Ravensblood Forest I'd rather drown

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“I'll explain it when you're older,” For she was much too young to have those primal desires and that was not, admittedly, a conversation he was ready to have with her. In fact, it was a conversation he wasn't ready to have with any of his children. Arturo supposed he could have been like his mother who didn't tell him anything at all and left him to discover it all on his own (and his teenager self did, much to the chagrin of his adult self). One of those numerous discoveries (it was hard to tell which time) led to the conception of his children, who he almost shuddered to think were nearing the age he'd been when he'd had them. No, Arturo wanted his children, and by extension Chusi, to be aware and ...prepared when that time came. Admittedly, he had left the explaining to his daughters up to Duana while he tackled the task of informing his snickering sons who had probably been in that stump hump stage by then. His mind rejected all notions of wanting to think that Chusi would probably enter that curiosity stage soon, where she became more aware sexually of other wolves despite that it would be a long time before she could produce children of her own. She was still a child in the gangster's eyes and he was eager to keep her as a child for as long as he could.

Her following question he would have been happy to answer but the truth was Arturo's muzzle parted and then closed as he grasped for words to describe to her what love was. He wasn't sure that he could explain it. How to even begin? Where did he start? It was ambiguous. It was different for everyone and there were many different types of love. He had not loved Duana as he should have, perhaps, but he had loved her as the mother of his children. Yet, it had been easy to part with her knowing that she would find another. Arturo greatly doubted that the day he loved a woman as he should, as a partner in all things that he would be able to just walk away on mutual and respected terms knowing that there might be another. But then there was the love of a father. Arturo thought he understood that love better than any. Then there was the love for The Family. “Love...it can't really be explained Chusi,” He admitted giving his throat a soft clear. “it's ambiguous, it's different for everyone and there are so many different types of love. You just feel it and when you feel it you know what type of love it is without needing to ask yourself or any one else.” Arturo knew that his answer would not satisfy his young ward but in truth it was like his struggle to explain death: he couldn't. It just was and you just knew.

His brow raised in the darkness and his head rose from his paws, offering the girl whose side was pressed against him a hard glare that he wasn't sure she could see. Though he was training her to be a warrior, and killing came along with the territory he (very hypocritically) found that he didn't like her saying she wanted to kill Zephyr. “That is out of the question.” Arturo told her firmly. While Arturo did his best not to baby nor coddle her, while he treated her as an adult for the most part he had no intention of budging on this. “You're not ready to take the life of a man, Chusi.”

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