Hideaway Strath before the song dies

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Lotte’s howl was desperate, calling for him and Hemlock and Ceannasach abandons his patrol and makes haste to the king sequoia. He has feared for the snowdrop, frail and tiny as she is, for several weeks now. It is hardly Roarke’s fault in the grand scheme of things but at the same time it is his fault. Two pups were not meant to share a sac and while the pudgy winter’s bane is healthy and plump his sister is frail and dying. The sinking feeling that it is miracle that Eirlys has made it as far as she had. While her siblings thrive around her she continues to decline in a downward spiral that the gangster believes only has one path: death. He supposes he should be grateful for the three healthy babes Lotte has blessed him with but the thought of losing Eirlys, the littlest snowdrop — as it would for any of his children — is a bullet lodged betwixt heart and lungs. It hurts; and for as much as Arturo desires to be optimistic for Lotte’s sake more than his own, he cannot. He is no healer and all he can do is be helpless. The dark thought occurs to him, that wishes for the witch doctor that the parasite might be able to save his daughter; Arturo’s fear of Riptide’s return keeps him from wishing too hard. He knows if he summons the parasite back that he will not be able to sever him again and that everything he has built and fought for will be gone.

The gangster comes across the birthing den as Hemlock is leaving it and he shrugs inside, fixing upon the frail snowdrop with low burning twin sun fire gaze. He cannot imagine anything more painful than losing a child and is thankful that up until this point he has not known what it felt like. He suppose his lucky streak has to run out at some point. The stillborns were different. He did not know them, not in the same way he had come to know the newest Lotturo’s. He checks upon the other three babes, healthy and happy before he moves to nuzzle against Lotte’s cheek. He offers her no empty words of condolences. He cannot keep any promises he can make her and so he does not attempt, instead offering what comfort he can by his presence.

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