

thank you, chacal. her voice soft as it nearly caught in her throat. overwhelmed with emotions that she quickly blinked away.

for the time had come to discuss the pirate.

rosalyn had been right. it would not be fair, but it did not stop jorunn from wanting unfair things.

i know all will be loved by sapphique...no matter what role. but there was that lace of sad whimsy in the back of her throat.

Chacal so loved the siblings she had, it would've been a loss to her too, if she had had to tell her Maman that the pack wasn't secure enough for them to have puppies that year. She had seen how much energy it had taken from her, though, and was glad now that it seemed Jorunn would be the one carrying children. A first-time mother, but one who was young and healthy. Jorunn was an ideal candidate for motherhood. She'd already begun her journey into motherhood when she'd helped raised Aminthe and Quennell. 

Surprise and misunderstanding came to Chacal when her mother informed her about Rosalyn. "Well of course dey be raised as a part of de pack, Mama..." A beat, and a realization. Erzulie and Jorunn were to be the children's mothers, but Rosalyn...She was withdrawing from a parental role. She said it would not be fair. Chacal didn't want to believe that. It felt too soon for her mother to be withdrawing from opportunities, for fear that she would leave young ones bereft. The impending loss was something that Chacal pushed from her conscious thought, day after day. She sought Erzulie's gave for any tell that perhaps, she might've known something. If Rosalyn's state had regressed, before she heard Jorunn's voice. 

Jorunn knew that her children would be loved by all. Rosalyn would see them, love them, and be a part of their lives as well. She shouldn't dwell on what the longterm future looked like. She feared the loss of her mother, dearly, but that was an unknown. What was known now, was exactly what Jorunn had said. 

"Dey be absolutely loved by de entire pack,
An met'inks dey will be 'avin some company in fact.
Meerkat too, plans to 'ave young, 
an me as well- should de time come." She said.

erzulie reached to touch her daughter's paw. "dis be wonderful news!" she said with an exultant voice. "so many mot'ers. de sea will be pleased." and the children young this year would be old enough to help in the following. already she saw among them little hunters and guardians.
"sapphique be thrivin' so well." her voice was a bouquet of joy. "i am glad dat meerkat be lookin' more content. she belongs here."
even if the young woman did not. "so i will be mot'er an' granmot'er again dis year," erzulie laughed. "and yet i do not be feelin' old. i be feelin' blessed, truly." she kissed jorunn's cheek softly and looked out toward the sea which had always nourished their women.

Fade here?

Indeed, the sea would be pleased. A pack which had thrived for generations, with traditions and stories passed down from one wolf to the next. At the head of it all were the mothers, the cherished few who had given birth to Sapphique's children, her future. And with nature standing by, balanced by the role they played as predators, they flourished, as did the land around them. 

New blood had come to them as well, but had been embraced whole heartedly. Meerkat had been brought to join them, and even though Njord had been gone longer than planned on his trip, Meerkat's place and legacy with the pack had been established. To Chacal, she was one of the fold; another mother of the Sapphique children. 

"She do belong, an' she fit in well too,
she be a blessing to us, dis much be true."

As much as Chacal did favour those of her own lineage, it had been easy to accept Meerkat into the pack, and to consider her truly a woman of Sapphique. Women were granted this bias, though wolves like Meerkat and Jorunn had come by their endearment honestly. 

She loved Erzulie both in her role as a mother and as a grandmother as well. 

"I be so lucky to get to share my mothers wid my children, day and night." She said. 
"An' my children wid my mot'ers. It simply be right."