Jade Fern Grove valar dohaeris

This is meant to take place some ambiguous amount of time after this.

Tapping @Skaigona and @Ezra for reference, especially because I made some assumptions (that I would be happy to tweak as needed!).

This is for @Sobeille, if you want it, and anybody else who’s feeling perilous! On that note...

Mature Content Warning

This thread has been marked as mature. By reading and/or participating in this thread, you acknowledge that you are of age or have permission from your parents to do so.

The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: suicide.

Druid left Rivenwood through the western arches, numbly splashing across the river into the neighboring grove. She paused there to catch her breath and gather her bearings. When something brushed her ear, she whirled with a snarl and a snap. She snatched the butterfly out of midair, destroying its wings, then spat out its broken body with a splutter of horror.

Forward she went, looking now for the place. Her heart hammered in her chest, almost as intensely as her brain hammered against her skull. Druid thought she found the spot where she’d buried her insurance policy, though she soon realized she wasn’t in the right place. She pushed her nose through the dirt.

Finally, she unearthed it, red peeking through the soil. Druid planned to immediately stuff everything in her mouth, though she froze. Her vision grew dim at the edges as she stared at the garish colors in her shaking paw. Once she swallowed them, she would be past the point of no return. She would be a dead woman walking.

You already are, she reminded herself, then shoved everything in her mouth all at once.

Still chewing, she stumbled back toward the water. She slumped down on the bank, muzzle dipping toward the surface. It felt like forever before she could swallow. Druid tried to wash it down with a drink, though the instant her tongue touched the water, she screamed and sprang backward as if she’d licked a live wire.

*breaks all timelines* oopz

her wandering brought her further from sapphique. she thought of the words of her maman, and held this close to her breast. she reminded herself that this was necessary if her future was to be secured.

she was more inland than she preferred, though the trail was pleasant and the weather warm. sobeille passed an ancient oak and paused for a moment in reflection, just in time to hear a scream ring through the woods.

she followed it to water. there on the bank was a woman -- but the energy surrounding her forbid sobeille come much closer. she did as she always did and studied -- eyes watchful and limbs prepared to move.

also shredding my timelines, let me know if anything needs editing. staying vague about @Gideon.

Isra was a fool, or was she? She'd lingered not far from the bypass, closer than she should have. They must be searching for the missing child by now, she figured.

Still, the scream was sweet to her ears, and the piebald woman couldn't resist investigation. Glassy green eyes narrowing at the woman from afar.

She didn’t dare try again. Druid recovered from the shock and charged across the stream instead, headed back toward Rivenwood. She didn’t feel the eyes on her back as she slowed to a stop outside the familiar arches. She stood there, breathing harshly, body quivering.

@Etienne had told her what to expect. Soon, the opioids would hit her bloodstream. They should block pain messages and boost pleasure, though Druid could hardly fathom the latter. Ideally, she would fall asleep before the poison began its work.

@Witch’s words echoed across the years, coming out in Druid’s slightly strangled voice: My bones shall rest in this loam forever…

She shut her eyes, recalling that late summer night. Instead of seeing her blood sister, she pictured a younger Heda Skaigona. They clasped paws in her mind, as they often did in the present, and tears oozed from Druid’s closed eyes.

sobeille started as the woman stood up abruptly and launched away from the stream. her words were garbled, and a curious reek fanned its cloying plumes from her body.

with her attention riveted on Druid, sobeille did not see the sharp faced, prying eyes of isra. she saw only an affected wolf, and clinically, was fascinated.

she took a wary step forward as the woman lurched towards a narrowing entrance. to sobeille, this entrance was a clear marker: do not pass. but she wanted to observe this woman, and know of the malady that seized her.

oi! she called over the brush, sniffing the air where some particularly singed molecules lingered. there was a dusty heat to Druid’s scent that reminded sobeille of the bones in the cave. what’s wrong wit’ you, lady?

Cameo! He's not physically here, I'm taking the opportunity to get Giddy here out of limbo. <3

Gideon's nape still smarted from where Isra had seized him. She had not harmed him further, but asked him a host of questions to which he had few answers. He was kept away from Rivenwood and yet maddeningly close by, with no opportunities for escape.

Today was different.

Isra was drawn away by a scream. Gideon watched her head in that direction. His guard hairs stirred along his nape; that sound had been otherworldly. He wouldn't much like to meet the creature that made it. Curiosity tugged at him, but common sense took the reins and made him plant his rear end. Yes, his compliant expression said. He would be right here when she returned.

As soon as Isra was out of sight and Gideon felt he had even a remote chance, he sprang to his paws, turned tail, and fled. Rivenwood was the obvious destination, but it was also the first place Isra would know to look for him. Gideon knew he couldn't go home, not now, not yet.

Instead, he ran north as fast and hard as his legs would move and didn't dare look back to see if he was being pursued.

Skipping Isra with permission via Discord.

“Oi!”

Druid breathed in sharply, eyes snapping open and head whipping to her left. Her vision swam a little but it wasn’t hard to pinpoint the reddish figure approaching the gateway. There was something disconcerting about the woman’s mask, though Druid’s fur smoothed nearly as soon as it prickled. The stranger posed no threat. She was beyond all dangers, now.

But still she warned, Don’t come any closer, because she was the danger, now. I’m sick and you could… you… Druid said, still staring down the unfamiliar woman, though the sharpness of her eyes belied the sudden disconnect happening behind them as her thoughts began to decouple and drift. You could…

The rest of her sentence disappeared into the ether as her conscious thoughts slowed and dimmed. The vague feelings of alarm and worry went with all the rest and though Druid would not have described her state as pleasant, if she’d had the words, it wasn’t unpleasant, either.

She finally looked away from the she-wolf toward the arches, taking a further step toward them. Now she stood in between the great stone plinths, pausing and craning her neck to gaze up at them. Then her mismatched eyes dropped to stare through the gates, jolting ever so slightly at a resplendent Rivenwood.

She could see Heda (@Skaigona) dancing in the distance, all six children gamboling at her feet as they collectively chased butterflies. @Sequoia was there, @Witch too. There were other faces beyond them, all of them smiling. Even as Druid beheld them, all the colors grew bolder and brighter. She had to squint, then shut her eyes, against the wonder of it all.

When she reopened them, everything was hazed in red. Druid heard someone breathing in her ear and whipped her head around again, snapping her teeth. And although she didn’t feel particularly angry, a sort of primal fury overcame her as she sprang at “Masquerade.”

when the woman's eyes fixed upon sobeille, she realized her mistake.

these eyes were not the eyes of any wolf she had ever known. there was no light behind the pupil -- only an arcing blackness that spoke of ruin.

the woman spoke, , but as she trailed off sobeille could see more of that lightless gaze siphoning. she was here, but not here. a husk. a cocoon like the larval shells of dragonfly nymphs left on the bank, their empty casings speaking of the life that had once lived in them, now metamorphized.

she froze as the woman turned and snapped at something invisible in the air. then, the woman was advancing. every part of sobeille's brain told her to RUN, but instead it was like she was a passerby watching a storm -- rooted, but somehow absolved of her participation.

it wasn't until druid clocked her across the face and knocked her into the dirt that sobeille came to her senses and scrambled to her feet. but by then, it may be too late.

How had she failed to recognize her right away? This bitch had ruined Druid’s life! She pinned the masked she-wolf to the ground, her face twisting into something unrecognizable as she snarled. Her jaws hovered just an inch from the woman’s face, foaming saliva dripping onto it as Druid leaned in closer and closer…

“Druid!”

She fell silent at once, turning to face the nearby archway again. She saw Witch standing there, waving her closer. Druid stared at her long-lost sister for a beat, then slowly stepped away from the stranger to tentatively walk toward Witch. She forgot her anger—and the other woman altogether—as she walked through the gates.

“Look who’s here!” Witch chirped, holding out a pale foreleg.

Bracelet, Druid whispered, eyes bouncing between her sister’s and her familiar’s faces for what felt like an eternity. Are you really here? This time?

“No,” came her sister’s reply as she bounded further into Rivenwood.

Despite that confusing answer, a sort of calm acceptance washed over Druid as she trailed after her. Now Rivenwood looked like its same old self again, almost drab compared to the earlier vision. But there was comfort in that, in the familiarity, as Druid thoughtlessly made her way to Slugstone.

She looked around for the königinmutter, though she saw no sign of him. In fact, there were no slugs to be seen upon the stack of stones. There was only soft moss, inviting Druid forward to have a seat. Only when she obeyed the impulse and settled down on the cairn did she suddenly see dozens—no, hundreds—no, thousands of slugs, all in various technicolor.

Druid didn’t mind these relics of her childhood. She felt sleepy, now, and let her chin drift down to rest on her forepaws. She watched with a slight smile as the giant slug appeared, after all. Witch did too, setting Bracelet loose among the denizens of the stones. The sisters watched as the ring-necked serpent ate all the slugs, one by one, finishing with the königinmutter before finally turning to Druid.

As the snake swallowed her too, Druid looked at Witch-turned-Heda all covered in butterflies and sighed one last time, My bones shall rest in this loam forever.

this was it, wasn’t it?

the she-wolf had sobeille pinned to the ground. with a scream, sobeille fought back — but it wasn’t until later that she wondered after the bruise on her cheek.

suddenly, the she-wolf released her. stunned by this, sobeille sprung to her feet and watched as the woman, with a faraway look in her eyes, tottered between sheaths of old stone.

sobeille knew she should run, but against her better judgment she followed at a distance. when the woman sat down in a bed of moss, she said something that didn’t make sense to sobeille — but the last words to leave her lips were decipherable, and earned a strained, dark look from the girl.

she rubbed the cut on her cheek with a frown. the stranger had not moved in some time — and the pervasive scent that emanated from her signaled rapid cell death.

spooked by her encounter, sobeille fled rivenwood.