Herbalists' Cache hoof cache

his blood still sings from the fight, from the words gjalla threw at him like knives, cutting deep, deep, deeper. he stops short, snow kicking up around his legs, his body taut with the force of his ire. your friend has lost her good sense. his words come in a sharp, cutting exhale of his warm breath, before he fires out another comment: i was attacked, and she chose to berate me like a child instead of standing at my side. and apparently, i am a fucking idiot for defending myself.

he laughs then, but there is no humor in it. only something bitter, something that tastes of resentment, of exhaustion. he turns his head, crimson eyes finding morwenna, where he sees her and he inhales heavily past frozen nostrils. she can be alone and miserable. i do not care. i will not marry a woman who seeks to squash me beneath her self-righteous paw.

it is a lie. because he does care. because he wants to marry her. but gjalla does not appreciate him! not for who he is, not for what he has done for her, not for how he treats her. he could have torn her down for what she did, could have let the full weight of his forefathers’ wrath fall upon her—but he didn’t. he let her speak. he let her challenge him. and it was not the first time! blackfell had never treated her lesser than, but she saw fit to do just that to him. it was fucking—he grits his teeth. his emotion is palpable, wrought by the unfairness of it all.

blackfell snorts. i have tried, morwenna! there is only exasperation. i have been good to that woman. i have been what she seeks in a man. but at what point— he hesitates.

at what point am i sacrificing who i am?