Phoenix Maplewood so, what are you gonna do?

vex regards kigipigak as he speaks, and barely conceals the sneer that threatens to tug at the corners of his lips as he mistakenly assumes the older male's words for fear, true or not. the fact that it might be caution does not occur to him for he, himself, does not appear to have much in the way of caution. he's a boy playing at being a man, a prince playing at being king. a elaborate game or something he hoped to will into existence some day hardly mattered, he was sucked too far into it to stop any time soon.

perhaps not always, vex responds thinking of when they were young(er) and kaertok made them leave the den in search of their own. without their father to act as a buffer, arbiter appears to have wrapped her iron fist 'round her children. to royal, who is more phantom than sister these days — he couldn't even remember the last time he'd seen her and worse he couldn't find it in himself to be upset by it or truly care — who in her absence from everything and thus the trouble vex frequently found himself belly deep in was apparently the golden child. by default because she did nothing. nothing worth praise and nothing worth reprimand.

it seemed to be only after dad left. though perhaps it was because that was when vex, for he could not speak for haunt, had begun to break rules.