The Sentinels some used your na[m]e for glory, some used it for their gain

he had lifted his border restrictions, for the caches must be filled with meat from the spring calves and lambs. his children were growing larger by the day, bounding out of doors and speaking not only their witches' language, but recognizable words, questions, sentences. eilidh remained a dedicated fixture near to the den, while casmir brooded along the borderline, no doubt recovering from his grief. he had not taken up with aria, and lasher thought this good, as he often enjoyed lustful and passionate interludes with the young beta in the shadowed places of the forest.

he patrolled, a thought of peregrine rising unbidden to his mind, and instead of shoving it aside, as he was usually wont to do, lasher allowed it a place. what had become of the devil? surely he had sired more children upon fox, turning out their last brood as her small red sides swelled with their new progeny. the caldera was a forbidding place, and thus his thoughts of his former lover were forbidden.

luke, ayishi -- he must trek to the hollow soon and visit the pair of them. he missed very much the touch of his pale, blue-nosed lover -- he would make a night of it, reacquaint himself with the muscularity and desire that dwelt in luke's body. and the little cherub -- ah! he would teach new things, so that the memory of their pleasure would not die when lasher had returned to donnelaith.

a thread of scent passed before him and it was familiar in its hateful musk; fear prickled to spike his nape. she had returned.

remembering ferahgo's words -- she was a woman without a home -- lasher whirled and began to dash in the direction of the den. his children wandered now, as small children did! they were vulnerable, and his heart raced wildly in his chest.

it was only by the grace of brambles that his daughter had been spared! taltos rushed into a terrifying scene; the woman's thick muzzle and masculine neck straining toward the spare bit of pale fluff he took to be deirdre, cowering in fear beneath the thorns where only she and emaleth were able to safely fit. more macabre still -- the rivulets of blood that ran from the wolfess' flesh as she fought not only for breath, but the soft flesh of his daughter, too near to those maddened fangs.

lasher sprang in a moment, silent, lethal; his own teeth flashed once and sought to sank themselves into the side of the woman's throat. rage curdled his belly; a thorny vine slashed his muzzle, but if he had gained purchase, his jaws would lock upon her flesh. the druid would not be denied her death a second time.