Moonspear my reign is built upon hypocrisy and all my casualties

There was one of many decrepit trunks caught between several, and when he moved to shove at this one, like the others, a plume of rotten wood spilled around him. Chunks cleaved free. Bugs flit out of his way along with the dense aroma of wood rot, like the final dying sigh of the forest. One more of these collisions was enough to split the last of it.

As the debris settled and Glaukos could peruse the area - which now needed tidying so that he could expand the space - he found a sapling rooted firmly in the rock. It wasn't quite as tall as his chest, but it was there, surviving beneath the ruin.

His heavy breathing was indication he had overdone things. It was time to withdraw. So, doing that, he moved to the center of his would-be arena and shook the mess from his shoulders. He looked to the ghost of a woman again, focused, serious — very much his father's son in the way the sun now caught his jaw.

He did not know why she waited there, why she watched without speaking. Perhaps her mind had gone in the last year or two? Glaukos clears his throat, but does not speak either — as if the silence was not his to break.