Redhawk Caldera [aw] another dawn

He was right. Of course he was right! This was why she always came to him; Eljay was her rock, the better voice in her head that she depended on when her own insecurities got the better of her.

Yeah. It’s silly, but for some reason I feel like offloading these things on the pack means I’m failing to do what I need to. Even knowing it’s a decision everyone should have a say in. Maia shook her head, then smiled at him. You’re right, though. Maybe they won’t want it. Or maybe someone else will want it more.

Wraen hadn’t been the driving force behind the creation of the pack, Ibis had, and her appointments hadn’t been voted. Maia didn’t correct him though; that didn’t need to be his memory, she tended to forget that herself. The only reason it struck her now was because she remembered how deadset her sister was against becoming a leader. She wondered if things would have been different if Wraen had gotten to have the experience she had; leading a pack filled with her own family. Probably not. It was hard to imagine her sister ever being happy stuck in a single place and role.

Maia didn’t feel stuck. At some point she’d come to love having a place that was so completely theirs that it almost felt like a part of them. Eljay had given her that too.

I shouldn’t judge them. Moonglow is different, and the fact that Chickadee and Kivaluk are here right now without being punished for it shows that she might not be as bad as she was. But I don’t like the idea that we could become a place that thinks less of anyone, just for making their own choices. She leaned into him again affectionately, partially because she turned to look out across the water again. And I think I’m also jealous. That her pack helped Chickadee when we couldn’t. And that her children all seem to stay. I wouldn’t trade our kids for the world, but I can’t help wondering if…

She trailed off, then took a breath to steady herself. I just wonder why Brecheliant couldn’t be home for at least a few more of them. And then I feel ungrateful for even thinking it. These were things she could never share with her children, and things she hadn’t even shared with Eljay yet. Whenever they’d spoken about Moonglow it had always been vague and was always either about Chickadee or about the past. It had taken Maia a long time to even sort out the reasons she resented Kukutux so much, and recognizing this one made the rest of it feel so much pettier.