Otter Creek You will kill or be killed, it's about progress

The reign of Astrid comes to a timely end in the most unceremonious fashion, a simple disappearance of authority that left little to question than the acclaimed princess of the Night's cowardice. As he approaches one full year of existence, he is thrust into the position as the wood's Dark Master, a title he has neither sought out nor ever wished to have. It is a matter of availability that delegates his position, the lack of any other viable candidate to take up the mantle his grandmother built before him. There were only him and his damnation left to hold together what remained of the once victorious Blackfeather Woods. And yet, he alone was not enough for Blackfeather Woods was not his sole responsibility. Sure, he held the crown, but those within had a duty to themselves to see that the said crown still existed once he was dead and gone. The teen soon to turn adult was not equipped for such tremendous entitlement so suddenly, without the training and the tools previous rulers had at their hand before him. What he knows is only what tales he was told as a child of the Dark Brotherhood's way of life, a life that was severely lacking in what represented the Brotherhood to date. He would start there, reform the sect that had been lost to false leaders and unaccountability. From there, he is sure the dark woods would reclaim its reputation as a force to be reckoned with.

Yet, he remains secluded to only a few acres of running distance in light of the bounty placed on his head. It is unfortunate, but survivable. He hunts what he can in the limited distance he has, and he holds a rather small hare in his jaw as he makes his venture back towards the looming patch of land in the distance. But still, he never fails to catch the scent of a lurker nearby, never void of the presence of those hoping to catch him in his weakest. His patience has run thin, and a low snarl formulates in the belly of his vocal chords, calling out those who lay ahead and venture far too close to the woods for his liking. The action of the other, as he watches, appears to be with purpose; detecting and aloofly observing the perimeter of his home with seemingly, a certain point in mind. It leads the newly appointed leader's snarl to grow in volume and meaning. But something rings to him as off, that the likelihood of this being a true loner whose first instinct is survival, would linger around the fringes of a pack who displayed its enemies' heads on their borders seemed all too uncharacteristic. Only those who had not been a loner long or who had a cavalry behind them stuck around as long as this one was. In all the loners he has made himself acquainted with (and that had been many, many whose blood now lined the borders of their woods), none were ever without the look and feel of desperation and Vaati did not receive either of those from the male who so stealthily surveyed his home, yet, there was always the possibility he is wrong. He has been wrong before. "What do you want."