the story of my life

<style type="text/css">q {font:13px Georgia; color:#BA6D00;}</style>She watched with some suspicion the way his lips curled into a smile, but his thoughts were revealed without further delay, and she found herself face-to-face with what was easily her worst nightmare. Though her body remained neutral, her ears nevertheless cropped closer to her neck as emotion washed through her: Nanuq had left her children for Shearwater Bay, children that would have died without their grandmother's nourishment. She had dared claim another family without sparing any thought for the former.

Jinx had, for an instant, forgiven her mother her departure... But coming face-to-face with a child that had undoubtedly been favoured over her and hers, who were stronger wolves than these Kesuk-Nereides (in her haughty opinion), ripped that forgiveness into shreds. For once the Kesuk was wise in that she did not direct her sudden anger at Akhlut; for all intents and purposes, the only change that was visible was the downward pull of ears, and perhaps, if one looked closely, a stormy expression in her eyes.

Akhlut went further, to mention something even more horrific: Nanuq's mate was a woman and, worse even than that, the true Siren Queen of the Nereides, Aktaie. Disgust rolled through Jinx's belly like bile, and it was all she could do to not recoil from him and the vileness of his parentage. A quiet voice in her head reminded her that his parents did not dictate his actions, but... Well, there would always be disgust for him, that was certain. He was the child of an unholy union, the child Nanuq had forgotten her firstborn children for, and the child of the Nereides.

Lecter had had it right when he said that Shearwater Bay and the sirens in the north had had no business joining in sisterhood as they had, and that it was the source of conflict, for even now Kaskae might have been breeding with one of their consorts to produce children who were taught two opposing faiths, as if two opposing faiths could possibly exist. They would bastardize Shearwater Bay's religion... As would Shearwater's bastardize the Nereides, and it would become a vicious cycle, until wolf slaughtered wolf in strife and argument about who was right.

These thoughts were very well-concealed—Jinx had become rather good at keeping things to herself—as she mustered a smile that was false, but convincing. It is good to know there are others in the world who speak those names with reverence, she offered, knowing that while Nanuq's did not deserve it (she was a deserter and now, coupled with a woman), Aktaie certainly had, at one point or another. My mother abandoned me and my siblings, she quietly revealed, and then, I hope you will take no offence to me considering her no more family than any stranger. You, however... You share my blood, and are not my mother, and so we are true family. I will do my best to honour that bond, and the bond of wolf.

Even if it meant serving a wolf whose very origins disgusted her, though to be sure, it was no fault of Akhlut's own, and Jinx was well aware of that.