And for all that it was worth, the bloodied madman did not feel his age, merely the weariness of thoughts dragged through the jagged fears of his own head. That he had walked, and she had also, must mean something; surely Sos counted their twinned trails to this place of His choosing as a sacrifice of sorts. Jinx — he had not yet investigated her scent to know if she had been taken in by denziens of the new land — but Lecter knew in his innermost heart that she had come alone, driven by the lashing verve of her cultist's heart and her mother's strength. Perhaps he had always known it, that she would be the one to survive, to press on, out of all her Atka-worshipping siblings.
Nanuq had failed them in that regard; to teach a child to crave the Light and disregard the Darkness was to rear a young mind to be weak, and his own nightmares had seen fit that he be aware of what had happened to Shearwater Bay and those who had not been chosen by Sos. It twisted his tongue within his mouth, filled his lips with the dry taste of dust; he could not speak of it, not even to the flame-eyed girl who stood before him now. In the eye of his mind, he had seen blood and torment, and death, and had stood aside, unable to cease the carnage and rot from overtaking his homeland.
And then a name fell from her maw, one he had not heard in many a moon; it was the old hatred, the old instinct, that dredged up the filth of loathing and coloured his black expression as his eyes hardened and he looked upon Jinx with an inkling of his familiar self castigating her. His very presence is very well what may have wrought Sos' wrath on Shearwater! he hissed with a violent vehemence that brought him lashing to his paws, the aching wound forgotten. The pelt along the nape of his neck stood tall, breaking from beneath a black layer of matted blood; he glanced skyward but for a moment before glancing back to Jinx, to calm himself.
She did not know — Nanuq's sin was not the burden of her daughter. And yet she needed to hear these words, for she was too devoted and wholesome to live in a blaze of half-truths and somewhat founded conclusions. We were not meant to mix with the Nereides, the pale shaman began, icewater eyes distant as he gazed unseeing away from his lithe companion. Your mother — I served her in all things, you must understand, and when Aktaie washed up on our shores, I would have gladly slain her had Nanuq asked it of me.
The telling of it was monotone, carefully modulate as not to let the wrath of the last years lash Jinx again; she was not to bear the brunt of his wrath. By some Sos-damned slight of choice, Nanuq ordered that Aktaie, Siren Queen of the Nereides, be nursed to health in our homeland, and kept there until she decided what was to be done. An abrupt pause fell, and the kiss of a brief wind flickered around the both of them, feathering through the newly liberated spikes of pale fur along the length of Lecter's neck and shoulders. He was lost! lost in a reverie of remembered betrayal —
— and what she chose was ... the binding of the kingdoms, as it were. The union of Nereides and Shearwater, and I was to be her vessel. I, who had served her in pure loyalty and blind faith since before the conception of her dream; she threw me to the bidding of Atka and I died that eve upon the beach, forced to do that which was evil and wretched in the eyes of Sos.
He had sunk down again, eyes fixed upon some distant point as head lowered between shoulders stippled in black blood from his latest sacrifice, and the wind would have carried his continued words away had it been of greater strength: She returned to her Cove laden with my children. Daughters, I am sure; the Nereides only treasured girlchildren, and they sent ... Aktaie's son back to us, discarded as so much offal, and for many moons he was a thorn in my side, a constant reminder not only of what had happened, but what would come to pass.
Lecter knew not from where the verbosity sprang; it was as if some boil deep within his heart had been lanced in her presence, and spilled forth its bile unquenchingly. It was after this that Siku rose to power, and your father ... He had loved Koios, and in the raw gleam of icewater eyes it showed plainly as he turned to look upon Jinx once more. And then I was led away, and the Bay is no more. We bear the sins that were committed that day. We are to make penance for them, but with what I am not sure, and for how long we are damned, I do not know.