Sleeping Dragon pulse

He snickered softly again. She wasn't wrong and he had no room to deny it: he'd readily enjoyed all he could, vanity, greed, and all other sinful indulgence included. "I earned that," he returned, for he had no shame and poked his snout back at her. He could be glad that his past transgressions, although not presented in clearest detail yet, didn't seem to hold a lot of weight here. Her curiosity was refreshing and easy enough to deal with even with him not quite used to answering such. "Four. One boy got sick early on, he didn't make it. The others grew up and really took after their mother. Still looked a lot like me, though." He missed them still and wondered if they survived, too, but he had always feared they would yearn to strike out and then rove as he had once done. Perhaps their mom's genes and upbringing may have tempered it some, he hoped; in all, they were good wolves and ones he would be distantly proud of, assuming they lived.

"We were having more, but last time I saw Viviana was before they were born." Dio remembered this with a drop in his own stomach. He'd been so hurt to watch her go, knowing his unborn went with her and to keep them all safe, he was better off staying put to attempt to fight their losing battle. That had been the first of many losses coming his way in the Rise's collapse. "Same for Elettra's coming litter, although they were hopefully my adoptive brother's before they were mine.. see, I told you: I earned my title of a slut there. That whole family practically encouraged it, I could swear." Dio sighed and shifted his weight slightly. In speaking of the Giamalva's so thoroughly, Matteo hung at the tip of his tongue also. He feared he still carried too much sorrow regarding their end. "It's not like that anymore. I do wonder about them sometimes -- all of them, if they live, so on. I hope they do." Even if they might have grown more beautiful than him.