Wheeling Gull Isle turncoat

this thread takes place between the events of this thread & this one, and this will be my only post <3 @John @Nakano @Malakai @Ava Amara @Anathema @Simeon @Dinah

caracal's family buried him in the lavender fields overlooking the sea. heda brought down armfuls of dried azalea, magnolia, honeysuckle; she sprinkled the potpourri of a gathered life into the grave dug from rich coastal soil.
she was unreachable.
this was unreal.
they buried him.
they buried caracal.
mothers are the ones expected to hold all things together no matter what torment befalls the family, and in that moment heda clung desperately to that role, to the knowledge that the redhawks were not only them. that they had others. that they could carry on in his name.
in whose?
you loved bartholomew too much, that's why he died. maybe if you'd been devoted the way he was to you, he wouldn't have been left here to get so sick.
heda sucked in a breath.
"he's gone," she said in a wavering voice, a high-strung voice. "i-i don't know why god took him." her face twisted. they had searched all over for judah, for judah, for her son; her mind had let go of the potential that he still lived, and with that she had lost a great portion of herself.
"but it's always for a r-reason," and then heda was staring off to sea.
staring. buried. mouth tasting of dirt. loam beneath her claws.
caracal would never come back. they would never be reunited. they had given everything to god and god had —
god had
— buried him!
her eyes turned blankly to @Towhee, suffused with something beyond mourning, beyond death. one paw before the other; the last words she would likely say were: "i want to find a place god can't go," on the edge of a hiccup; she met each set of eyes in turn.
another step. another. and then heda was stumbling down from the lavender fields, ears closed to all voices, for she no longer trusted herself to make another decision, not for herself, not for her children, not for sweetharbor — she had given it all to god! and god had plunged them all into terror and horror and pain, and taken all their offerings with him.
heda found a desperate peace as her conscious mind fell softly behind the plod of instinct.