Arrow Lake melusine

for the barest of seconds after speaking her name, stigmata regretted the decision to come here. his thoughts fled wildly to thorn, who he would have preferred to confide in, but whose eerie absence over the night left him glowering and annoyed. a feeling that would evolve rapidly from plaintive dread to imperishable grief over the next day or so. yet through the turmoil of his emotions, takiyok's eyes cut to him in the gloom of the den, and he forgot all that troubled him in that instant.

she, the mother of his youngest children, was flourishing. she looked everlastingly tired and all the more beautiful because of it. he couldn't help the swell of pride in his chest as he looked at her, and then at their combined creations, before descending almost eagerly to her side with his gift in tow. depositing the hare at her paws, stigmata circled the round-bellied brood with a investigative sniff, and then came to sit at her opposite shoulder so that he had to gaze over her to glimpse the children.

he was quiet a moment - admiring this time and place for what it was, then reveling in it - before at last speaking. "i promised you a legacy in these mountains," he murmured, scouring her face for a reaction; "but i am starting to realize that i cannot uphold it. not when so many of diaspora think we should take on more allies, even ones we cannot definitively control." and as always, he got straight to the point.