Blackfeather Woods so you run and you run to catch up with the sun

She was interested; it wasn’t necessarily surprising but, rather, pleasant to hear. For though she was not the first overall to be curious, she was the first from the woods.

“Before finding my way down here, I lived in the far north. Farther than where the Teekon Wilds reach, farther than many from here have ever travelled before,” he began. “I was born there, into a large family that expands across the entirety of the northern lands. Things were wonderful, calm—it was nothing like the lands down here. I miss it sometimes...” How could he not? How could he not miss his original home, the place where he was born and raised, where much of his family resided still? Every now and again, he has to resist the urge to make the long journey back.

“The stories from the north are great ones—perhaps I will share them with you someday but, for now, I will focus on the Apaata’s that may be found here,” he continued with a small, unmistakably sad, smile. “I ventured for a long while without a true home. This was my first home after leaving the north. I met your grandmother, Meldresi, and found that I could stay here.” It was so different from the home he left behind. “Eventually, I left after meeting a woman name Scarlett. She was... someone amazing. I miss her, though I spent a long time after we parted ways hating her.” And that weighed on him each and every day, how he’d treated the memory of her—and how he’d initially reacted upon hearing of her untimely passing. “Her and I ruled Bearclaw Valley together. We had four children—Alexander, my son, and Desna, Nanook, and Sesi, my daughters. Things changed, though. Times became rough, with me being pulled up north to reunite with a sibling I’d previously thought dead. Eventually, we separated, and I hated her for that. For such a long time, I hated her, but I suppose that’s what happens when your heart aches so badly.” That was the first chapter of his life, the most significant piece that then led to his current existence. “She took my daughters with her and I brought our son here. Eventually, he left to start his own life and I remained here.”

He always remained in the woods. Even after leaving, he was always drawn back—perhaps it was a curse, or simply just some terrible sense of duty that he felt obligated to fulfill, even after all this time.

“Perhaps you will run into my children if you ever travel again. Desna is Valette now—she told me once how she leads a pack of her own now, but time has taken the memory of the name away from me,” he explained. “After them came Astrid, Atshen, Keelut, and Abraxas—their mother is not a woman worth meeting, and I hope you never cross paths with her. Those children are all gone now, too, but they were never truly mine. Two carry names from my homeland but not a single one of them would bring pride to the north. Be warned that, should you ever meet them, you should turn tail and run. Keelut is not so bad but... there is something off about that boy. Will you promise me that you will avoid them?” He had to mention them, even though he wished not to. They were still carriers of his blood, they still existed—he couldn’t pretend that they were not there, not when the crows and ravens knew them to exist, and not when they could very well try to steal Maegi away someday.

They were his shame, truly and undoubtedly.

“Then came the most recent additions to the Apaata line, though they were stolen away,” he explained, beginning the next chapter. “I met another northerner and thought her to be what I needed, but she was not. She was nothing like the women of my family, nothing like those from the other northern families that my siblings and cousins have settled down with. She bore my children and then ran away with them in the night, encouraged and assisted by those of her own family that had gradually started to appear.” It was the only way she would have made it out, he’d assumed. Not to mention how they’d all vanished at once—some things were not purely coincidental. “Her name is Shivali. I cannot leave to find her, just as I could not leave to find you. But I hope that someday those children will wonder about their father, that they will find their way back here, back to us, so that they may be raised correctly.” As Apaata’s, with proper northern morals. “There are many of my family spread throughout the lands, Maegi. Some are old, some are young, some travel and some stay home, but they all share something—you can trust them,” he added, a prideful tone filling his voice. “If ever you meet another, you can trust them. Many know of me or my grandfather, Aningan. If you mention either of us, they will help you, no matter where you are or what you’ve done. You will always have the assistance of the north.” His siblings, his cousins, his aunts and uncles... he knew anyone would help her, any single one of them would assist someone with a connection, direct or otherwise, to Aningan Apaata.