Two Rivers Isle i knock the ice from my bones

Devin's eye roll did not go unnoticed by Arturo and for a moment it occurred to Arturo that in just the brief time he'd been away from his children — specifically Devin herself — he'd forgotten how utterly agitating and frustrating that simple gesture was. To Arturo, he saw it as a gesture of rebellion, a dismissal of his words of wisdom. His “wisdom” was not always right — and sometimes his children did know better than him — but the insubordination, while not unexpected, seethed just under the surface of Arturo's skin where it could not be eased. Yet, with a remarkable amount of willpower — found simply because he did not want to ruin this reunion — he took a deep breath and let his irritation slip from his grasp as if it were smoke. It was surprisingly easy, though he offered his youngest a look that stated his lack of amusement. No matter how trying Devin and her siblings might have been — and were they ever trying — Arturo couldn't love them any more. Surely, there was nothing more powerful than a man's love for his family...for his children. They always made the test of his patience worth it, at the end of the day (and let's be honest Arturo deserved what his children could give him).

Devin's concern for him was warming, seen as, perhaps, touching to the gangster king and yet, despite how his stomach rumbled as his fiery red-orange gaze swept over the meal, the scent of blood enticing his temptation, he resisted. Her muzzle was ravaged in blood when she lifted her head from the groundhog. A gruesome sight upon his beautiful daughter, that with a blink took him back to the first time he'd seen her eat regurgitated meat before the memory was gone with the next blink. A feeling of nostalgia washed over him, though he was not sure why his level of sentimentality was so high as of late. He had been a constant and never ending presence in his children's lives from the moment they were born until the moment he spoke his goodbyes to them, despite that he had never taken Duana as his mate.

For a long moment Arturo simply studied her, canting his head ever so slightly to the side as he deliberated. He did not want Devin to worry after him — she needn't. Letting himself starve in favor of his daughter's hunger being sated was an easy decision to make but he considered how it might affect her. By now, he was weakened by the famine, his svelte appearance made more gaunt still by the lack of sustainable food. “You finish. I will eat then.” He assured her. It wasn't particularly a lie. He would eat...simply it might not be until the morning. That was just the odds. Thus far, they'd appeared to be in his favor for the most part but Arturo didn't put much stock into luck, nor was he so arrogant as to blindly believe that his good fortunate would continue until the famine was gone.