Arrow Lake one breath, it'll just break

She was antsy—the morning sun just grazing the horizon and the lake she had settled before, feeling a certain pull to the area now. She had wanted solace—time to think, a moment to process. When she still came up feeling overwhelmed by emotion, she tried a new route—she shut that shit down and blankly stared to the waters before her.

Her skin felt like it was crawling in some ways—her paws finding it hard to truly sit still.  The fog along the water began to burn off as the sun continued to rise—though the air remained cold, grey clouds rolling in the distance that signified a storm could be coming.

She thought of the man who had stumbled upon them in the storm. How he had seemed to get lost from his friends.

Idly, she wondered how easy it would be for her to become lost physically, when she felt even more so emotionally.

it felt like a plan was taking form.

and as the rough edges of it started to smooth, germanicus began to second-guess himself. still distant in some small ways as he pushed upon it, the imperator took his run toward the lake.

his muscles had become harder in the last three weeks. winter had carved what little fat there was to spare from his sinewy frame.

and as he rounded the glorious corner of the shimmering lake, he found there one of the last individuals he had wanted to see. 

genuinely germanicus bore meadow no ill-will. his resentments lay solely with arsenio. she had not known and reyson — reyson had been forced to retire.

the imperator slowed his run. he held no ill-will and yet he held no gratitude or platitudes. if he was honest with himself, the desire for her was still there, forced far down beneath all that had happened. 

but attraction was not a reason to act. it had not been before.

"lady meadow." his voice was unreadable and cool as the rest of him. his yellowpaint eyes turned to the darkening horizon and he was silent otherwise.

The quiet was becoming—lost in her search for inner peace and answers, the she-wolf slowly shifted closer to the ground, her slender form stretching out, back curled to the oncomer of the lake, copper ears tuned toward any hint of sound across the still waters.

But it was a noise from behind that drew her attention, arching her neck over a shoulder as her eyes raked over the familiar form of the Imperator. She was surprised—and then a blush rose—for only then did she consider he had wanted to show her this place. And it should not have been entirely surprising to her that he stood there now.

She faltered for a moment—perhaps she should leave him to his thoughts and lake, for was this not where he sought solace? Flustered—she was about to apologize, to give way and allow him whatever he had come here for, when the clipped tone of his voice greeted her, cold and impersonal.

She blinked. And then she felt a cloud of annoyance—and with a nod to the man, and a murmured “Imperator,” she turned back to the lake, unmoving as had been her plan before. Because now, just to be petty, she was going to have to stay here at his favorite lake until her body became dust in the ground just to spite the fact he had become such a cold stranger.

germanicus meant to keep walking.

instead he passed meadow and plunged his hard legs into the frigid bite of the lake. he rinsed dirt and red sand from the fine charcoal hair of his limbs and lowered his muzzle to follow, drinking a space aside.

the droplets of water arced from his chin to follow as he turned his head toward her. 

it felt he should say something else. something more.

"surely there is enough in epoch to keep you closer." maybe at one time it could have been a jest. now it only held an edge that inched toward mean-spirited: unlike germanicus.

unlike who he wanted to be.

He strode past—fortitude, hardened. She watched him openly—his tone prior only reiterated with the hardened wall he presented her now and he bathed, ignoring her completely.

If she had been seeking zen here, earlier, it was all moot, at this point, and her eyes in turn hardened.

A brow arched at his words. They hurt—of course they hurt. They had not parted ways well at their last interlude, and yet the man before her had told her he held her in high regard. Apparently, that was not the case.

“And yet I can say the same for yourself in Mereo, I’m sure,” she noted, grimacing now as she pushed herself to her paws. Unlike the soldiers in her life who could keep themselves as solid and blank as stone, she had never held that ability, and she gave a swift shake of her pelt, turning from the man. “I’ll leave you to find your thoughts at your lake, Imperator. It seems you could use it more than me right now.”

germanicus cut a harsh sigh and rose from the waterway. "meadow, i — lady meadow," he corrected sharply.

and she was to be reyson's own.

he cleared his throat and looked out across the expanse of lake. "i would be remiss if i suggested that you should not blame yourself for things you did not know."

his eyes met her own. "if indeed you did not know them." only ignorance would have driven her to akashingo. but perhaps he meant to barb. to test.

He spoke—her steps giving pause as she looked to him. He seemed to collect himself from something—his anger? But when he addressed her next, she found herself blinking in confusion—

—until she realized this had nothing to do with their last conversation here. The day she had tried to pry more from him… and received the closed off soldier.

His gaze met hers. Her conversation with Tamar replayed in her mind over and over again—a soundtrack in repeat the moment it had happened. But never before had Germanicus been voiced as knowing anything. 

It almost seems to me like you might know more than I do on the matter, Imperator. Yet it made no sense to her—why would Mereo be so closely allied to Akashingo? 

Especially with the implication that he had known Tamar and Arsenio had tried to remain hidden from the Pharaoh.

"i do," germanicus confirmed with a roll of commanding baritone. "that is why i would have told you long ago to stay away from the palace."

and yes, creeping tendrils of pride, demanding that he recoup even a small portion of his injured pride from beneath arsenio's tongue.

but she had been allowed to traipse there in full ignorance, and now she shared guilt with him. even if he saw no evidence of that in her now.

and it was a guilt that could have been spared.

Emotion spiked her heart—thrumming in her chest as honeyed eyes studied him with perhaps what could be described as an open bewilderment. He had belittled her on every account in this moment—and the silver lady truly believed she deserved the ire if only to pay her dues for the storm she had very likely brought on to Epoch.

What she didn’t understand is what the Imperator was angry with her for—and while she had paused when he beckoned, she also did not know why he kept her here to continue the lash of his tongue. “And yet you send your own there and have allied with them. Protect them.”

He knew something of Akashingo. His words more than implied such—she would never pretend to know what. But what it did occur to her was that the man before her very well had made a deal with the devil.

"what i do, lady meadow, is protect the future investments of mereo. i do not live in the present. only the days to come. better to have eyes inside the corridors of a madman than not." she had met him, had experienced a taste of his seeking hunger, certainly.

"and the ones i send are ready for it. designed for it. not innocents sent into the belly of the beast. that would be you."

harsh! too harsh! germanicus felt the sting of his own resentment bittering his mouth. his yellowpaint eyes flared for a moment of heat and passion and rage and something else lurking. 

"you never did detail what the pharaoh said to you." the soldier was a cold-rock imperator now, thrummed by her beauty and expressiveness but a tactician's serpent. "tell me."

“You lay with the devil,” she clarified for him—a tactician she was not. But she was a woman who held her friends close to her as fiercely as one would family—for they were the only family she ever had. And in this matter—the tears of Tamar and the heart-wrenching sobs that had seemingly torn at the woman’s throat—that alone could only bring about a wave of protectiveness from the silver arrow.

She would have argued Reyson was not ready for it—had never been ready for it. Had begun to fray in the realm of Akashingo—

—or had it been her, that acted as the catalyst, when the Pharaoh had demanded time alone with her?

He insisted her incompetence at delving into the land—she did not argue it, could not argue it—never had she been prepared for what had emerged from what had been such a simple decision at the time: to spend some time with Reyson. What stirred an arch of her brow was the demand of his tone now—an order to her—a wolf of Epoch—

—she was not his. He had ensured that.

“You lay with the devil,” she reiterated to him, eyes locked upon him, “and then demand of me to tell you the intricate details of my visit?” The Pharaoh had used her for information—she had given it freely and naively. “I shouldn’t have to remind you that I am not a pawn in your strategies.”

"devils are for heathens and pagans. i serve what i can see. ramesses is a man and nothing more."

germanicus was also a man and therefore cultivated refusal of his flaws. one such was a flickering pride and wounded by arsenio it raised head with gritted teeth and snapped proverbial jaws at meadow who had indeed proven to be some sort of catalyst in the end.

"these intricate details are of use in the goal that has always been foremost to me. you have already laid epoch open to his eye because you did not know who he was." she had already been a pretty pawn for arsenio had not seen fit to warn her. "now you withhold any indication that he means to move against you and therefore mereo. despite what might have been said, meadow," germanicus murmured, taking a single step forward to tangle hard sungold with the deep amber of her open gaze, "do not make the mistake of believing i would allow that man advance in any part of these mountains without a swift and violent answer."

his heart galloped in hard dust that ended at the blustering bloom of a visceral need to prove himself and the passion that burnt in his belly.

Her world felt aflame—the very same as it had when the maplewood had burned around her. The chaos—the cries. It was something that remained tucked away in her heart, and just as she had felt helpless and useless then, she felt the very same now—whether it were flames devouring her family or wolves, the result in the end would be the same.

“Ramesses is a man who has built a kingdom on religion and fanatical beliefs and embellishments. I don’t need to be a tactician or soldier to know the very real danger of that,” she noted to him—for did Mereo not play their role, then to continue to humor the Pharaoh’s ego?

She moved—his gaze intense toward her, and she drifted further from him and to the edge of the waters, her eyes hard upon it, every inch of her being very much perceptive of his nearness to her now. Cold, calculating—the very same aspects of him he had revealed to her during their few conversations prior, when the man would place his wall before him.

“I would like to trust you, Germanicus,” she whispered—her tone smoky with the emerging of grief. “And you need to understand that I will do anything it takes to protect my family. So I’ll ask you to be honest with me—Epoch is not your ally. Something severed between you and Arsenio. I don’t need to know why, that is between you and him… What I want, is your word that if anything comes from this, it’s Epoch that you back—not Akashingo.” She didn't want to look to him now--but her eyes pressed to him, intricately studying him, looking for anything that resembled an ounce of honesty upon his coldly masked features.

"but you must be such to see the process of waiting and biding and appearances," he delivered with a swift voice.

she asked of him an ultimatum. he did not want to give it, not because he trusted akashingo over epoch, but because she slighted him in the same manner as arsenio had done. they believed guile and cruelty of him. and logically he understood that company kept defined one but it was intolerable to the shreds of his clinging pride.

"there is no way to gain trust without proof. what have i said to you? that i would move against him if he arrived to claim some pound of flesh." she was not listening and he felt meadow sought the upper hand. "i am not asking for your trust nor your loyalty nor your alliance. i am telling you as plainly as i am able that you must have a plan. and if you will not involve me, go home and decide what you will do when he comes to your doorstep."

his gaze was almost a caress save for the thorns crowding its edges. "we are not allies, yes. how many more of epoch will suffer for it?"

The calm waters lapped at her tiny paws—so small, in comparison to the company she kept, both now and in life. Inconsequential, even.

His words were as liquid and waning as the water. She felt a small smile pull at the corner of her lips, but it was not one of amusement—if anything, a certain sorrow had begun to blanket her once more. “You have said many things, Imperator,” she offered, quiet in her agreement to that—“And so if I go by proof and action, if I go by your belief to serve only what you can see—then all I can see that Mereo is allied with Akashingo. And if Arsenio had believed it appropriate to share with you what I know, he would have done so already.”

She mused on that for a moment, and turned from him, a slender shoulder given as she padded back to the dry shores—the stretch of arrow lake no longer becoming with it’s offer of fortitude and silence. Now, it seemed a long walk home, with far too much her mind and heart wished to bear.

“What you refuse to say speaks far more loudly.”

He wished to try to place death of her pack upon her—and she would take those words, and she would hold them to her for now. And with a flick of her tail, the healer would begin to make her way back home—resilience only found in a stolen moment of realization that her trust in others and herself was almost entirely shattered now.

arsenio, the same one who had allowed her to go heedlessly.

germanicus would later regret this but would not allow himself to recognize it. let there be no more ties between he and epoch.

reyson could not keep her safe. and if the imperator were a better man than his wallowing and angst, he might have seen his own sordid jealousy leaping to fore.

as it was, he contented himself with the breaking and marched home once meadow had gone from earshot, straight-backed and tight-jawed.