Dragoncrest Cliffs yon sèl flè

mireille felt it must soon be time to relocate the young ones beyond the den circled by protective thorns, but today's thunderstorm steeled her nerves for another day. she had almost lost sobeille, and now was hesitant, more thorough with her choices. more anxious too, mireille supposed.
knowing val or one of her elder sisters would remain with the young ones, the obsidian wandered the strip of cliffline where the blackpines grew, watching the roil of the darkening sea as lightning bit across the sky, and a thin rain washed through sapphique.

hope u don't mind me tossing another one of my idiots at u LOL

A storm had begun to snarl across the cliffs. A whip of white light that breaks the blue-gray stain of the sky, something that was perhaps a bit reckless to be wandering about in.
And yet, here she was.
The darkling weaves through the trees — another dangerous game, but she felt a desire to busy herself. Lonesome and boring was her den, a brain that itched for stimulation.
She hadn't been aware of Mireille's silhouette, at first, merely snuffling at a patch of moss that climbed up a nearby pine's root. It could be useful, she thought. But Maleah's eyes were fond of wandering, and they find the cinnamon oceanwolf just beyond another swath of foliage. She squints, trying to recall if this could be someone Chacal had mentioned — until she notices the swollen pink-red teats that sit at her belly. This had to be Mireille; who else was nursing?
She says nothing, at first. Merely leans a jagged shoulder upon the trunk of the tree, and resumes whatever it was she had been doing. What was she doing? Flighty today was she.

not at all! <3

a step in the land, one unknown; slanting scarlet ears and then a tip of her muzzle along the curve of her own shoulder. a woman in repose, a woman made of charcoal and bits of goldcoin, silvered when the flashes of electricity bit through the ocean skies a second time, a third.
next to the small litheness, mireille felt positively ponderous, bulky with her rippled belly and changed hips. "you be new," came her stunning observation, followed by a tracery of her emerald eyes along the shadow-shot details when lightning forked over the sea.
the rain was beginning to dampen her red fur against her salt-built frame; mireille turned away back to her patrol, but the movement was slow enough to be an invitation.

The redwoman speaks, so she thinks, and her head is swiftly turned in her direction. Yes, a chirp, a birdlike twist of her head. I'm Maleah, the new medic. Chacal inducted me last week, or so, A few shuffles forward on stilted limbs, blinking pale gold eyes. You must be Mireille? The co-leader. Chacal told me a little about you.
She had not entirely expected such a vibrant cinnamon to come from a sister of Chacal. She supposed she knew not what their parents had looked like — or if they shared the same biological mother. There are little freckles that dance across her face, a power to her strut; a studious emerald gaze, and Maleah feels almost as if Mireille is boring holes in her.
She steps forth, a turn of a newly softened body away from the woman of ash, and she finds herself meeting her stride. I hear you just had your first litter? Congratulations.

maleah, a new healer. mireille felt a twinge of tinny pain to consider her mother erzulie, how this had been her role. it was good then, for a woman to take up that heavy mantle once more. "oui," the obsidian answered with a low exhale. "i be mireille, an' my children number four, thank you. thibault, sobeille, tousaint, an' chantale."
her eyes were curious toward the darkfurred woman but for now mireille asked nothing else of her own curiosity. simply, the rote; "how be you settlin' in sapphique?" a kind, vapid inquiry, but women learned swiftly how to communicate outside the spoken word.

A list of names. Thibault, Chantale, Sobeille, and Tousaint. Cultural, she presumed, based on the heavy accent and the way they flow from Mireille's lips like four birds taking flight. Maleah responds with a swift nod, a cheek-filled grin. I'd love to meet them, a subtle offer to babysit, should she need it.
She's asked how well she's settling in. A loaded question, one she has to think about. It's beautiful here. I'm excited to call it home, now. Everyone's been very welcoming, one feathered ear twitches. but it is a little intimidating. You guys are so close-knit. I'm still kinda learning my place. a breathy laugh with that.

mireille smiled at that, a curve of lips that slid to a wider, jovial grin. "dat be by design. my mot'ers came from a pack where de leadership was always allowed to be challenged. dey ended dat here in sapphique and de dahomey-rivanis have held it dat way since."
something in maleah's interest piqued mireille's own. "any woman already be havin' a claim to de lan'." her eyes flickered over the nightweave features, the set of the other's mouth. "usually we have babies to secure us once we come of age, an' raise dem here wid no unrelated man."
a brow arched, and now she truly was teasing, testing with a little sharper grin the allusions made, the fit of maleah to sapphique.

The Dahomey-Rivaini clan, the redwoman says; a constant leadership, a monarchy, of sorts. It wasn't a bad idea. Maleah herself had only known chaos within her previous homes — war. A clinical nature to her presence there. A purpose, no bond; tend to soldiers' wounds with a polite smile and send them along, wait for the empty bed to be filled. Sapphique seemed the complete opposite.
But change was welcome, sometimes.
Your mothers were smart to keep men at bay, a teasing tone to her voice, lilted as a laugh bursts through her previously timid expression. I come from places where winning wars were really the only goal, y'know? Testosterone with such a heavy presence, you could smell it wherever you went. Tikal had the holcan, yes, but with ajaw at the head of it all. A staunchly masculine leadership. And the Saints—
Well.
Chacal had hinted at the no-males policy of Sapphique, but Mireille seemed to expand upon it with dazzling colors. It's a welcome change, though, don't get me wrong. I get tired of them sometimes.
The obsidian goes on to speak of the children, the ones with no paternal figures. To her, knowing the amount of men that wander these lands with no ties to their children anyway, it made sense. Perhaps she'd be a much different woman had she been born in a place like this. She gives a thin-lipped smile. Sounds like your kids live peaceful lives, huh?

the scarlet ears were attentive and thoughtful as maleah spoke. she had seen war and known a place where men ruled, neither of which were mireille's personal experience. "i only be carin' for my brot'ers an' my nephews now. dey will be raised de proper way, an' will become proper men because of it."
something pained touched her expression. "my brot'er, sobo. he was raised here. an' he died defendin' us."
her throat clenched.
the smile maleah offered was small. mireille wanted to draw it out into the sort of expression that had lit the woman's eyes only a moment ago.
"peaceful. yes. sheltered. if it were not for how large we be, some might call us isolated." and that too, was as the obsidian preferred.

Proper men. While perhaps not intentional, perhaps meant to frighten or intimidate her, test her; the redwoman speaks as if she is selling a shiny new luxury to her. Maleah's teeth glitter in the waning sunlight as her smile stretches.
And then, a brother.
Sobo, his name was.
I'm sorry to hear that, she shuffles, clinical in her own delivery, which she frankly dislikes. But there was little she could offer for grief. There was no medicine. So she then adds; I'm sure it's not easy to carry on in his absence. I wish there was more I could do aside from, um, try to help where I can.
Peaceful, sheltered, isolated; this drew a question from Maleah, this time with a curious tilt of ragged ears. What do most pursue here, if they aren't... warriors? genuine, as honey-lemon eyes search for answers within the evergreen of Mireille's.

do u wanna fade this in another round and have an updated one? <3

but there was nothing maleah could do, and mireille felt it keenly, the isolation in that moment. at least between them, if briefly. she did not wish for the other to carry her pain, or to know how the bite of it felt against oneself.
"you listenin' be enough," she said, and with feeling. "my sister be a bard, a singer, an' a hunter. i sometimes track de waterways an' de tidepools. my mot'ers were guardians. you can choose anyt'in' you like, maleah. de world be open to you."
the sunniness of the other's eyes was suddenly hard to bear, as this talk of sobo twisted her heart. "i should get back to dem," she said, a bit apologetically, but colored in a soft mien that asked for more time with maleah.

yes!! <3

The person Maleah found herself looking upon in this moment was but a girl. A girl, still learning to navigate the world and all its sickness. A girl, who had learned the shape of grief in multiple forms, and of new life alongside it.
Too young. She was too young for something so bitter, and yet Maleah in her own youth knew it too; oh, how she knew it.
And there was nothing she could do.
I'm always here to listen, she wets her lips with a pass of her tongue; solemn eyes, reaching for Mireille in a way that said she knew. always. I feel like it's one of my best qualities.
The world is open to her, she says then, and truth be told Maleah didn't have much of a response. Her whole life had been built around healing; medicine, death, birth, poison, remedy. Her fascination with everything from the morbid to the resolute and beautiful grew tenfold as the moons went on. Never once had she questioned it — but was there true use for someone like her here? 
Go. Be with your babes, the redwoman avoids her eyes and Maleah does not press her further. She retains her smile anyway. I'll be here when you need me.

<3

she found that with maleah she did not feel so prompted to answer, to forestall. the obsidian instead offered a warm look and a sigh. 
and the knowingness squared itself, in that moment;
a flicker of eyelid, a nod, and mireille understood she did not need to speak. on impulse she brushed the other's cheek with her muzzle, and then went away at a long trot, headed for the thorny tangle and her nest tucked within.