Neverwinter Forest there was a thousand storms in his eyes

[speeds up Cypress’ grieving process slightly]

“You’ll never be alone, Cypress, I promise.”

Cypress offered his brother a lopsided grin. The ruined left corner of his mouth, tipped perpetually downward, seemed a mordant parody of the right — and perhaps this was a reflection of the growing duality in the young wolf, who both appreciated the sentiment and disbelieved it. He said nothing, but a telltale flicker of doubt snuffed out the light in his eerie yellow eyes; for all that he trusted Kjalarr, there was a burgeoning certainty in the hollow raven that he would always end up alone. That things were somehow meant to be this way. It made him keenly aware of one truth: keep what you have while you have it.

“Torgeir,” Cypress repeated reverently. He was a natural linguist and found that the foreign syllables rolled easily off his unpracticed tongue. “Will you teach me what you know?” he breathed, latching onto the novelty of the wild, gods-touched North with the desperation of a drowning man and the eager alacrity of his vanquished youth. He was still distraught about the loved ones he’d lost, but for the first time since his parents’ deaths, he allowed himself to be distracted. Surrendering wholly to his grief and fury had been exhausting — and terrifying — but he had limped through the eleventh hour to stand at this precipice:

Leap now, or languish!

Torgeir leapt. Cypress leapt. His renaming was not like Kjalarr’s; it was never meant to replace an identity that no longer fit. He became Torgeir to save what could be saved and to excise the necrotic tissue of his perceived failures. “I’m not brave,” he admitted, but he rose proudly anyway, butting the bridge of his blood-encrusted muzzle against the underside of Kjalarr’s chin in affectionate acceptance and homage. In a short time, Kjalarr had become mentor, alpha, and confidant — and the boy felt no shame as he commented, “Spear of Thor — that’s like me,” in reflection. “My paw was like Thor, and Noch was just like him — and you’re like them — but I’m not. I’m different.” It wasn’t that Cypress lacked leadership qualities; he simply didn’t have the same ambition. He was the wingman, the weapon, the infantryman.