Dragoncrest Cliffs deity of scars

Svalinn made for Sapphique’s borders a while after the bear’s attack.

He gave them time to regroup, to heal, to mourn their losses before showing his face again. He wanted only to see how they were recovering – if there was anything at all he could do for them. Plagued eternally by a thousand regrets and pretending as if none of them hurt, he emerged from the haunted shores of Ankyra Sound with a rabbit clutched firmly in his jaws.

At the cliffland’s scentline, he deposited his gift at his feet and howled for a representative to greet him.

who was this?

a man on their land. she did not recognize him, having been sent swiftly out of consciousness by the bear. she knew not anything he had done for those who stayed with sapphique.

she only knew what dangled between made him less than here.

her gait was slow and stiff, but she came. eyes filled with a hardness that had not been there before the bear. before all the loss.

what?

she ignored the watering of her mouth at meat.

Svalinn watched the dour approach of a solemn-faced she-wolf, his ears pressing forward at the sound of her flat greeting. He took no offense; he tended to greet most others in much the same way and that was without the grievous overlay of recent deaths hanging over his head.

He bent down to push the rabbit forward. This is for whoever needs it. I thought your hunters might be recovering still. The vagrant took a few steps back, allowing the sandy siren reign over the kill. It was a meager offering, but it was all he had to give and at least one wolf in Sapphique could have something on their stomach. Even this guardian looked like she could use it.

wary.

distrustful of a man who came bearing gifts. what did he want? messing with and disappointing the women of the cliffside? she thought she saw asmodeus in the pales of his features. a man who had been good for one thing. a man who had given pleasures only to disappoint tenfold.

it was an unkind judgement to cast upon him.

but he had come at an unkind time.

and why? what do you hope for?

still she brought the offered rabbit underneath her. she would sooner send him away than return what he had given — no matter his asking price.

Svalinn blinked as the lines of skepticism deepened upon her face. He shook his head, taking another solemn step backwards as she gathered the offering beneath her own paws.

I don’t hope for anything other than Sapphique’s well-being, he answered. I share a history with its founders. This was my sister’s pack. Val is my nephew. I may not belong here, but I will support you where I can. Even if he had to leave rabbits at their doorsteps under the cover of night. My name is Svalinn, he offered in the hopes that she would not be inclined to chase him away if she knew a tidbit more about him.

she blinked at him with sunken eyes.

he was connected to val, the only grown man present for sapphique now. connected to founders who no longer stood upon the sand. change had come in the bear's blood. now he sought to come and stick his nose in post-tragedy — on going tragedy, really.

svalinn.

if she could have, she would have placed a hand on her hip to face him squarely.

jorunn. tiredly grunted at him. do you mean to stay not belonging? but it would not be up to her if his answer was to stay within. help them in more personal ways.

Jorunn.

Svalinn bobbed his head to the siren of sand-and-driftwood. His fire-brown eyes scanned along the haggard lines of her face, the tender sag of her tired back, the stiffness of her wiry limbs. Something about her made him feel exposed, like a raw nerve. He considered her question, knowing what he wanted and knowing that his reason for being here conflicted with that.

Yes… and no. A soft admittance that might have been bashful if not for the stoicism that etched him a permanent expression. It’d be an honor to serve Sapphique. I will serve it, where allowed. But I belong to the sound. It’s where I was born. He motioned towards Ankyra, the direction from which he had come. And I wait there for the return of my daughters.

men!

gluttonous heathens unwilling to commit! daughters he spoke of and yet it did not soften her at all. why were they not already with him? why did he not go after them?

she soured with a soft tcht sound.

and you serve just for good nature?

a skeptical brow raised pointedly above hardening copper eyes. he had already said such and yet her heart! to drenched in acid.

She made a sound of discontent, and Svalinn read her face which had become shadowed with distaste. Having been raised by an archfiend of a mother and briefly married to an impetuous shrew, he had learned to detect even the most minute changes in expressions out of self-preservation.

Women!

Temperamental. Quick to judge. Easy to offend. He was used to it. By now, it all rolled off his back like water on a duck. Though he did wonder what he said that upset her, he knew better than to linger on it.

At her query, the raybearer snorted. Hell no. It was almost laughable. I don’t do this ‘cause I’m some altruistic sap. And I wouldn’t do this for just anyone. I serve because I know my role. And I want to serve Sapphique because it was born from the pack founded by my mother, a tried-and-true siren. There was pride there, even if he knew his sole purpose was to serve the she-wolves in his life. But I’ll only provide for those who want me to.

she snipped with a sound that might be considered laughter. the first bout of it following the bear. yet it was an achy, tired sound. short lived for the relief of her ribs.

at least, she thought, this man had enough sense to gather some bluntness about him. to speak the truth of his intentions a bit better. his mother a siren. she thought of erzulie and sobo longingly — the only thing that could have softened her at all.

fine. begrudgingly, but perhaps just a mere degree warmer than before. you should speak to @Chacal or @Mireille. she tilted her head back to call specifically for them now, hoping one might be free to come see this svalinn.

but for now, he was still stuck with her. jagged jorunn who had moved into the place of a once more forgiving, softer woman.

sharp-edged and lean with anger, mireille answered the laramite's call. jorunn could not replace her mothers, nor did she wish the woman to do so. but she was not only pack; jorunn had become family, tied tight into the tapestry of she-wolves who defined the cliffs.
it was erzulie's scathing look she raked over the man of pale gold, seeking to pin his eyes with her own in silent judgement as she stepped forward, starting to circle.
"what do he want, jorunn?" mireille drawled in a tone that bid the man shut de fuck up.

When she seemed to relent, even if it was just an inch, Svalinn felt a modicum of relief. He knew that his ability to remain undisturbed in the sound would rely heavily on his relationship with the wolves on the cliff. Sapphique was not Rusalka, for better or worse, and it would do him well not to end up on anyone’s bad side around here.

When Jorunn’s howl had died away, he bobbed his head in wordless gratitude. In the silence that followed, he seemed to want to speak, but hesitated, perhaps concerned by what she might say. Has there been any more casualties since the attack? he asked, forcing it out.

Mainly he wondered after Wing, who had not been quite out of the woods before his departure that day. Surely Val was okay, since Jorunn did not immediately inform him of his death when he’d mentioned him as family, but he dared not ask specifics.

Soon after, they were joined by a scarlet naiad, who was not familiar to him except for the carving of her expression. She reminded him of the dead corsair, whose name he wanted desperately in this moment not to recall. Thinking of her dredged up memories of the heartbreaking sounds she had made over her deceased loved one, followed by images of her disfigured body and of what he imagined Raleska had looked like the day she died.

It was enough to make him wish that he had not been here to witness such tragedy.

She didn’t address him, so he did not speak, but the sunbearer looked down at the dead rabbit between Jorunn’s paws, which seemed the safest place to look. At least it couldn’t stare daggers back at him.

lost some. do not think more died.

and if they had, she had been too lost in her own healing to see it. hear of it. sobo and erzulie weighed over them all. the loss of rosalyn perhaps may as well have been another death, and yet jorunn held her heart close. willing the woman she loved to come home. she did not think she could lose both so close to one another.

but she was not inclined to speak these things to him. nor did she imagine he'd care about the woes of her mourning love life.

"what do he want, jorunn?"

stiffly her neck turned. eyes warmer upon the obsidian.

this is svalinn. saying he wants to help sapphique. val is a nephew of his. sapphique supposedly born from his mother's pack. she paused, wondering if the redhead might know more about that than jorunn did. the winding relations that predated her. but the sound calls to him and he waits there, even if he serves sapphique. says his mother is a tried-and-true siren.

she rolled the rabbit out from under her, towards the obsidian.

brought this too.

mireille snorted at jorunn's explanation. her hard greenstone eyes never left the man. svalinn. she tasted the syllables and found them wanting. 
he had brought fresh meat and yet she found herself far more focused upon their familial ties. that he was relative to val dragged the man up one single rusted notch in her estimation.
val had earned his respect. this one had not.
"an' who be your maman?" mireille demanded in a harsher tone as she came to stand beside jorunn once more. she did not know him. he had proven nothing. and now he asked to squat just below the cliffs as if he owned the sacred sound.

Being summoned immediately sent Chacal into a defensive state, and summoned a thick growl. Her hips and lower back still aching from the pain of open wounds, she plodded toward the borders with her eyes bloodshot and stern. There was no panic in Jorunn's voice, but Chacal had little patience for trivial border calls at the moment. She did not want any more loners coming to join them- not while they mourned. She simply wished for the pack to be left in peace, until they were ready to open their hearts again. 

She'd forgotten about the pale stranger, but seeing him again eased some of the sternness from her features. Mireille bristled, Jorunn too looked tense. 

She'd not spoken to them of the pale man who had offered his help. She had not taken his help easily, and she regretted that she'd had no other choice but to allow him to tend to Wing while Jorunn, Val and Theo had lain unconscious. She saw the slain rabbit on the ground, and flicked her eyes from one woman to the next, before looking back to him. 

She approached, and uttered a soft growl; an indication that she expected for him to stand still, and suffer a more thorough inspection. She remembered his claim now- and sought to find through scent if he did truly belong to them. She flicked her tongue over her nose, and pushed her whiskers forward. Exhaling soft puffs of air, she brought her muzzle toward his. Her tail arched- an indication that any violation of her proximity would result in a punishing blow. She sought with each inhale to find anything she might recognize.

And it was upon this one single rusted notch that Svalinn would cling, dangling feebly from the sea-weathered rung like his life depended on it. His ears pressed forward as Jorunn relayed his proffered spiel, and he made no motion to deny anything that she said. The cayenne she-wolf demanded more; she glimmered like a redgem in the sand, a warning sign to all who approached.

Caiaphas Eyjolfur, he responded. Val called her The Sea Witch.

Though she had been no witch to him. Just Ma.

The gold-caped wolf from the day of carnage arrived then; all of her surging like blacksmoke from a coal train, heated and pressing like the force of a hammer upon anvil. Svalinn remained very still at her command, lankly allowing her to inspect him as she wished. He had felt enough teeth upon his hide that he no longer feared it. In fact, his very first moments in life had seen him tattooed by the hate of bedeviled fangs. He was not afraid.

But he was reverent.

skippable unless addressed!

obsidian and tanzanite were here now.

svalinn continued his case and jorunn felt her part had been done. the family of sapphique that stood above her could handle it from here.

she was merely here to be teeth, ears and eyes.

the man of moongold to his credit was silent, even when chacal arrived with a powerful step. mother, warrior, tanzanite; mireille watched with something almost like pleasure as her sister winnowed out this svalinn into the very atoms of his scent.
feeling the incredible power of the deepening bond between the women of sapphique, mireille looked toward chacal now. "caiaphas eyjolfur," and it sparked something primeval and remembering inside her. but perhaps her elder sister might confirm this sensation.
mireille stood against jorunn's shoulder now and regarded svalinn with interest under the iron of her gemstone eyes. "your nephew was de only man who stood wid us when de bear came." not even her own da had done that.
not da.
njord.
her eyes sparkled with enraged tears now, for sobo, for quennell; how she was desperate to know he and swordfish and stingray lived.
"you be lucky you share a name wid him." rusalka. the moors. mireille knew pieces of her history but was too incensed to put them together.

His stiffness was acceptable. Any fears she might have had that he had come back to be repaid were vanquished as he allowed her to trace his scent back in her memories. Deep into the core of her instincts, where a mere scent could trigger a recollection and for a time, there was nothing familiar about him. 

The name, however, caused her ears to prick. The seawitch. Her breath hitched and she held it for a moment. She pressed her tongue against the roof of her mouth as the acidic tang of terror was recalled. It was not Caiaphas' name which had sparked it, but something familiar about his scent that made her recall someone. She remembered the girl...The one whose shoulders and brow were marked with ash; whose skull had been crushed and dashed upon the cliffs by the hefty paw of Shardik! She drew in a sharp breath and recoiled so she could see his face, her narrowed pupils shadowed by the drop of puffy eyelids. 

"Raleska," She breathed, a name which had never touched her tongue before. The name she knew; the face, the sour eyes, the way her mothers had treated her as one of their own, though she had had little to do with the children. Something about him brought the brooding young woman to mind. If he was Caiaphas' son, then Raleska would have been his sister. But that did not male him Valravn's uncle. 

Her eyes clouded. "Valravn is my brot'er. We were raised side by side.
I remember de scent of Raleska; I was dere de day she died.
Who be you, then, Svalinn? Why do you call 'im your nephew?
I know how he be related to me- but not 'ow he is related to you."

She believed now that he'd fabricated something; spun some story of a relationship which did not make sense, thinking he could get away with it since Erzulie was dead. She would be the only one who would know exactly who he was- and why it was he'd lied about being Valravn's uncle.

Svalinn looked towards the redgem wolf as she spoke about Val. An air of pride swelled in his chest, though he made no move as the other wolf inspected him still. She called him lucky to share a name with the brave descendant. I’m very fortunate, he concurred. Eyjolfur wasn’t a name to be trifled with. The fact that Val might have even been named after him made him doubly privileged. Proud to be related to a wolf like him.

Suddenly, the Anubis took in a sharp breath and stood back, looking up at him with her freshly scarred face, as if in the middle of an epiphany.

Raleska.

The sunbearer felt his heart leap up into his throat as he turned his head to look at her, but his perpetually somber expression went on without changing. Still, his insides twisted with hurt. He wished for a day when the mere mention of her name wouldn’t feel like the reopening of some grievous wound.

The sister-leader went on to speak in rhyme and for a moment he thought she was giving him a riddle. His brows knitted together in befuddlement, and he stumbled over her words in his head. Oh, he hesitated. They didn’t know what Val knew. He wondered if it was his place to say. You might want to hear it from Val instead of me. Let him speak his own truth; let him confirm that Svalinn was no deceiver. He’s your brother. I’m just a stranger. It’d be better coming from him.

mireille kept herself from openly gaping at chacal as her sister spoke of a story she had never heard before.
it seemed that the man was not lying, and then it seemed as if he had. her emerald eyes moved between the tanzanite and the wolf who was a stranger, but not. 
his denial, however, immediately switched the obsidian's tail into an audible slash through the air. "you want to join de pack but you want to sit in de soun.' you be related to us somehow but you say someone else be needin' to do de tellin'."
mireille was unimpressed, but his hesitance did stay the majority of her ire. she would have liked him to be sent away at once, but wanted also to hear her sister's opinion of what she was rapidly regarding as a mess. had svalinn even intended to join? mireille waited for the conversation to move on.

In his features, she saw regret. He knew Raleska, then, but she couldn't place how he would have been, to her. Still- if he was related to Raleska, that did not make him a relative of theirs. Not by blood, anyway, though the girl had easily been considered family while she'd been alive. 

He seemed unwilling to answer. Chacal's tail flicked, and she could sense Mireille's fading patience when she spoke. Telling them to go and ask Valravn sounded, to her, as though he was trying to back out of the confrontation. He sounded like someone caught in a lie, who wanted very much to run away the moment they turned their back on him. Chacal, too, was not satisfied. 

If she had to take a guess, Mireille wanted him gone- and not just from Sapphique, but from the Sound as well. Chacal was willing to send him off, but she wanted the truth from him. She knew that the easiest way to get the truth from him would be to put him with his back against the sheer drop of the cliff. Faced by three Sapphique women, he would either tell them the truth, or have a few seconds to consider his folly before he was dashed upon the rocks below. 

But alas, they weren't as close to the cliffs as she would've liked. And she couldn't simply sing him a siren song and make him follow her, as she had before. 

He had helped them, in their time of need. And somehow...he was of this place. 

Still a man, though. A man with lies.

"Tell us what it is you know-
if Val also know it, 'e will tell us so." She said, simply. Before they addressed whether or not he would be tolerated at all at Ankyra Sound, she wanted to test him to see if it was all a farce. After all- if he told them one story, and Valravn told them another- that would settle the dispute altogether, and they could chase him away.

A muscle of tension flexed along Svalinn’s jaw as the flame-furred leader lashed him with her accusatory tone. He started to have flashbacks of his contentious marriage with Drusilla, and he was suddenly glad not to be a younger wolf; one filled with rash behaviors and hair-trigger reactiveness. He let out a breath and gave one long blink.

I’m not here to join Sapphique, he responded flatly. I can’t join and still keep my promise to wait in the sound for my daughters to return. I told them I would be there. They could understand that, right? I only came to relay my allyship. You are the wolves that stood by my family, so I will stand by you, and I don’t need a rank or to carry your scents to know who I serve. I will do what I can for this pack as long as it is welcome.

He looked between the three of them, though focused mostly on the body language of the redhead in the middle. He didn’t know what he had done to offend her – and he could not possibly know that his mere existence was a full-on affront to her senses – but she seemed the most ready to chase him off.

The gold-slicked leader recited a short rhyme to him then. His mouth replicated the feeling of sand on his tongue, and mouth dry, he swallowed, nodding to her. I don’t have a problem telling you. But it’s more his story than it is mine… Sorry, Val. I tried to let you be the one to tell them. His mother is Raleska, my sister. She wasn’t ready to raise him, so she gave him to Erzulie and Rosalyn. I presume to be raised alongside you. It was only pure irony that neither himself nor the sisters before him were actually related to Val by blood.

mireille felt her spirit pin some of her loathing for men on this one, this supposed half-relative. he clarified but she did not apologize, for his next pronouncement floored mireille in a way that perhaps was more intense for chacal.
confusion flooded through the young obsidian, and then hurt for val. how long had they known? and why?
it would be like her mothers, to take in a boy and make him their son.
she swallowed and for the first time the anger lanced out of her boiling skin. her eyes moved to chacal, as much for interpretation as solidarity.

She could feel her sister's ire. She did not like having a man linger so nearby- not in hopes of joining them, but simply to wait for his daughters to come. That, at least, she could appreciate and forgive. She felt uncomfortable, having another wolf settle on Ankyra Sound...But he had helped them, when they had needed it most. His job had been without thanks, but she figured by allowing him his request, they might have their debt paid. 

His reluctance to speak didn't seem to stem from the chance it was a lie- instead, it appeared to be more of a burden he felt might sound better coming from the source. She did intend to speak with Val, afterwards- and if there was any discrepancy between their stories, she could just as easy hound Svalinn away from the Sound. 

The news fell heavily, but at the same time...It was not impossible. She felt none of her affinity for Val disappear; he was every bit her brother as he had been when they'd been young. It was slightly alarming to then have to admit than a man who was not their blood relation was so deeply rooted in the pack- but he'd been raised as one of them from infancy. Valravn was as integral a part of Sappique as he had ever been. He was one of the few wolves in Sapphique who could trace their lineage back to Rusalka, as well.

Her expression smoothed slightly, though there was a slight crinkle in the skin at the corners of her eyes. Grief found its way back to her. She felt herself tiring fast. She gave him a nod, and turned her softened gaze to her sister and Jorunn.

"Svalinn 'as 'elped us after de attack.
I feel what 'e says...no honesty lacks. 
We accept your gift, but need to know more-
when your daughters come, what is it you will do on de Sound's shore?"

The Sound was immediately adjacent to them. Would he seek to found a pack, or was this simply designated as a meetup place?