Blackfeather Woods My owner and my prey

Alexander would never admit to being a hypocrite, partially because he was far too proud to admit to any faults, but mainly because he didn't actually consider himself to be one. The situations that were their lives, the issues stemming from their mothers—they were two totally different scenarios. They didn't overlap in any way, save for the fact that neither one of them would ever see their maternal figures again. They were both gone, but the circumstances surrounding their absences were different by quite a lot. "I'm allowed to talk about mine this way because she isn't a good wolf, parent, or anything," he stated, justifying his actions. "She abandoned my father and me by choice, and even stole away my sisters! She doesn't deserve to be spoken of kindly." His opinion of his mother had long since been set, leaving his heart overflowing with pure hatred. Someday, perhaps someone would be able to pull that darkness out of his chest and leave him feeling pleasant again, but for the time being it was left to fester and grow. Her latter response was more or less ignored, or maybe just brushed off, for he'd said all he'd wished to, and then some.

"Well you felt wrong," the boy returned. He couldn't possibly be jealous of her, or anyone for that matter. It simply wasn't something he was capable of; consciously, anyways. Deep down, perhaps he could feel a twinge of envy towards her, if only for the fact that she had her siblings with her still. Not just her twin, either, but her elder siblings, too (except for Potema, of course). He didn't like that, the fact that she had so many while he'd been cheated out of growing alongside his own. Such feelings were easily masked and pushed away, hidden even from himself, by his belief that they would all abandon her someday. Every last one of them would split off and go their own way, and that would be the end of it all. That very same thought had kept him from snapping at her, but only because he felt himself to know better. He knew what was coming, what would hit her in the future. So when she'd offered her assistance in locating what it was he was searching for, he did not lash out at her, but didn't accept her help, either. "I need to find it on my own," he answered, looking ahead into the darkness. "My dad gave me clues and directions, so I have to actually get there without being dragged right to it." After all, what use would he be if he couldn't even follow basic directions?

The response given concerning the matter of swimming was far from being the one he'd wanted to hear. "You better learn quickly then," Xan said, pausing briefly as his ears swiveled forward, catching the faintest of sounds in the distance. It reminded him of the waterfall in the valley, and the rush of rain during the storm so long ago, leading him to believe he was heading in the right direction. He really was following right in Kove's footsteps, though he knew not yet whether or not that would be the day he completed his little task. "We're going to have to jump into a pool of water somewhere up ahead from high up—my dad told me that was how he'd first found the glow worms." And he saw absolutely no problem with mimicking his father's past actions. After all, it'd been during his original stay in Blackfeather that the elder Inuit had done such, so it had to be okay to do.