Ouroboros Spine taaqtumi ≜

for @Vairë (sorry i know we have one!) & @Shikoba; PPing @Aiolos <3

ariadne and kaluktuk are gone. they left before anyone went back to moonsong. dutch is in charge now, i think. he's asking what you want to do. he asked if you'd send someone, as their numbers are low and they may disband and join the other villages. he asked for me and kivaluk, maybe. but he wants you to know that no matter what, he'll try to keep them going.

the message had been recited haltingly by chickadee, who had looked more and more regretful at each shift of moonwoman's expression, even though she knew the anger and sorrow was not for her.

at last she was sent away, with warm thanks; she ran for @Kivaluk and their ulaq, gasping out all that had happened since the women's circle and her visit to moonsong, though she kept secret her own small hurt that kaluktuk had seemed so eager to mend things with his son and had not.

moonmother kept to herself in silence, the deerskin upon which she had been working now fallen away in folds that gathered cold. 

so.

it was an old story.

man who wants takes as many wives as he wants to rebuild what was lost. in her mind, she felt that kigipigak would take ariadne right back to natigvik, the source of his first failing. men kept to what they knew.

and what he knew was the use of women as a vessel for his personal ambition.

sending away any children who might be gathered at her hearth, including little quiet nasamiituuq, kukutux called for a council of their leaders and vairë, who would soon join them, she had decided.

"ariadne has gone. they left while the camps were still at winter hunting. she was angry after the women's circle. it must have been then she made this choice."

aiolos; to lose a daughter of his people's namesake. she placed her paw upon his own and went on.

"dutch asks that we send more in number. kivaluk and chickadee will welcome children. he has suggested their names. but he will work alone if he must."

it was not the way of the sunshine people.

"valiant and his sister minnow now live among us. i say that firsthunter choose a hunter to replace him if he wishes to go. but first we must ask him. before we bring him here, i must know: if a moonwolf abandons her home, do we carry it for her? she is my daughter and i believe she will come back. should her ulax be kept or should her choice to leave moonsong be honored by its people coming down from the ice?"

sun man was silent.

kukutux sat beside him, waiting for star hunter and moondoe to say their words.

she did not speak the story of grey brother.