Redtail Rise tell me that i'm still breathing

Being vague since I have no idea how Merc's thread with Gunnar is going to play out and this is likely set after that thread. Also, warden thread! :D

The early morning held a soft chill to it, the darkness of night having cooled everything from the previous day off. A pause was given to glimpse up at the sky, lightening with the colors of dawn as the sun had began it's slow ascent into the horizon, a thin veil of gold illuminating the crest of the earth in the vast distance. Imperial green eyes took in the sight, the myriad of velvet colors painted across the lightening skyline before he set his gaze back down to the earth, back upon his chosen path towards the pack's borders. Reek had told him that he had to prove himself, and this was something that Mercury had no qualms about doing. He had been proving himself for a full year now, as to which hit him like a brick wall he had only partially realized was there as his steps continued, long legs carrying his svelte form to the scent markers, where once more the skylark gave pause. It was his birthday, he thought with numb surprise. He was a year old. It should have been a great milestone, something worth celebrating; yet he felt nothing other than perplexity at how it had came so fast. His lack of joy at his birthday was only because he had no one to share it with. Yes, Gunnar was in the same back but the discontent and tension between them that sparked like a hammer to an anvil — a stark change to how they'd been as children — sucked what little excitement he might have been harboring about the date out and left little than anger and bitterness in it's wake.

Gunnar was mad at him, and Mercury was mad at Thistle, Ragnar and now this anger also transitioned to Gunnar, which was not how it had been supposed to happen; but nothing ever happened how it was supposed to, of this Mercury had learned long ago. If things had been how they should have been he'd have known Crete a long time ago, as a father as opposed to a stranger. Pushing his family issues far from his mind, the ebony tyrant set his shoulders and began his patrol of the borders, ears cupped forth atop his skull, alert, as he paused to inhale at the markers every so many feet, determined to shake off the nightmares that kept him awake by being productive.