Noctisardor Bypass laksen

whenever! <3

it had been ten days since heda had seen druid, and she did not count on her sister showing again.
just like that, she was alone, helming a pack of opposites and children that still needed guidance.
her heart felt as if it would break apart.
her heart felt as though she had a new hopefulness in amadeo. but where one chapter opened, another must close; must be slammed to a close if need be.
that goldenlight evening, heda called to @Anselm, settling herself in silencepine to wait as the sun fell to its waiting bed.

When Anselm heard the call, he hoped that Druid had returned; instead he found Heda alone in the silencepin. 

His step slowed; she was alone, neither Fiona nor Amadeo or the puppies around her. As dusk filled into the grove, Anselm canted his head to the side in silent question.

'we need to talk' was not a common part of heda's lexicon. anselm would see it in how pensively she turned to him, almost wary as she visibly struggled for what to say.
"i don't think druid is coming back." quietly she explained the wolfbite and the creeping sickness that etienne had confirmed could be spread. almost tearfully she described the forest where her sister had gone, a place she hadn't yet been able to visit.
there was that and there was, "so we need another leader. fiona is gone too. there's you and etienne who have stayed the longest." out of obligation? out of debt? 
one more thing to discuss, but she was quiet now, waiting for anselm to discuss this and process it.

Something pensive stole across Heda’s face. It took the shape of stifled anguish; Anselm felt his stomach lurch in an unrecognized species of concern. 

Heda explained that Druid’s departure had been deliberate; the bite, the sickness — the little fractured pieces all fell into place. Anselm’s expression went from confusion, to concern, to anger — yet another thing stolen from him that could not be taken back. 

So her fate was to die alone in the woods, then. Past-Anselm would have taken this news with calloused indifference. He’d spent months with Druid. Hunted alongside her. Lived with her. He’d even once or twice shared an almost friendly camaraderie — and now her bones would join the faceless thousands in some unknowable oaken crypt. 

It was as unkind and hopeless a fate as any - a rare and feeble spark of empathy briefly glimmered within Anselm’s mind as he thought of Druid’s end. 

He stayed the growing emotion inside of him when the topic shifted. Etienne’s name inspired a dark movement in him, but he remained silent on the topic of leadership. 

He bitterly wanted to point out Etienne wasn’t here; but that wasn’t patently true, was it?

anselm said nothing, which frustrated and pained heda. "druid ... asked that she be found. brought back, buried here."
when fiona returned, the den mother would know she had been mistaken, too wrapped in her own grief and anger to know who was around her.
so badly she wanted anselm to — provide some gesture of understanding. to comfort her. yes. and she could almost laugh now, knowing full well he wouldn't do that.
the play of emotions along his face was heda's only comfort — he felt as she did.
the memory of amadeo's passionate words burnt through her, offering strength for a moment. 
she didn't want to be alone!! heda's eyes suddenly scorched with grief and she looked away to hide their fall, at least the first several, scrubbing madly at her face even as the sobs threatened.

It was unpleasant to think of dragging Druid back here dead. Anselm ruminated, a frown deepening across his face.

He could tell something was missing. It wasn't in anything Heda said -- but maybe he saw a ghost of disappointment briefly darkening the ivory lines of her narrow face.

Anselm's heart - oh, his barbed, brittle heart - sank to see Heda look away with her eyes scorched by tears. But he could not stop it. Even if he wanted to, the chasm between them had grown so wide he was scared to leap across it. What if he was turned away? What if she found a lioness' courage within and pressed him with teeth?

He remained still though he felt shameful for it. I can bring Druid back. Anselm suddenly offered, feeling a prick of masculine obligation stir him. It would be his duty, it was his duty -- to act as guardian to the last surviving members of his thinning cohort.

as much as heda lied to herself about the absence of anselm's investment in her, it hurt. it hurt so much in fact that as his somber voice sounded for druid, the scared girl inside heda cried what about me? and continued to cry, no matter how much she mentally scourged herself.
the tears slowly ended their eke; heda dabbed the last of them away and swallowed. "thank you. druid would appreciate that," she said in a soft voice gone sallow with formality. "she told me she was going to a big forest east of the bypass. i can't even remember its name."
she didn't want to look at him. every time she did, she remembered all the times and ways in which he'd rejected her, using no uncertain words. even the night where they had almost — she ached to remember how angry she had been with druid over this man! of all men!
heda's pale shoulders straightened. "the last thing i wanted to talk about is that amadeo has — amadeo has asked to court me. i said — well." her breath extended in an exhale too harsh. "i'm not against it. we are ... well-matched."
golden eyes filled with pain settled to the taciturn man. "i've been — waiting on you, anselm. and i-i'm tired of waiting for something you told me you never wanted." that was her own fault, not his, heda told herself, trying with every part of her to let him go, let him go, let him go.

Again came that needling feeling whatever he’d said had not been right. At a loss for words, Anselm mentally examined everything that had been said so far. 

He knew the problem, in many ways, originated with him — but how could he move past that, when he was who he was?

Heda wiped away the last of the tears that wet her soft face. Anselm got the sense she was avoiding his gaze. A great weight seemed to settle between them. 

At last, the axe held over his head dropped and fell. What should have been a clean cut, so pristine in its pain, was instead a snarling and gristly rupture. 

He had no right to feel ownership over her, or to feel betrayed. He reminded himself that their relationship - a laughable term if it was that! - was a black seedling that should never be allowed to come to fruition; for it was equal parts bad for them both. And yet, the idea of thinking of a man — Amadeo of all men — moving inside Heda churned so cold a loathing in Anselm that for a moment he was besides himself. 

In true Anselm fashion — and further supporting the growing global opinion that he was a Giant Dick — Anselm laughed bitterly. The moment that hideous noise left him he felt ashamed for it, but there was no going back now. Even if he tried to articulate all the thousand ways that man made his skin crawl, his reservations would be perceived as jealousy. At the end of the day, he knew that it was true: he was jealous. And he was a dick. 

He only just managed to rein in the insolence of his tongue. Ve are adults, Heda. Her name felt like ash thrust upon his drying tongue. As he spoke, he could not help but marvel how his feelings did not align at all with what he said. Was this part of growing? Would his hard-heartedness eventually catch up to his brain? You are not mine to control. Though there were times he wished this was not  so. 

And while he knew that an apology was needed there — deserved, even — for Heda to move past, he could scarcely scrounge it up from the withering in his chest. Vill he replace me as their father?

silence and silence and silence.
his laugh splayed her ears, a touch of hurt dimming the opennness held there. for the duration of his almost labored speech heda looked away from anselm. did he think it so laughable that — she could want him? would want to try? it was more likely that the situation was so disgusting to anselm that all he could do was express a cold relief it was formally to be ended, any further attempts.
gut-wounded, her ears trembling, heda listened on, swallowing the bitter taste of tears left in her throat.
i wanted to be yours, anselm.
and i would have worked to make it something that brought you some measure of happiness.
worked for nothing — "no one could replace you as their father. i wouldn't want that." despite the emotion in her voice, the earnest timbre of it was clear, despite the fact that she found herself still physically unable to look at anselm, lest she hurt again and anew.
"just — get along with him when you're both around." the boys weren't babies any longer; by winter they would be half-grown and by spring perhaps dispersing of their own accord.
there was no reason to dissent or to fight. amadeo wanted this with heda. anselm did not.
so why did the 'not' stab her again to think of it so plainly?

For all the intimacy they'd shared in body, neither could meet each other's gaze. Heda could not look upon the man who'd thoughtlessly lanced every one of her wounds -- and Anselm could not look upon HIeda and see all the hurt he'd inspired within her.

The small measure of relief he felt to know he would not be replaced as a father was dwarfed in comparison to the rising insurgence of loathing cresting his chest.

In that moment, Anselm hated Amadeo -- but he hated himself more.

He hated himself because he was starting to taste a glimpse of the biting truth. And it prompted a question in him he could not will himself to answer.

Had he wanted Heda for who she was as a person?

Or had he wanted her to prove to himself that he was sexually attracted to women?

Even now, thinking of their coupling sent a burning sensation rippling within him. It was powerful, and raw, and profound -- but Anselm knew at its core it was simply hunger. Desperate, clueless, indifferent hunger.

He knew Heda deserved better. And he wanted so badly to give her what she deserved -- but he could not. He was the stone she needed blood from; the oak in which she needed fire. But knowing this, and accepting this were two very different things -- and Anselm was terrified to think he stood a chance of losing her.

The fist he mentally raised to the image of Amadeo in his mind fell -- and the fury that suddenly tensed his muscles fell with it, replaced now by a flood of bitter jealousy that drowned out any good-will he had for the man.

The most unwilling, unpliable sigh loosened itself from Anselm's singed chest. He brought his tear-studded gaze to her own eyes, feeling about eight thousand crippling emotions simmer within him.

In a quiet, defeated voice he asked the question he'd no right to ask.

Is he good to you, Heda?

it was the glitter of tears standing in his eyes which brought heda's own pained gaze back to him, surprise rippling through sorrow. why did he weep? wasn't he happy that she didn't expect anything of him?
a ribald bounce of hope went through heda, followed by a deep horrendous frustration. he had no right to cry! he had no right to pretend that he cared all of a sudden.
the idea that maybe anselm thought she needed the performance did very little to send away the sting of humiliation and anger. 
is he good to you, heda? and she felt herself respond with a dizzying power to him, wanting nothing more than to throw her arms around his shoulders and kiss the places beneath his eyes before the tears could fall; to feel the dark strength of his arms wrapping tightly around her; wanted to pull him down atop her in this leaf litter and answer anselm in the only voice he knew.
in the space of only a few seconds she was unraveled.
"he talks of god. he wants to marry me." there was no way for her to rejoin in the way anselm asked; heda remembered the burn of amadeo's paw over her own watersilked skin. "he wants me," and that was goodness enough, voice falling to a sodden whisper as heda felt her own stare filling with new salt which overflowed and cut rivulets into the fur cresting her cheekbones. 
he wants me and you don't. why are you asking this?

The power in each torrential emotion Anselm felt caused him to look away; in that moment, he did not see the salt-burn of Heda’s stare or the glittering tears held in her eyes. 

He focused on a patch of grass not so far from them; how the sun bounced off its gently bobbing edges, how a halo of light seemed to dazzle around every blade. Strange what one noticed at times of discomfiture. 

He pushed away the welling emotions; Amadeo this, Amadeo that — and while he wanted to be furious he knew he had no right to be so. He and Heda simply did not fit. It did not matter how hard they tried to rearrange the pieces or smooth out each bitterly shattered edge; their margins ground against each other like bone on bone, leaving spurs of bitter pain at every contact. 

Amadeo was a man of god, which was more than Anselm could say. He tried to swallow and it felt as if his throat was a furnace of glass.

A man of God, Anselm marveled to himself with a bitter laugh. He vill be good for you, Heda.

Anselm could not stomach thinking of this a moment more. Overwhelmed by too many emotions and thoughts to put in rational order, he made something akin to a weakened exhale and rose, beginning to walk away.

He was hurting — and it never occurred to him that Heda was hurting more.

he will! because he'll at least try! you wouldn't even try once, anselm!
heda closed aching jaws over words barbed to cut more holes in his icy hide. this needed to be done, be through. be over. his laughter raked at her ears, and then she felt anselm move and pull away.
and she did not call him back; she sat trembling and still and staring until he truly was gone and the sound of his footfalls were no longer discernable.
and then she wept, she wept. for caracal, for all their many children, for glaukos, for druid, for the children her sister had left behind, for john, for anselm. for herself.
for anselm. for herself. for the unavoidable rending that had been torn in the fabric of her soul, and one now she knew would not mend.
she wept, and then she slept.