Ocean's Breath Plateau avappasugjuk ⏧

there had been no time to tell her sun man and the star hunter of what had happened. not until rodyn went off with ariadne, carrying the new lives which must be given milk and warmth.

when they were only two figures in the distance, kukutux rose wearily and called out to @Aiolos.

our island daughter has gone beneath the long dark, to begin to sedna. she takes a daughter with her.

kukutux felt her throat emit a long hoarse sob, one not easily controlled.

two sons have been born to rodyn's hearth, and watched over by ariadne, i have sent them all to moonspear.

her voice was a pouring cry; her heart lay open and rent and torn with such an anguish that far surpassed any suffered thus far.

the others must come. @Vairë must be told, though she lay now resting after her own birth. it was why kukutux had not sent rodyn to her hearth. three children, a first birth, to lose a sister — too much. sialuk too was first mother but she was older and with only two to nurse between she and elentari.

moonwoman felt it was the way things must be done.

@Shikoba, @Ajei, @Massaraq, @Kassuq, @Arrluk — all she bid to arrive, to gather for the death songs.

she called out to @Kausiut, even if her daughter was not close; her spirit must sense the tearing.

and for @Saviguk, now called mauruk, too now a song.

once she had done this for those upon the mountain, with sialuk only at her side.

now would the nuiruk clan pour their strong spirits into forming a way for their sister's return among the stars.

kukutux had seen the preparation of those dead for burial.

she knew the words.

had she not made a death ulaq for her grandfather?

moonwoman had buried before, but now as the loss of a child pierced her gut, she turned to her old words and her old ways. reaching back through a memory tinged all in grief and fire, kukutux found the birthing chant of her daughter's first breath, and it was this she sang softly in muted ululation.

the bundle she had brought was unrolled, her things laid aside. kukutux brought her child from the den and lay the quiet body here, arranging limbs in sleeping movement and placing a soft piece of rabbitskin over the silent eyes.

here kukutux did stop now to cry, to weep aloud against the unmoving form, to clutch for what essence of nature remained to define her daughter now. that cloth she had meant for a newborn, some firstgift of a practical item for a woman come into motherhood. that it should be now a shroud —

in time she went down to the sea, and brought up warm water from the surf. the chant found her tongue once more; she washed the body she had formed within her, sluicing blood to the ground outside the den and drawing great draughts of breath, for if she did not she felt she might die.

the young woman who had only just lost her spirit looked more serene to her mother's hurting, red-rimmed eyes at last, at last. kukutux rocked back upon her sore haunches, tucking a last bouquet of wildflower and dried rosehips under one soft arm.

her child would go with many things into the throat of sedna. she would be known as healer, sister, daughter.

mother.

the daughter who had not lived now lay too in the arms which had birthed her. the sea girl would not be alone in her journey; kukutux had wrapped the child in another soft swaddling-skin, placing her beside the silent heart.

would rodyn wish her buried? she would build a death ulaq all the same.

kukutux sat for a long, long while, gazing almost unseeingly down over her daughter she had not thought she would lose, and the granddaughter she had hoped to know.

her mouth was silent. her eyes empty. she slowly aged through those hours, waiting for @Ariadne to return, for her family to join her in moontide.

the songs must be sung, and the girl returned would do the singing that sialuk had once done for those lost to the falling star.

history; a chapter pained to close.

Ajei had been on her way home with her Pop and the boys when the pained call of Kukutux came. A sad softness burrowed into Ajei's chest. She knew Rodyn had played at his hearth as Samani had watched over them happy and proud in her mother's glow. And to be cut short.

Ajei didn't know much of death, but she did know it was final. She would hug the brothers. Taking care to love upon them both as they turned back around towards Kukutux. She wouldn't allow them to think they were alone.

Upon arrival the sight drew her breathless and she stared at the tiny bundle at mother's chest. How beautiful and yet so heartbreaking.

It was a tragedy on all counts.

Kassuq had felt his heart plummet into his stomach, where it would sit and curdle for the next days. He had already run himself ragged in search of Galana, and just as he was beginning to accept he would never find her, another call.

Samani.

She was gone.

Kassuq didn’t know his older sister too well, he knew he loved her as any younger brother did, and in all of this he knew that he was coming out the other side at a negative loss. Two sisters, one vanished, one dead. Grief lodged in the place where his heart had vacated, and abruptly he lurched into the brush, where he would throw up his breakfast, before shakily making his way down to the beach.

There, he would see his mother, bent over the peach, quiet form of his sister, and he would come to her side. The boy looked up at his near copy, before he would settle at her side, fighting back the want to weep.

Massaraq had not known his sister well and yet he had counted her family all the same. He accepted Ajei's hug and stood near the family that remained on the beach. Death. He thought of those gleaming white skulls, Samani was already cold, her body could not hold warmth long without that mystery of life to send red hot blood through the veins. And yet she looked nothing like that, as if summer were to return for a moment and blow a warm breeze through her fur she might rise again, and yet he knew that the seasons had changed.

He wondered where Galana was. Tears pricked at his eyes, why he did not know. But he felt a deep tug, as if the sea's wind were moving through him as the tides moved the waves in and out. Samani, he rolled the name around in his head and wondered what would remain of her. Death was final, and it felt like an end for all that some might say it was a beginning. He could not stop the bitter tang of loss that hung in the air.

Heph trailed after the party, following with mute grief and without a smile. She had thought, she had hoped, that the birth of Samani's pups would be a time of joy. A time to bring gifts and laughter and stories. She had thought it would fill Moontide and the plateau. Yet Rodyn had gone to ferry the precious young life to Moonspear and Samani was gone, forever.

She did not know what they would do with the body, what they would do with Samani. And yet she could not simply leave her. A bright soft smile. Promises, a journey south, just like old times. Arriving to the shore side by side. Memories, layer upon layer, all bound up with the hopes and dreams of a future that would never come to pass and so soon after she had just returned and reignited that flame of hope.

The last dead body she had seen had been her brothers, and from that she had fled. The urge to run, to forget Moontide. To forget Rodyn's laugh as they spoke of his and Samani's pups eating up all the prey in the coast, to forget Chakliux's pawpads as they ran alongside, to forget the warmth of Iiana's new den. She thought if she could not forget at least she could run faster than any of those ghosts could chase her.

Her breath lay heavy on her tongue and she found it difficult to swallow the ocean's air, before it had felt so light.

Time had begun to mend his relationship with his mother. He stayed close, but not too close. Paid the occasional visit to the borders of her village, Moonglow. Never stepping within, unsure of the reception awaiting him. He did not turn towards Moonspear, where his sister reigned. A sister who still believed him a ghost. He would not force her to rebuild anything with him, if she was not accepting.

Saviguk, now Mauruk, yearned to know his extended family. He was excited in knowing two younger sisters were destined to become mothers any day now. But would he be allowed near? Allowed in their lives? Or would they too, reject him as Sialuk had?

Fate had a cruel twist in mind, instead.

A shattering song of anguish, in his mothers voice. Relaying to him a painfully encoded message. He had never wanted to hear such skewering emotion. Never again. Yet here it was. His instincts kicked in, sending him racing towards the borders of the seaside village. The drive to be close, comfortingly, protectively around those of shared blood, overriding any immediate caution.

Only when he grew ever closer, catching the taint of birth and blood in the air, did his legs feel like jelly, forcing him to slow down. As if struck, he kept on the outskirts of the scene. As if afraid to venture near and behold the still form of the sister he never knew. 

They could turn on him. He was supposed to be dead. A bad omen.

He wretched, dry heaving. Hung his head, grimacing with guilt. "No no no. Not her. It should be me. No, take me!" He whispered for no one. No one but Sedna. A son returned, in exchange for a daughter. 

This was all his fault.

there is a solemn and dense air that surrounds the ocean, and shikoba must wearily make her way towards the others as she overlooks the mourning family. samani was a bright spirit, one who did not deserve to have her life cut so shortly. a pit forms to swallow them whole, for the spine wails and mourns for the loss of their own into the arms of sedna.

shikoba is swift to come to moon woman's aide as she remains one in the woman's circle. and when needed, she provides the shoulder to lean against as she presses her muzzle tenderly against the duck. there is nothing that could be done to represent the loss of a child. even in shikoba's own miscarriage, nothing could compare to this.

Aiolos knew something was wrong when his wife did not return. Not with new fire in her eyes from the new life of their blood which were born. Not with news of their new grandchildren's genders and names and a reluctance to leave them behind. As she has with Sialuk. As she with Vaire. Instead, she had rushed from the outskirts of Moonspear and did not return. 

Time passed. 

And then a call, carried by the salty breeze and bouncing off the encircled mountains of Moonglow. 

A twin of their first litter together, their daughter and a granddaughter unseen, both gone. The sons being sent to Moonpear for milk, so that they might still survive. Moontide's Queen was dead. The leadering pairs children swept away. Moontide left broken.

Samani; girl who looks out to the sea always.

His son's were made to go. Others followed. Aiolos held back and he was silent as was Moonglow, as it's residents left for a funeral after a birth. And here with certainty that he was alone, the father wept. 

After a time, distant eyes swept across the open lands of Ocean's Breath Plateau. The people of Moon gathered. They encircled the body (and child) of what he knew to be his little girl. He wouldn't try to look, happy for the cover of those gathered round. He didn't come near yet only stood to watch and to listen from afar.

Arrluk follows along the side of his brothers silently. Ajei is near, comforting to them all. His sea-green eyes sweep to his mother, though he could not seek the features of her face. There lied a grief in her which he could not bare to see. 

As they began to circle round, he sees his father back from them, watching with a silent guard's still and hollowness. In the minds of the brothers are thoughts Galana, still unfound. The unknowing was deafening. The knowing and certainty of death which lay before them now, was worse. There was no hope in this. No possibility that she may walk with them again. 

Though he could not look to his mother, he looked to Samani now. He only remembered her vaguely so, when he was still but a pup struggling to stand on his own four legs. She lay there still now, flowers tucked around, an infant pup tucked to her breast. 

Arrluk's jaw tightened and he took in a heavy breath. How long could it be before happiness might ever return to them?