Ravensblood Forest All I do is love in spades

trying not to overtake myself so please no more than 4 or 5 others. Group threads tend to make my head spin. This is for Etienne to tell his family he has help coming. I am fine with him being hurt, but please do not assume that is what everyone else wants who is involved. Please private message those you are unsure of what they may like.

Also Lauren if you aren't okay with the slight powerplay let me know. Please allow Anselm, Chacal and Mireille to reply first.

This can also stay private if you'd like a chance at a true ambush. Just pm me. And I'll switch it.

@Anselm had done his very best to lead Etienne to his family. And it had only made Eti grow fonder of the mountainborn. And that scared him for he did not know his love could grow. Especially when he was supposed to be trying to not make Anselm uncomfortable.

Etienne stared at the dark foreboding forest a tick in his jaw. This was not a happy place. And his family, his manman. He screwed his muzzle up to hold in the wail. How dare these monsters. He had watched. It was well guarded. But even they must sleep sometimes.

So in the dead of night. He found his way. Sensitive ears quivering. He had told Anselm not to follow as he went further into the territory, but he doubted the mountain born would listen. And he had told Arric to come even if he didn't return. He would never tell.

Etienne used his senses to find @Chacal and @Mireille. And he fought the loud cry of relief he wanted to utter at their sight. Belly crawling he found a spot of underbrush and whispered the soft snatches of song his mother gave to him.

They camped that night in a knoll overlooking Murkwood, and spoke quietly of their plans. 

He watched the seaborn until his silhouette blended with the unbecoming gloom of the forest, his heart hammering an uneasy tune. 

It must be done, but that did not mean Anselm enjoyed it, and after a time alone he realized he could not tolerate Etienne being out of his sight a moment longer. 

His entire heart was in that dark and unlovely forest. He knew what must be done. 

Low to the ground, Anselm followed Etienne’s tracks in the stealthiest manner possible, ears swiveling and senses on high alert.

she hasnt seen them yet! <3

sleep was fitful. the birth had been excruciating, and mireille was left with a studied inability to walk far at all. between this captivity and the ruined nerves of her pelvis, the obsidian was beginning to experience a deepening sense of despair.
she lay her head down, nudging two newborns closer, and shut her eyes.
chani's lack of return felt as though it should be a boon, but mireille was only filled with an exhausting, insistent worry.

Just a cameo so she doesn't fall off <3 Mirielle and family can freely pp

The babe was growing just as one should.

Days spent suckling and cuddling with siblings, from looking at Seraphine alone a stranger would never know that anything was wrong with the full picture. A pretty fluff of white and ginger fur, wriggling by her maman's side as she felt the cold touch of her nose.

Days had passed since the children had been born, but the ache of grief was as keen as the moment it had arrived. Grief was a shadow that followed her, at times consuming her. Her thoughts meandered like leaves on the wind, revisiting past losses as if they might be tombstones in a graveyard that existed only in time. Rosalyn, Erzulie, Sobo, Valravn- each loss was a wound that had never fully healed, cracks in a dam that she had given up on trying to patch.

She feared for her sister's well-being. Her hips wobbled when she walked, occasionally a toe would drag- indications she had not survived the traumatic birth unscathed. While the children would have no shortage of milk between the two nursing women, Chacal took on the role of nurturing Mireille as well.

She sat by a nearby creek, searching the water for any sign of a fish though the mesmerizing current transported her deeper within her own grief. She took time to feel her grief, exploring it in spite of the pain it brought because at least through her grief she could find some semblance of escapism.

A familiar lullaby pulled her from her reverie, causing her to gasp. She glanced to Mireille, and then squinted into the dark forest. Not wanting to arouse suspicion from their captors, Chacal casually leapt to the other bank of the stream, so she could study another bend in the water, searching still for fish. The move brought her, quite intentionally, closer to the shadows where her son and Anselm were hiding. To disguise the sound of her son's gentle voice, she hummed the melody herself, fighting back tears at the realization that there might be some hope for them yet.

Help had come; but would it come with a cost?

Etienne was not privy to his mother's sufferings and had he had been. He'd have begged to help her. He'd have done anything to take it away. She smelled of milk. And babies regardless.

A Shuffle of his feet and he titled his head golden gaze on his manman. He peered around searching for any others. Knowing Anselm would watch too.

His mother hummed. And it brought tears to his eyes. He spoke quietly and quickly.

Èd ap vini, manman. Silans. Diskresyon. Gen anpil. Arric ak lòt moun. Kukutux ak lòt moun. Chen mawon ki soti nan mòn yo ak nan fon an. Yo ta dwe isit la 2 jou. lannwit tonbe. Pou ede osi trankil ke posib. men nou gen konbatan si nou bezwen.

chacal was an illusion that shimmered before mireille where she lay prone, half-curled around the newborn lives which had wrenched her with such ordeal. constant pain had separated mind from body, and she was thankful for it.
the children nursed and slept.
chacal took care of her, and mireille in turn insisted that they share rations, that her sister sleep while she watched for them.
they both had suffered, but murkwood had stolen so much from chacal.
when the dark woman moved away, she lay back, staring at the slowly moving shadows which marked the progress of the sun.
chani was dead. did chacal know?

Anselm's focus remained on a shape that moved along the bank. Despite being nighttime, his excellent tracking sense and hearing clocked it a mile away.

As it came close, it turned into a shadow - twice now he looked over to Etienne for cues, the hair along his spine lifting as the shadow leapt across the bank and began to answer the soft notes of Etienne's hum.

He tensed, but something told him this wasn't a raider.

While Etienne spoke in a hushed whisper to the woman in that lyrical language, Anselm raised his head over the reeds and remained very much on alert, his heart hammering so loudly in his chest he could scarcely hear Etienne's words.