Sea Lion Shores we creatures of the sea

For a brief moment, Lysianassa felt her heart stop. Welcome sister, came a deep voice on the wind, and she felt both elation and confusing. She ceased her private celebration immediately, head cocked to the side to listen. Could it truly be that the Sea she so longed to hear was finally speaking to her, in the way that It spoke to her mother? But from Aktaie's tales, the Sea had always been female if not genderless. Her brows furrowed over mismatched eyes, sea green and ice blue, as she attempted to decipher this turn of events.

But something made her turn and look around, and though she felt the swoop of disappointment, she also felt a greater elation. Unlike Akhlut's perception of her, when Naga looked upon her older brother he seemed the same as always—tall, proud, and filled with Atka's Light. She bore no prejudice against males, and certainly not against her brothers, though she knew the stories of the Nereides. Even Aktaie's hatred had cooled, though old habits still pervaded on occasion; the matriarch, the Siren Queen as Nanuq continued to call her, even found herself passing lessons of the Sea and Moon onto her sons. Naga had only ever known that male or females could teach of the Sea's religion, though males would never be as close to the Sea and Moon Mothers as their daughters.

All at once, Akhlut raced towards her and she, in turn, began to run towards him. Before long, they stood before one another, all smiles and sweeping tails. She fervently return his licks of affection before pressing the top of her head beneath his chin. Although Naga had been a familial nickname, born of ill-pronunciations of "Nassa" by her littermates, and carrying dual meaning amongst her mothers... it had become a kind of armor to protect her true name. To hear her brother speak the name given to her by the Sea felt like coming home.

"Akhlut," she breathed happily. "Thank the Light."