Redtail Rise obbligato

He was interrupting. Ashlar's news was important but so was what she was teaching, and he stood with outward patience while she finished. He didn't move to join them until she'd turned towards him.

He met her greeting with an affectionate return of his own, smiling, before it faded some with the reminder of why he'd come. His tail stilled with the slight nerves of this, but he wasn't coming as a father. He had no claim to the child who was missing. He came as a packmate who had met an ally on the borders.

Chacal came, from Sapphique. The name rolled off his tongue in an odd fashion. He'd always just thought of them as her cliffs, but he thought Avicus would understand better with the formality. An eagle took a pup from them. She thought that it came this way and asked if we would help search. He's... brown. With light marks.

My son. It hung unspoken, something he didn't feel able or worthy of acknowledging. He wouldn't be, not if he did not choose to eventually know Ashlar. And now he might not ever get the chance.