Silver Moraine kill

The silence they share remains comfortable. Neither felt the need to fill it with senseless things that did not matter. Their footfalls were quieter now that they were able to drift through the paths they had forged through brute strength. As the sun moved, their shadows stretched and stretched, becoming as tall and as great as any mountain. They arrive too soon to his borders—she had missed this sort of companionship. Tikigâk was not built to be a lone wolf, a pack animal, like any wolf, at heart. 

He speaks again, and Tikigâk listens—words, words with meaning. Faust. Kaan. Darukaal. His attachments—his ties. As he was now, why should he choose the path that she had? Walk the long, bloody road to become Tartok? 

Tikigâk had not known that she had desired this of him until she understood it could not then be had. Kaan Faust of Darukaal could not also be Sangilak Ujagatsiak of Tartok. 

Hm. Who was to say? It was not impossible. Before Tartok was always something else, something that prompted the choice to become. What might it be for him? 

She was not so introspective as to think on it more than that. Tikigâk would not dishonor him in such a way, either—Faust appeared more than capable, and she did not doubt that the wolves within his ranks matched his fierce spirit. 

I am Tikigâk, she rumbles in turn, golden eyes looking to the path they had briefly shared, I see your strength, Kaan—Darukaal, your people? it was not a word she knew, Kaan, and Tikigâk did not prefer to assume when she could receive an answer from the source.