Ankyra Sound Don't want to let you down, but I am Hell-bound.

She did not hear the clack of Lycaon's claws on the cold, slick stone as he crept into the grotto, nor did she hear the words he breathed. Nyx simply lay in a crumpled heap on the ground, oblivious to the presence of her pale companion as she openly and loudly wailed away her despair. Sobs racked her frame as she curled close to herself and she squeezed her eyes shut, desperate to block out the horrific scene that would forever be engrained in her mind's eye.

Something in her finally urged her to pull herself together, a selfish darkness that reminded her that she had to escape. To gather the evidence and remove it from the place of her crime and be gone before the others were to put the puzzle pieces together and realise what she'd done. On shaky limbs, the golden Ostrega pulled herself onto her paws and tentatively turned to see the broken bodies of the cubs that she'd slaughtered and, among them, Lycaon.

Nyx felt herself deflate, and her heart yearned to reach out to him. He had crumbled just as she had, wept as she had, and truly felt the weight of her guilt. She had done this. While she couldn't recall the how or the why, she had thought of disposing of them in this manner long before their birth. She had genuinely considered disposing of them swiftly, all the protect herself.

She had barely given thought to how he might feel, and she hated herself.

Parting her jaws, the golden Ostrega attempted to breathe his name, but no sound spilled from between her teeth. A tiny cry drew her attention elsewhere and, ears suddenly alert as that fleeting, unfamiliar maternal pull to respond to a baby's mewl heightened her senses. She looked down at where two corpses lay bloodied on the cold slate, but it was the pale-furred live child among them who gained her focus. Nyx gawked at him, finding herself unable to move, and just as she swallowed the bile that had risen to her throat, another had arrived to look upon the devastation.

Caiaphas went from anxious to ferocious in the blink of an eye, just as Nyx herself had. She whimpered pitifully beneath the Alphess' sharp stare when it turned on her, body sweeping low to the ground as she felt the sting of each bellowed demand to GET OUT. But he's mine, came a glimpse of her maternal instinct again as her wild yellow eyes darted between her remaining son and the wench who sought to drive her from him - he needs me.

But she had killed his brothers. Slaughtered his sisters. In her unsound mind, perhaps she would destroy him too.

Her shoulders sagged and her gaze lingered softly on the tiny, fragile little body of her single child, hackles bristling as she considered the strengthening urge to fight for him. Caiaphas continued to press closer, cornering her, suffocating her, and she had no choice but to run.