Dragoncrest Cliffs Rhondonite

portia shrugged. she didn't have a good answer, and dalia's certainly must've been different than her own. portia had left as an act of defiance. of course, to make a name for herself was on her list of reasons, but as a yearling portia wanted nothing more than to disobey her mother and go off into the world and do whatever she wanted. truthfully, she never meant to actually make a name for herself. she just happened along drageda. and here they were.

"well," portia began with a gentle sigh, deciding how she could sugarcoat her reckless youth to her malleable son, "it is the way of the wolf. to travel, to leave the nest. i never thought it'd happen with my own children, but that was naive of me." it was, but no one ever thinks they aren't good enough until someone else plays their hand.

"and, of course, i would never want you all to leave... but most yearlings do. and i could never hold it against you. once they get old enough, their feet yearn to travel and they venture out into the world to make a name for themselves, to carve their own destiny," she explained, hoping her son would make sense of all that. 

and then, after she'd rambled a considerate amount (not that dacio wasn't used to his mothers tendency to over-explain), portia got to his question-- his actual question. "i didn't like my mother very much, i thought she was mean and controlling and she wanted me to marry a man who i found repulsive," portia explained with a small smile, "because a lady is expected to do what a man tells her-- but i didn't want that for myself. so i left, to find something better for me." her smile widened, and she looked at dacio with a glimmer in her eye.

"i found drageda, and your father."