Stavanger Bay everyone, step aside; this is the last warning

Weariness burrowed deep into the marrow of Szymon’s bones, but he continued doggedly onward, dragging the remains of the fawn and its spotted hide back to the bay with a growing sense of urgency. He was weary. If another wolf dared to challenge the Cairn for his prize, it would awaken the killing urge in the obsidian-ribbed monster. He would not fail — he had too much at stake — but engaging in battle when he was already so tired was, quite simply, folly. Panting raggedly in the summer heat, he heaved a heavy sigh of relief as he crossed through the territory borders, pausing to refresh them by snaking his body along a gnarled tree to leave tufts of his fur dappled with the blood of his kill. He dragged the carcass to a shady corner of the pampas grove, taking great pains to sequester the coveted organ meat and the thick, fatty muscle of the fawn’s thigh — and then he ventured to one of the pack’s many caches to bury the rest, pulling the salt-crusted kelp carefully back over the top.

The caches were well stocked with meat and fish, due in part to Szymon’s efforts. Grayday had taken some of the fawn’s meat for the Silvertip wolves, and some had been gifted to Donnelaith and to Deirdre, but the Blackrock wolf had saved the choicest bits of meat for his slate and smoke witch doctor. Satisfied with his efforts, he took up the spotted hide in his jaws with as much gentleness as he could muster and brought it to the seaside — there, he rubbed away the last vestiges of fat, sinew, and connective tissue with sand and porous stone. Careful to keep a tight grip on the skin lest the Sea tear it from his grasp, he cleaned away the blood in one of the intertidal pools. Then he rolled the skin in sprigs of mint and lemongrass, butting it with his scarred muzzle and dropping to the ground to crush the leaves’ perfume into the skin. It was a whimsical gift, and Szymon was not normally given to whimsy, but his desire to impress his Chosen One drove his actions. After all, it wasn’t like he could actually give her cubs, unless he stole someone else’s.

Getting up and shaking the foliage from his fur, he pointed his head and howled for @Doe.

Please, I need him to actually steal some cubs, now. That would be amazing. Doe would die.

She'd been spending more and more time apart from him lately, though not through any conscious effort of her own. Things had been hectic, and they all had to do their duty to prepare for what was to come. Atoll had been training hard with Laggy among all her other duties, and had gotten held up on the other side of Donnelaith during the disasterous meeting with the pale alpha. Needless to say, she felt they had a bit of catching up to do. What had he been up to all this time? She'd noticed him leaving the territory quite often, as of late, but it no longer bothered her the way that it had before.

They had chosen each other, after all. No matter what happened, they'd still chosen each other.

When Szymon's call perked her ever-twitching ears, Atoll had already been searching for him. She stood very still for a moment, determing his location, and then turned toward the sound and trotted on.

"Szymon," she said when she saw him standing so near. She hadn't realized just how much she'd missed his presence - but she realized now. Doe's tail wagged with tired relief as she paced toward him, head lowering to butt into his ivory-trimmed chest. So fierce and true was her joy at reuniting with him that she did not notice the pelt, or the smell of warm-blooded prey upon him. For the moment, she only cared that he was there.

As Skellige’s claim on the bay territory began to solidify, a warring tangle of confidence and insecurity had taken up residence within Szymon’s breast — it taunted the monster that normally lay dormant and filled his tortured heart with a bottomless hunger. He would not be satisfied bowing and scraping before his siblings in this new and untamed land — he could not allow rank to jeopardize his affection for the witch doctor — and yet, he knew that wherever Skellige placed him on the hierarchical ladder, he would willingly remain. The Leviathan had control of every wolf who followed him; his control was absolute. Szymon was no exception to this rule, but he knew that something within him had expanded and changed — he was stronger now.

The sound of Doe’s familiar footfalls, light and airy as a seabird’s, caught his attention and his heart in one swift motion — and the monster that clamored and rattled its cage settled down to sleep. “Doe,” he crooned to her, his throat thick with words he never would have been able to say with the urgency and fluency he needed. I missed you, I missed you, I missed you — I told somebody that you were my Chosen One today. Did you know that? Do you know you’re mine? He craned his neck to preen at the base of her satellite dish ears, a shuddering sigh allowing all the tension to ripple from his body. He didn’t know until she was here and safe within his embrace that he’d been waiting for her so ardently. “Doe,” he growled helplessly, preening his fangs through her fur, his scabbed right foreleg reaching up to crest her shoulders as he rocked back onto his haunches. For a moment he brought his left foreleg up as well to wrap her in a wolfish hug but he did not want to weigh her down overly much and reluctantly let her go.

He could not relinquish the physical contact — the refreshing feel of her pelage twining with his own — and continued to groom her, his lips and tongue cresting her neck and shoulders, his fangs gently tattooing her upright ear. “M-Missed you,” he uttered senselessly, involuntarily, crooning to her, humming to her of julep and mint and timing being everything, promising her that she’d give in to him.

It was an odd embrace, but one that the dusky shewolf thought she recognized. Even odder that he should embrace her this way when her Time, though near, was not yet upon her - but she was pliant to whatever plans or wishes her beloved might have, and whatever worries about Skellige's plans she still harbored faded away in his soothing presence. Atoll - Doe, right now - shuffled herself under his larger frame, only to find him slipping away.

The game irritated her for a moment before she saw the clear-eyed affection etched into his handsome features. Oh, she thought to herself, feeling a strange mixture of disappointment and relief, Just a hug, then. That's probably for the best.

But she could not allow her beloved monopoly over such affections! Doe reared back on her hind legs and clamped her thin forelegs around Szymon's neck, locking her clunky paws at his jutting shoulder blades. From there, she did her best to drag his face to her level, exactly where she wanted it, and peppered it with wet, sloppy licks and scrapes of  her preening teeth. She made she to breathe her fish-breath into his nose before releasing him and burrowing her face more firmly into the fur of his chest. The soothing scent of Syzmon filled her nostrils - as well as mint and lemongrass. An odd medely, but one she could appreciate.

"Did you already see the den?" Doe asked, wondering if she'd seen how she'd opened it for him, and whether he'd gone in and messed with her stores before she could warn him about the oleander. Although, he seemed healthy enough and smelled free of any poison.

Had Szymon been privy to Doe’s present thoughts, he would have stopped short and simply stared at her pretty, sharp-featured face in disbelief; he was, after all, venturing into the confusing maelstrom of love and affection for the first time in his life. The lowest ranking member in his home pack and a youth besides, he had kept as far away from all of his siblings as possible, with the exception of Skellige — and although at least one of his older sisters must have been receptive at some point, he would have been so overwrought that he never would have noticed the warring males’ — or Jaglon’s, if it came to Ksenia — renewed and fervent interest in them.

Growling pleasurably, the sound dropping to a low hum as Doe repeated his odd embrace, Szymon turned his head obligingly and chuckled at her sloppy overtures of affection — a deep and rolling sound accompanied by the joyous thwp-thwp-thwp-thwp of his wagging tail. The perfume of her breath carried for him an intoxicating, ambrosial allure — he liked fish, anyway — and he nibbled and licked at the crest of her slate-furred neck as she burrowed her face against his chest. “M-My l-l-lovely girl,” he crooned to her at her question, “no.” He hadn’t been around the densite all that much over the past few weeks. Border marking kept him busy, for they required constant refreshing until the perimeters were worn with his paws; he left visual markings as well as scent markings — dragging fallen logs and driftwood when he could, adoring them with the tufts of his fur and blood of his kills and abuse of his talons when applicable.

It was at this point he remembered he had brought gifts with him, but if she was going to show him the den anyway, perhaps they could do a mutual sharing of All the Things. “H-Have something to sh-show me?” he questioned haltingly, but with more fluency than he could boast at other times or in other places in his life. At her reply, “H-Have some — th-thing — to show you, too,” he added teasingly, his teeth preening her shoulder. His tongue swept the fur there, and he watched with rapt fascination as the slate gray fur, once pushed aside, revealed a paler, more vulnerable undercoat.

His lovely girl!

Doe preened under his attention, fur fluffled like the feathers of a prideful bird as she blissfully endured his praise. Her nature dictacted that such a fine compliment be answered with violence equivalent to the savageness of her own joy, and Doe turned to sink her teeth into the thicker fur on his shoulder, catching skin between her jaws but keeping her grip loose enough not to pain him.

His next words, however, made her jump back and do a little dance. She did have something to show him, and so many things to tell him about! And what was this? He had something for her? Another dance was in order, but she pushed aside that need to draw close to him once more, her tail wagging so hard it made her whole body shake.

"You first," she insisted, unable to wait for her own gratification, and unwilling to outshine whatever prize he'd brought back to her with her masterpiece of a den.

Szymon devoured his Chosen One’s delight, relishing the needlelike clasp of her teeth as they pricked his skin and the way her whirring paws rarely ever touched the ground when she was happy; he chuckled, a low, rich sound that became lost and muffled against the precious press of her long-limbed frame against his own. He moved with the force of her whipping tail and wiggling body, growling possessively as the unbidden thought of any other wolf touching her this way crossed his mind — and perhaps it was the electric feeling engendered by the nearing approach of her season, something Szymon had yet to fully understand or experience — but he could not help clasping the looser skin at her nape between his teeth with the same gentleness he’d brought to the fawn hide or the gyrfalcon eggs, closing his jaws just enough to leave an imprinted tattoo that would fade in mere seconds. Still, it made him feel better — it made him feel qualified to face the imagined intruder and say, “She is mine.”

“Mmm,” he hummed his approval, “mine.” As if she didn’t know!

“You first,” had been the witch doctor’s command, and Szymon’s tail lashed the air in exuberant agreement with this plan. He was not a creature for teasing and play — unless the play was with Doe and specifically requested or initiated on her behalf — and had no desire to hold out on her. He tried to reach the gifts without moving away from her, but found himself unable — and so, with an apologetic lick across the crown of her skull, just between the uneven peaks of her ears, he stepped away to retrieve the spotted hide. He shook it with a deft twist of his head, unfurling some stray sprigs of mint, and laid it at her feet. He had no reason to feel anxious at giving her such an odd gift — she had never looked upon any of his previous gifts with scorn — but the flicker of his tail betrayed his frenetic need to be praised by her. “M-My first — ” deer kill, he was about to say, and that was about the time he realized that he’d murdered the animal his Chosen One was named for. Well. That was a bit awkward — but it was too late now.

Scrapping whatever he was going to do with that particular sentence, he dragged the meat — the gleaming haunch and thigh, which would provide a nice bone for her to chew on when all was said and done; and the rich, warm blooded viscera that most of his coastal menu items lacked. Here, his actions seemed to say, just forget what I said. Eat this.

Her pride at being called his was soon interrupted by the appearance of the first of his gifts. Stark white spots stood out against a cinnamon base, dazzling Doe as much as the flashing pinpricks of lightning bugs in the summer. This, though, was not a myriad of far-off insects. This was something she could hold and touch, feel bristle against her tongue.

She did not hear Szymon's words, so intent was she on this new and perfect prize. Uncertain paws picked unconsciouly through the sand, and a scabby nose brushed the brilliantly painted canvas of fur. It even smells beautiful - blood and mint, tart lemongrass, saltwater...

"Thank you," said Doe, eyes turning at last to the giver of this fine gift. "I've never..." never touched something to precious. "Nobody's ever given me something like this," she murmured, strange emotions rupturing the unconscious wall that always separated Doe from the real world. Once again, Szymon had envoked in her that strange clarity, and she saw herself as if from far away, watching from another's eyes as her own gazed deeply into those of her love.

"Oh," she breathed, realizing - for the first time - that she loved him. She loved him; would do anything to make him feel the way she felt right now. All at once, she was ashamed for the way she so often treated him - as though he were something put on this earth to serve her, for her own entertainment and pleasure. Here and now, for this moment only, she saw him as he truly was.

A pale wolf, streaked with ginger and cream. Yellow eyes, filled with the kind of selfless compassion she would never achieve. Scarred face, battered body - offering fur and meats won by his own skill and power. A burgeoning confidence she could kill or encourage as easily as she breathed.

I don't deserve you, came the unpleasant realization. Your esteem, this affection - it's all so misplaced. I'm not the right girl to trust. I just take and take and never give, and you deserve someone who will treat you the way you've always treated me.

Selfishly, she kept this thought to herself, hoping he would never discover the truth on his own. Instead, she promised herself that she would do better, be kinder. The next time gifts were exchanged, she would have something to give to him in return.

For now, she pushed her muzzle into his fur once again before proceeding to fawn over the loody meats he'd presented to her. It really was a treat - so much easier to justify eating land-food when it was a gift than when it was something she hunted down for herself. Doe savored each and every bite, and then insisted upon Szymon sharing in some of the tastier morsels.

The scrappy little witch doctor was many things — a mystic, peering at the real world through a shifting veil of fog; a supplicant of Skellige, as fanatically devoted as Szymon himself; and yes, perhaps a selfish girl, focused on those things and people that afforded her the greatest pleasure and entertainment — but Szymon belonged to her like a too-snug glove or a stiff new pair of shoes. The fit may have initially been imperfect, but he had stretched to suit her needs and, in that way, had become wholly, uniquely hers in a way no other wolf could claim. He was tailored for her. It was not something he voluntarily chose — she had happened to him — and he could not articulate what she was to him with the same eloquence that she found in her moment of clarity. What he felt was possession and protectiveness — a skip of heart similar to that which Skellige felt for Deirdre, with the same lack of understanding; the Cairn boys had not been raised to express love — though perhaps as his worldview expanded, they could learn.

It was pride that swelled Szymon’s breast as he watched the rapt attention with which Doe examined the first of her gifts; her scab-prickled nose brushed the spotted hide with uninhibited reverence, and then she turned her brilliant lemon eyes to his, luminescent and liquid with emotion. Szymon dragged air slowly into his lungs, blowing it out on a shaky sigh at the look in those eyes, and shifted his lean, angular shoulders in a bashful shrug as she thanked him. He canted his narrow head to look obliquely at her with a smile of fond amusement — it was a gift that paled, he thought, in comparison to what she gave him. Still, he could not negate the effort that getting and preparing the gift had taken, so he accepted her thanks with another roughhewn chuckle. “Good,” he said playfully in response to her soft musing. Other wolves would perhaps give her gifts like these in the future — perhaps even the greatest gifts a male could give a female, if Skellige and the Sea so wished it — but they would not see her face the way it was now, open and clear and just a little bit awestruck. Szymon was the first.

Had Szymon been privy to Doe’s realization, he would have negated it immediately — though he would have been wholly unable to articulate why. The golden-eyed Cairn was raised for a life of war; Doe would perhaps never know how fulfilling he found it to provide something other than an extra set of fangs and an extra warm body to pit against the foes of the lofty Cairns. Her eager taking gave his giving — and his life — a new layer of meaning. It was clear that he found her nearness gift enough, for as she pushed her muzzle into his fur, all the tension in his body melted away and he crooned to her lovingly — a sound no other wolf had heard him make. He watched with rapt amusement as she fell to the warm-blooded meat with a will, finding it interesting to note that she tore into it with far more gusto than she did the oceanic fare he normally brought her — and understanding bloomed suddenly in his golden eyes. She was not a wolf of the sea — that much had been apparent since the first day she’d almost drowned at his feet. Perhaps her palate was more suited to the beasts of the land.

Hunkering down beside his Chosen One, the inky-ribbed Cairn helped to clean up the last of the meat, pushing the spindly leg bones toward her just in case she wanted to chew on them in the near future. “Y-You — ” he stammered out, his tongue working clumsily to encapsulate the joy he felt in that moment. He fell short, of course. Compliments were new for him, and they felt untutored and puerile when they fell from his lips. “Your t-turn,” was what he fell back on. With mock demand, he nosed at her neck and shoulder, butting her insistently as though to demand his surprise.

Clarity lost in the food-induced haze, Doe could only further succumb to the renewed excitement of their reunion when Szymon demanded to see his own surprise. The doctor, of course, was all to happy to lead him to her newly enlarged den, carrying the beautiful pelt carefully in her bristling jaw. Once there, she dragged the pelt over the sandy floor of her home and sat down upon it, eyes still fixed on the pale form hovering outside her home.

Atoll opened her maw to bid him enter, but the dying embers of her moment of clarity made her pause. She wanted to force him inside, to tell him that this was his home now, and that he was to return here each night to sleep. But while he belonged to her, she also belonged to him. He deserved her compassion, and to decide without persuasion whether he wanted to make his home with her.

Sweeter the victory if he surrenders without duress, the sensible voice reminded her, appealing to her selfish nature. Doe had to agree.

"I made it bigger," she said softly. "So that you can come in."

Sizzle says, “HOW DO I DEN”

Szymon followed the eager skitter of Doe’s paws with a measure of his own alacrity, betrayed in the snap of his paws and the flick of his bottlebrush tail. The smile that shaped his kohl-lined lips was fond as he watched his Chosen One spread the spotted pelt over the den’s sandy floor and curl her pert haunches beneath her in a demure depiction of imperious grace. Still, his steps were tentative as he stepped cautiously into the den — there was an instinctive dislike to the sensation of being walled in; it did not please the Cairn, and his tattered ears fanned back against his skull for a moment in trepidation. He turned a slow circle, moving carefully, as though every wall was forged of fragile eggshell — and his scarred muzzle investigated every nook and cranny of the cozy space. He had never had a den before. The lowest ranking wolf of his natal pack, he had snatched bits of sleep when and where he could, for to have a traceable location was to court folly.

“I made it bigger,” came her soft, smoky voice, “so that you can come in.”

A sensation so sweet it was almost painful twisted the warped and scorched strings of Szymon’s heart into knots — she had done this with him in mind. He wanted to rejoice in her gift, to rub his body along the walls and mark it with his scent as he had marked every border of the bay territory, but every inch of sinew and flesh in his body felt stiff and cold — he needed her touch to thaw him and set him free. “C-C-Come here,” he demanded roughly of her, standing a bit awkwardly, his lean, spare frame blocking the light of the outside world. “I — ” The halting lock on his words had returned to him in this unfamiliar situation, but if only he could touch her — if only he could taste her — everything would come untangled. The bass whine that hummed in his throat spoke of his need for her — edged with a guttural undertone, it was one of the few times he had asked her for something instead of waiting for her to offer.

Doe did not like this - this baring of the heart. It felt almost like surrender, but she was used to that, and this? This was frightening. It was scary to offer up herself and see him stand so rigid and still, yellow eyes glinting into the darkness of her den but not with any emotion she could name. Why didn't he say something? Why didn't he move or run or scream, or tell her she'd gotten it all wrong, this wasn't what he wanted -

But no - come here, he said. He still wants me at the very least.

Still, her legs shook as she shuffled toward him, ears back and head down like a scolded pup. Part of her knew - the part called Atoll - that she should not balk at anything; not anymore. But somehow, Szymon was different. Outside of Atoll's influence. For him, she would always just be Doe - the girl he'd brought back to life simply by virture of being Szymon.

Her thoughts stuttered, running back and forth and into each other as she bumped the top of her head against his neck. Do you like it? she wanted to ask; Do you like me?

Ahhh. Clunky post day.

Guilt swam through Szymon’s veins as Doe shuffled toward him with her satellite dish ears pinned back and tapered skull canted down — did she fear he was displeased? He could not find the words to reassure her, still feeling irrationally unsettled by the enormity of the gift she had given him, but as the crown of her head fitted into the crook of his neck he felt the tension melt away, just as he knew it would. A low, heavy croon spilled from his jaws as he surveyed the den with his brilliant sulphureous gaze. “It,” he sounded out quietly, one foreleg snaking around her shoulders to pull her nearer still, “is b-b-beautiful — l-like — ” Heat flushed the young wolf’s cheeks; his tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth, and he unfurled it to groom the fur betwixt her ears with meticulous, deliberate care. “Like you, Doe,” he said, feeling within himself for the thread that could hold together the shaking of his nerves.

Dipping his narrow skull, he rubbed his scarred muzzle through the longer fur at the nape of her neck, with its slate softness and dusky red guard hairs. His eyes closed as he lulled himself into a sense of comfort deep enough to allow speech: “You d-dug this whole d-den?” he questioned, the note in his guttural bass timbre obviously impressed at the strength and resilience of his Chosen One. He didn’t need to say it — it was made evident in the way he lifted his head to glance around, feeling more secure with Doe at his side, able to face the walls and see them for what they were: sanctuary. “I’ve n-never…h-had a den,” he confessed, wondering whether she had dug it with the intention of having him stay here or just admire it and spend time with her inside it from time to time. He resumed trailing his muzzle through her fur, nibbling at her nape in mute apology for his initial reaction. There were things Doe didn’t know about him yet — things she’d undoubtedly find out if they slept together — and Szymon was embarrassed by them.

“D-Do you sleep here?” he asked, wondering if it would be easier if he had some practice at it. “W-Where?”

The tension that pinned down her batlike ears was quickly relieved by his nearness. The doubts that often plagued her always seemed to fade away when they were together, and soon enough, her ears were each back to their own watchful dance.

Satisfied that he would not be running or screaming, Doe raised her headed to comb her teeth through his fur and shove her nose into his uncoat - sneezing hot breaths onto the skin of his neck whenever a bit of fur found its way up her nostril. A low croon thrummed through the den as his teeth found purchase at the nap of her neck, and she arched herself into the touch without thought, pushing more firmly against him as old instincts told her body to go limp; allow herself to be protected and cared for.

At his question, she could only nod, mute in the return of the blissful comfort Szymon always offered. Not even her pride could stir up a stronger reaction in her - she could brag later about her mastery at digging large holes.

His next query, however, invoked another surge of excitement in her. The sly and cunning part of her brain saw an opportunity to further her agenda, and Doe took it without mercy.

Pulling away from her tender-hearted love, she backed herself further into the den and seated herself again where she'd been called from. Tail wagged, ears swivelling demurely, she first curled herself into a restful ball, and then allowed her body to unravel into a sleepy puddle. Lids half-lowered, she gazed invitingly at Szymon, stretching a paw toward him in exaggerated longing.

"I sleep right here," she said, her voice almost a pur. "But it's so big, now - I don't know how I'll sleep in such an empty space."

Eyes flashing mischievously, she awaited his reponse, hoping this would evoke mirth or tenderness, and not add further tension to the set of his jaw.

The scrappy little witch doctor relaxed into her errand boy’s embrace and he felt again that odd stirring of mingled confidence and possessiveness; he drew a breath so deep his obsidian-ribbed chest shuddered with it, then let it out on a heavy, contented sigh. He found it fascinating, the catlike way she arched her neck and crooned as he nibbled at her nape, but before he could explore it further his Chosen One drew away from him to resume her place on the spotted hide. He watched her, allowing the last remaining shreds of trepidation to fall away as he chuckled amusement at the tidy way she coiled herself with a swivel of her oversized ears and a flicker of her tail. His plan had worked! Szymon felt like something of a genius. He thought if he could only lie next to her in the den, he would learn to love the walls that surrounded them — and even if that hadn’t been on his own sneaky agenda, he would have been helpless before the look in her eyes.

Her tightly wound musculature uncoiled then and she melted bonelessly on the den floor with a beseeching paw stretched out to him — this was a gesture he more than understood, and fondness warmed the eerie yellow of his eyes as he recalled their first few forays into physical touch. The mischievous look in her eyes and the “innocent” musing as to how she’d ever sleep with so much extra space clued even Szymon in to her machinations, but it was just the right way to go about it — he could handle solemnity and sentimentality, to some degree, but having those two things plus a new situation — and a walled situation besides! — had been more than his neurotic heart could take.

He sidled over to her eagerly, fitting his body around her to nibble again at her nape, wondering if she’d make that fascinating noise of contentment again. He tried for suavity, but missed the mark — but now it didn’t seem to matter so much: “Mm,” he murmured thoughtfully through a bristly mouthful of her fur, his bass timbre honeyed with affection for her, “g-guess I could h-help, if y-you’re — if you need — I mean…if y-you’re asking.”

Triumph flared up in her heart as he started forward, moving easily, now. It did not seem too selfish this, time - Doe rather thought that they both would appreciate the fruit of her underhanded methods, if the glint in his goldleaf gaze was anything to go by. In the cool of the den, he curved himself around her, ensconcing her as neatly and as safely as her little den once had. This, though, was even better. Her den had never soothed her with its heartbeat, or massaged gentle teeth into the ruffled fur of her neck; had never spoken so sweetly that the words were lost but the message sang true.

They had a lot to talk about - so much had happened that Doe didn't know where to begin. The words that had been bristling to escape her mouth no longer seemed as important as what she wanted to say, now.

"Thank you," she sighed, rolling to her back, so that the teeth that'd massaged her nape were now posied to do the same to her throat. She hooked a paw around his neck and wiggled until she laid across his paws. "For all that you do. I would be lost without you, Szymon."

Presented with the creamy hollow of the witch doctor’s throat, Szymon experienced again the strange phenomenon that occurred whenever he was in possession of something particularly endearing or fragile — he felt quite acutely the strength of his jaws, knowing that if he wished it, he could crush that tantalizing curve and end her life. It was a sobering thought and a disturbing one — he would have killed any wolf who tried it and would never have done it himself — but the knowledge of his capabilities, though horrifying in practice, was merely something he accepted as truth. He felt no danger of losing control here and so he smoothed his tongue along the fur of her cheek with exquisite delicacy and traced small nibbles down the fur until he’d reached the coarser fur near her collarbone. He adjusted his position to accommodate her, pillowing her head and shoulders on his scarred forelegs, preening the fur of her throat as she spoke.

“Mine,” he growled, allowing his breath to heat the fur of her throat with a billowing rumble. He drew back, licking the sharp pinpoint of her muzzle with a contented grin. Her words stirred a fissure of unrest in his heart — the life of a Warsaw wolf was not a gentle one, and there were no guarantees that he would survive the battles that lay ahead in the claiming of the bay — but he could not find the words to tell her so. What he did say was, “I belong to you,” in the most even, fluent cadence he could muster. She would never be without him, as long as he lived.

Doe sighed, her eyes fluttering shut at his easy declaration. She loved it when he spoke to her any time at all, but when the words were particularly clear, it always took her breath away. He had a beautiful voice; low and sweet and mellow. When he was at ease, it always shined through.

"We belong to each other," Doe said, swallowing the lump that rose up in her throat. The words came to her again, like lines of a well-remembered song. I will be a shadow at your side; your journey will be my journey, your ambitions, my ambitions, your sorrows, my sorrows.

But the timing was all wrong, their situation fraught; Doe could not swear herself to him while her plea to Skellige was still unanswered. So she held her tongue, tucking the Vows away for later use, and dragged Szymon down until the thick fur of his neck buried her head.

"Skellige has made me Atoll," she told him, partly because she'd meant to in the first place, but mostly to distract herself from the pain coiling in her chest. "And I asked him to give you to me - to be my mate."

“We belong to each other,” Szymon’s Chosen One said in turn, and his tattered ears strained forward ardently to savor each syllable. He made no protest as she pulled him near to her, the coarse bristle of his ruff hiding her face from view — and he listened raptly as her words, made more precious by the way her breath scorched his skin, reached his ears. “Skellige has made me Atoll,” she said, and his heart leapt for her — Atoll was a step below the sea king himself, and thus Szymon would not have to fear that the war for dominance would lead him to killing his sister should Kadia prove aggressive toward the tiny, dancing witch doctor he considered his.

“Good,” he was about to say — and then she flipped his world upside down.

“And I asked him to give you to me — to be my mate.”

There was nothing in Szymon that questioned Skellige’s right to give him away or Doe’s right to ask for him — the golden-eyed Cairn was no knight and chivalry meant little to him, so he did not feel the surge of masculine bravado at not being the one to ask. What he felt was panic, pure and simple — the elation that surged within his breast at being wanted by the odd-eared she-wolf was a huge part of that panic, for he had never felt such happiness before; but there was also the worry that Skellige would not approve — the bewilderment that he was held in such esteem when he thought so little of himself — an underlying fear that despite Deirdre, Skellige would wish to keep the mystic and her great power for himself — and an overwhelming sense of, “SAHUFGIDJOASDGUWEHFAWJEF WHAT DO I DO NOW AIOYWEFRHAISIDASG HELP HELP”

Rallying — or at least trying to, Szymon immediately lost his marbles and died of a massive heart attack bent his head low, unaware that he might be smothering the girl who had asked for his hand. As he tried to remember what breathing was like, the stutter came back in full: “Y-Y-You asked f-f-for me?” he questioned incredulously, his bass timbre too deep to crack alarmingly but clearly fraying at the edges. “B-B-But I — but wh-wh-what — ” What did he say?

The return of his stutter irritated her, though she still quirked an ear to catch every trembling word that tumbled from his mouth. When he got caught up in whatever he was trying to say, restlessness displaced her patience, and she wrapped her forelegs more firmly around his broad neck and held on tight.

"Stop that," she snapped, gnawing a bit more harshly than usual on his already scar-ridden ear. "You told me that you chose me, and I have already chosen you. I have only asked Skellige's permission to ensure the status quo. It'll be the same as we've always been."

By the end of her speech, irritation had fully faded, and her tone had grown soft and wheedling. Though her words were true, in practice, she knew that things would certainly be different if - when - Szymon became her mate. Perhaps not through any change in routine, but through changes that were already beginning in her heart. And, although she was a vain creature, and trusted wholly in his affection for her, Doe knew that a certain worried unrest in her soul would be soothed when they said the Vows to each other. He would not dare leave her behind, then. Could never be taken away. They would be fully bonded, and not even the sea could truly tear him away.

But she said none of this to Szymon, determined not to add any more weight to his burden; her love was already quite overwrought.

Releasing his ear and giving it a few gentle licks, she began to hum a tune her aunt had taught her. Straight on til Morning had known all the words, but Doe remembered few and far between. The tune, though, was as sweet as ever, and the meaning of the song sang through them without need to be spoken aloud.

Szymon made no protest when his Chosen One wrapped her limber forelegs with renewed vigor around his steely-muscled neck, clinging to him not out of vulnerable need but an imperious desire that he listen. His tattered ear, wedged firmly between her sharp teeth in a series of gnawing nibbles, flickered with an involuntary desire to escape but cupped forward aside its twin immediately thereafter as he tried desperately to catch every syllable. They were clipped and brusque at first, but smoothed out and became entreating — Szymon couldn’t understand her trepidation. He was not an empathetic creature despite his affection for Doe and the gentleness that he had found, waiting behind an inconspicuous door in the innermost reaches of his battered heart like a forgotten store of gold and riches. Even had she tried to explain the unrest she felt, he wouldn’t have been able to fully grasp it — despite it being the same emotion that drove his occasional fits of possessive jealousy.

Drawing breath as she began to hum to him, determined not disappoint her and thereby earn the renewed sting of her voice in tones of impatience, “All right,” he said slowly. She had said, “You told me that you chose me, and I have already chosen you.” He set that knowledge carefully upon the wall of the den directly before him, tattooing it upon his forearm so that he could always refer back to it. He chuckled as her tongue soothed the scarred flesh of his ear, flicking it at the ticklish sensation of moisture, and bent his head to set his fangs against the hollow of her throat, tangling them in the thick, protective fur that covered it. He guessed without asking that Skellige had made no reply, for if he had, the scrappy little witch doctor would have spilled his answer along with the telling of her asking. That troubled Szymon, but not overly much — the blessing of the Sea was the important thing, for until that happened not even the Leviathan could, in good conscience, take a mate. They all had to be reborn — perhaps not Deirdre, who was a dryad and keeper of the forest, but certainly everyone in Skellige’s warband.

“Wonder what spirit g-guide you’ll re-receive,” he mused, smoothing a lick from her throat up the narrow, tapered slope of her pinpoint chin.

A soft, happy sigh escaped her as they returned to the regularly scheduled program. Though she would never have thought it might be pleasant to have teeth at her throat, Szymon's gentle attentions were all it took to convert her to true faith in the practice. Her melodious hum warbled as his tongue laved against the hollow underside of her jaw, making her squirm restlessly atop his long forelegs. It was something almost like a tickle, but instead of the skin where the touch was focused, the fluttering sensation attacked her heart and stomach.

It was good to have her conversation with Skellige no longer ricocheting around in her head; sharing it with Szymon, even as simply as she had, seemed to have lightened her burden. There were still many more things she wanted to share, but his question was far more exciting than the rest of her news, and she shuffled them away for later use as different possibilities came to mind. "Something with teeth," she said firmly - "My blood-father was called Cactus Jaw for his fearsome gape. Maybe a crocoidile, since I'm not really from land and sea, and I've only known freshwater before this."

She'd hardly known water at all, where she came from. Did Szymon even know what a cactus was?

"You have the sea turtle, don't you?" she asked, pushing her nose insistently at his collarbone - the easiest part of him to reach. A testament of how little she knew of him, Doe had trouble seeing why he might have gotten that particular creature. Though she had never seen a sea turtle, their freshwater cousins could not be all that different, and Doe had seen plenty of those. Good for eating, but not very impressive. Except snapping turtles, maybe. Doe still had scars from her first encounter with one of those. "Do they bite?"

Doe’s reaction to his ministrations was fascinating, but Szymon paused to breathe a chuckle against her skin as, “Something with teeth,” the little witch doctor said with staunch vehemence, naming several creatures he had never seen before. The Cairn brood was a pelagic bunch, and the golden-eyed wolf had no reference point to draw from when she spoke of cacti and crocodiles. “Doesn’t matter,” he said when she mentioned she’d only known freshwater before now. “She gave you back — She f-found you worthy.” Doe would receive a maritime creature along with the rest of them; of this, Szymon was utterly sure. If he had been the one to do the choosing, he’d have chosen something little, swift, and fearless — a remora, perhaps, for her close relationship and conciliatory nature when it came to Skellige. They were not beautiful like Szymon’s odd-eared, wide-eyed Chosen One, but Szymon’s unassuming appearance drew a striking discord with his own vibrantly colored spirit guide, as well. Speaking of which —

“Mm,” he murmured, offering tacit affirmation to her question, humming low in his throat as her nose pressed insistently against his collarbone. Doe was an imperious creature and Szymon was eager to give her whatever she wished of him, be it food or hides or horns or simple information. “Some bite,” he said. He hadn’t received a predatory creature like his other siblings — although some turtles were renowned for their powerful jaws, Szymon’s spirit guide was most likely focused on the protection and longevity it offered. No matter how many times he’d been beaten down, the inky-ribbed Cairn had never been content to stay where he had fallen. “My spirit guide is not f-fearsome,” he admitted. “It is strong because it endures. I have faced death many times and won.” His voice was solemn, flowing steadily as it often did when he was fully wrapped and immersed in Doe’s literal and figurative embrace. “When I was y-y-young,” he said, his bass voice hesitating as the lock on his throat fell briefly shut, “I was s-small — smaller than all of my siblings. I needed protection. Turtle gave me that.”

He wasn’t sure why a wolf as vivacious as Doe would have picked someone like him — the doubt that swam sickly in his soul was not so unfounded. He had been the smallest, the youngest, and the weakest for practically all of his young life. Though he was stronger now, he was still the baby and like to be treated as such if he ran into his more brutal siblings again. Stringing together so many words was fairly exhausting, and the thought of being overpowered by one of his siblings where Doe would be able to see dampened his mood. To distract himself, he buried his muzzle in the thick ruff that protected Doe’s throat and rubbed his cheek against hers to immerse himself in her warmth and scent.

Although she had always admired the giant, mythical lizards that grandpa Isawea had told tales of, Doe was proud that she'd been found worthy by the sea, and prouder still that she would be receiving a spirit guide alongside the rest of her packmates. The sea had been very vague in his descriptions of the ceremony, but Doe understood that she had some part to play in the giving of these totems. It made little sense to her - in her own pack, a wolf's mother was the one that gave animal guides, and they often ran through blood and bone. (Herd animals had been the chief protectors of her family, and both she and her brother had been named for them, just as her mother Hind had been.) Still, it made a sort of sense. Her packmates would not be receiving deer to guide them, but she supposed that she was the pack-mother in Blackrock, in the absence of an alpha female.

A soft hm came from her chest as she set aside such thoughts to listen carefully to Szymon's explanation of his turtle. It took a moment for the words to mesh with their meaning, and another for her to superimpose this new information on her mental picture of her love, but after that, it felt right.

"You are strong," she agreed, pushing herself closer to her bodyheat, despite the weather that already bore down on them outside. "I know - I can see it. And I can hear it in your voice, when you talk to me. Your words are my greatest treasure. I horde them all."

When she thought about it, there was a start contrast between the Szymon she'd first met and the one she laid with today. He'd hardly been able to say her name, back then, and now? Full sentences, complete thoughts - voice a dee and steady thrum that went through her like water in the tidepools. Even now, his current wore down the stones in her spirit, made soft the sharp edges that'd risen up in her heart. Every wave that crashed upon carved a new path for his healing waters to flow - Doe did not know if she had ever felt so complete.

Nestling closer still, “You are strong,” Doe said, the vibration engendered by her low, warm timbre teasing palpably along Szymon’s muzzle and face. The perfume of her — mint and pampas grass, lemon and salt — tangled headily in Szymon’s nostrils; he breathed her in deeply before drawing back to look upon her fully with sulphureous eyes full of the emotion for which he had no name and little understanding. “My words are yours,” he said honestly, his bass timbre resonant with the weight of his vow. His body and blood — and a great deal of his heart — belonged to Skellige and the Sea, but Doe had a hold on all of these things as well. His words, though, and the thoughts behind them belonged to no wolf but Doe. Skellige had always kept a special place in his blackened heart for his youngest sibling, but what they shared was deep, enduring devotion and rough affection — though they could not be precisely called affectionate by nature. The brothers, though close, did not talk in this way — their relationship, though fulfilling and absolutely vital to Szymon’s existence, was brusque and often businesslike. Doe was different — special — and fortunately seemed to share the fanatical devotion for the Leviathan.

All of the Cairn children hungered — they were selfish and ruthless, each of them craving something. For many of them, power was paramount. Szymon differed in that his burgeoning lust for power existed purely because of his feelings for Doe. Doe was his addiction — her affection was what he sought, selfishly and single-mindedly. The mere thought of her saying these things or being this close to Jaglon, Jagoda, or even Skellige irritated him — the reality of it terrified him. To Jaglon and Jagoda, Szymon owed no fealty — but he knew, too, that he could not best either of his heavily-muscled brothers in physical combat. And [i[Skellige[/i] was in another tier entirely. Not one of the Cairn brethren had been able to defeat Skellige; even in friendly spars where the broad-shouldered behemoth was going easy on them, he had been known to wreak havoc on the bodies of his opponents.

If the Leviathan wished for Doe to keep away from Szymon, the golden-eyed boy could see no getting around that.

Szymon could see no other solution aside from climbing the hierarchical ladder.

Bending his head, he smoothed his tongue along her tapered muzzle and the pert pinpoint of her chin, the exquisite care he always exercised with Doe evident in the meticulous slowness of his ministrations. “You have been b-busy,” he crooned, licking tenderly at her flopped-over ear and nosing at its base. In his simple statement was a question he did not ask outright — “what have you been up to?” — but the pause following it invited Doe to talk about her adventures.