King Elk Forest This poem is mournful & sentimental & filled with complaints:

 Winter has been cruel on all creatures, leaving the earth marked by frozen bodies, small and lifeless beneath the paws of creatures with bigger things on their minds. Who stops to mourn the curled form of a dead mouse, the torn feathers of a crow? Their kin, perhaps, if they have a concept of kin at all. Yet these deaths bring with them celebration, too, the hungry scavenger finding an easy meal, the hungry, frozen root finding nutrient under soil. 

 Bigger than the mouse and crow is the elk. Winter has been cruel for him, too, crueler than most: while wolves live out their petty dramas, illness takes hold under muscle and in blood. Slow at first, impossible to detect. Fatigue sets in. The elk takes shelter in the deepest parts of the forest with no patience for his wolfly settlers. 

 There will be other elk in this forest come spring. There will be the calf his cow will bear. Yet does it not seem unfair, the ceaseless turning of mortality's clock? The elk is smart, smarter than wolf gives credit: he is smart enough to not give in to existentialism. Let the wolves worry death like a bone between their teeth, like his bones between their greedy teeth. A mighty snort escapes him.

Snow is beginning to fall, gently, gently, over the collapsed form, a smudge of black swallowed by white. The elk's chest heaves once, twice, and then there is nothing. ​

 

dated for feb 27th.

post written by delight.

there is a saying delight is familiar with: death comes in threes. he's never paid much mind to it -- it's not as if the lives that were swallowed under rock and snow, ghosts of a former life, were divisible by three. at heart though the morwinyon is a storyteller and there is an undeniable appeal to crafting pattern out of nothingness. life is abstractly cruel, but death can be made poetic, can't it?

that's what he's gonna tell himself. that's what he's gonna tell himself, confronting the slightly swollen corpse of the king elk - their king elk. of all the things that could have happened under his tenure as morwinyon, this one strikes him as particularly abysmal. mato's dedication to the elk had been unwavering -- even with his retreat to burke's side he'd maintained the habit of leaving offerings for the beast -- and delight's gone and let him die. 

burke's death -- what happened with cicero -- the elk now. he thinks about the conversations he's had with jomyo and gracious and queenie and mato and even zenith, thinks about what he needs to do. swallowing the lump in his throat the morwinyon tips his head back and calls for his pack to come pay their respects -- and address their next steps.

@Kota @Gracious @Mona @Anatha @Jomyo @Nathaniel @Malice @Queenie this is going to be serving as our official(ish) ~moving meeting~ icly, while not mandatory it is highly encouraged everyone post at least once!
(@Euron/@Ramsay, you're also welcome to join if you'd like!)

Ramsay was busying himself with attempting to wrap his arms around a rotting stump in the snowy forest when Delight's howl rang out. Frustrated because his body was demanding an outlet for his stress and he was unable to secure it, the boy aimed a kicked at the stump, caving in the side of it, and then ambled off to heed the leader's call. It took only a few seconds for the tingle in his belly to subside and the stress was pushed back into the compartment of his brain intended for its safekeeping.

Cicero had led he and Euron to this pack, where they would be safe, but it was a long and hard road if they intended to make suitable citizens out of him and his brother. Take the gathering, for instance. Ramsay didn't yet know the significance of the elk that came into view when he zoned in on Delight's position. He didn't know the pack revered it, or that it was special in any way. He also didn't really know pack meeting etiquette, since Blackfeather Woods had never had such a gathering. And he had an authority problem, so that was a thing too.

When Ramsay arrived he didn't greet Delight, sit politely nearby, or do any of the things one might expect of a young pack member at a meeting. Instead, he went right for the fallen elk and proceeded to try to worry its thick foreleg with his teeth as his belly grumbled greedily.

There wasn't much that could have prepared her for this. Queenie herself had never been overtly interested in the affairs of the King Elk, nor had she ever made any real effort to learn more about him, but because Delight respected him, she did, too. Thus, when his call sounded and her paws led her to him, she was quick to show her support. 

Well, she would have been, at least. Queenie's attention was taken from her distressed leader and placed onto the small, malformed body of a boy she'd never seen. He was tearing away at the King Elk right in front of Delight. It was an instinctual response, but one that she didn't appreciate. A warning growl bubbled in her throat, finally exploding as her ears fell back and her body pressed onward. 

There was no need for a fight, but she wanted the child to know that he was out of his lane. Queenie lunged for him and tried to wedge herself between his body and the corpse of the King. With Delight's blessing, she would fall back, but there would be no faltering until then.

the call brought forth the misty woman, a gentle gallop was set for a pace as the cut through the woods in order to seek our her morwinyon. She was curious about what he called the group together for, though she would have her answers when she arrived. She didn't pick up much as she got closer, but something about the way the air felt made her want to gag.

When she broke gait into a trot, she realized why the pack had been called together. The elk, the king elk to be exact, had fallen and lay before them, dead weight. Gracious felt a wave of sadness wash over her as she drew closer, noticing how Queenie asserted herself against what looked to be a deformed wolf. While she would rather scold the girl for chasing away the mysterious boy, she let her be, deciding to come up next to Delight and gently nudge his shoulder with her nose. She offered him a reassuring expression before settling before the carcass and doing what she can to show her respect.

She bows, her entire front body begins to tilt forward as her legs bent beneath her, holding her steady. She doesn't know what to think of this situation, but all she can do is wait for the others to come along.

At the call, she rose from her restful hibernation feeling immediately anxious and perturbed. As soon as she was up, going, and mostly awake, she guided a swift route towards the source to find quite a curious scene.

Her approach angled her in near where Gracious watched from, but the scout's hackles raised up in immediate question when she saw the tail-end of Queenie's warning to the strange boy—over the dead body of their king elk, no less. She shot a questioning look to Delight, hopeful to gauge this situation further through him, then back to the foreign dark wolf. Jomyo's stance immediately tensed more noticeably then, with her ears tilted forward and muzzle beginning to wrinkle with general distaste since she didn't know the half of why he was here at all.

Although she maintained a reluctantly observing role here still, unease was taking hold quickly. She leaned subtly towards the focal point of the scene: the elk and the mutant boy with no right to its flesh.

it was only delight's call that roused mona from her moping; she wasn't sure she would have even gotten up for nathaniel — she'd been avoiding him, after all. but the sylph's voice was edged in sorrow, and this both piqued and worried the mayfair. 
she arrived amidst most of the other tindome wolves. it was the tension she noticed first, however — movement and the inclination of bodies toward the weirdly shaped boy who had come to live among them. only did then did mona recognize what the downed form was — the elk, and near its still body, delight.
swallowing uncomfortably against the collar, mona's eyes widened as she saw what the child was doing, and she flinched somewhat as queenie darted forward. part of her wished to comfort delight, but the gathering was already too uncomfortable for mona to do anything else aside from awkwardly stand off to one side, wondering how the scene would end.

just gonna keep this moving, feel free to pop in/cameo/pop out at your leisure

the scene takes a turn for the macabre and delight has to bite down on a wildly innappropriate burst of laughter, threatening to overcome the shock and sorrow. ramsay of all people is the first to arrive, his presence as uncomfortable to the slight morwinyon as ever, and immediately sets to eating their fallen king elk. "w-wait," he starts, feeling the edge of a panicked hysteria that's only exacerbated as queenie shows up just in time to reprimand -- well, threaten -- the child. oh fuck yeah he didn't do a good job introducing them to the rest of his pack did he. forgive him, it's been a busy... it's been busy.

"queenie," delight says sharply, feeling the reassuring bump of gracious' nose ground him. there's no anger in his voice (when is there ever), just a desperation to wrest control of the situation back into his paws. taking a deep breath the morwinyon steps forward, aiming to nudge ramsay away from the corpse if he hasn't already been moved back by queenie's growl. more calmly than he feels he says, "we don't know how he died, it could be something contagious," hoping that will suffice as explanation in lieu of a crash course on the oddly specific attachment the elk carries for tindómë (though there's really little he can do to deter him if ramsay chooses to ignore him anyway).

to the whole group he says, "i've spoken to a few of you about the possibility of relocating. it's something mato and i've considered in the past." distantly he notes @Mato's presence, quiet and off to the side. he wishes (maybe a touch bitterly) that the prince was standing beside him as morwinyon too, but it seems like that spark is never going to come back into him at this point. and it is time to move on. "i know it's a big ask of all of us... but i think even the forest is telling us it's time to go," delight says, trying to sound lighthearted. how else is he supposed to take the elk's death but as an omen? burke, cicero, the elk: the trees themselves may as well be shouting leave, find fresh soil to root or you will end here. 

he looks at queenie and gracious (who already know of his plan), at jomyo and mona, at kota (who, like mato, had arrived quietly and remained to the side, whose presence is nonetheless appreciated). he looks at ramsay and feels a little awkward and sorry he's continuing the trend of instability in the brothers' lives, since they're sort of his wards. there are those not present that he'll get up to speed once he can, but.. his mind is made up by the corpse of the king elk, if it hadn't been before. what a symbolic note for tindómë's stay in the king elk forest to end on.

"jomyo, can you lead us back toward the vale?" delight asks, nodding toward mato. the prince can help her if needed, too, he knows. "we'll take a day or two to prepare and then we'll head out." 

with that, the androgyne takes a seat by the haunch of the once-great creature, available if needed for further conversation, but feeling his adrenaline rush crash into exhaustion.

He kept his distance from the pack though remained near to Ramsay. He barely ate and did little else besides hide himself away, lying despondently in the cold embrace of some thick tree roots. He was plagued with headaches, and he could not sleep. There were sticks, stones, feathers, cones and leaves and all other manner of forest debris sorted around him; neatly piled together and arranged methodically. He looked upon them blankly.

—

Euron can scarcely recall the steps he took from where he lied to where Delight had summoned them to the fallen elk. He immediately searched for Ramsay from the fringe of the gathering where he stood in shadows, his distant gaze finding his brother just as a mixed-color female made a lunge for him, and as Delight was stepping forward to salvage the situation. Euron reacted fiercely, and without thought.

He was upon Queenie's heels in a flash, a crocodile rising out of the mire and snapping for an ankle that likely had no idea he was even near. There was no sound nor expression to accompany his aggression, just a mechanical and baleful need to defend what was left of his world. But he had no intention to pursue her; his fangs would stay with Ramsay. If she stepped away from his brother, she would be stepping away from his teeth too.

He registered only one thing that Delight said in the wake of it.

It's time to go.

She was locked on scene, keen to see how this would escalate.. not that she needed this to get any worse, even as another young one came for Queenie's heels. This pulled back her lips in a silent snarl--even if she did not understand the context here entirely. Already, everything was far too questionable with this once hale elk now dead at their feet and Delight's words brought in the whole gravity of the situation soon enough.

Her hackles stayed half-mast at the thought of the lingering unease that she felt from their ragtag bunch as she listened. The morwinyon had made his mentions, sent her off scouting even, and now, here came the final push they needed to get themselves out of here it seemed. She wouldn't argue with any of it--it really was time to go.

"I can," she affirms without an ounce of hesitation. Maybe even too quickly (without entirely considering a whole pack to uproot), but she skims her pale sights over their group once more, lingering lastly and longest on Mato and Delight. She doesn't second guess her answer, though: she will get them to the Vale. "As soon as we're ready." the ambar nodded before it could sink in.

From the moment he was born and abandoned by his mother, Ramsay had embodied the quintessential anarchist. He had ignored any command given him by any but Cicero and had lived by his own rules, free in the truest sense of the word. There had been no discipline in the earliest, most vital stages of his development, and thus, he was used to getting his own way. He didn't respond well to being put in his place, having never grown accustomed to it. When Queenie growled and lunged for him, he turned fangs on her just as surely as a cornered dog might turn on a trapper.

His jaws slammed shut perhaps an inch from her nose and his dark violet eyes seared into her face with a total lack of regard for her superiority and right to assert herself. He had never been disciplined by a higher ranked wolf before, never expected to submit, and so even though his instincts screamed at him to lay back his ears and slink away, he fought them because no one had ever tried to stop him from doing what he wanted before. The displeasure sat heavy in his belly.

With Euron's arrival, the boy snarled and tore away from the elk's side, hunched spine bristling high as he retreated to his sibling's side. Much of what Delight said he only partly heard; it was hard to listen while snarling at another wolf. Something about leaving. Ramsay was no stranger to traveling around at this point, and could only hope that their travels would bring them near to Blackfeather so he and his brother could go back home.

Though he wasn't sure how much a home it was any longer, not without Cicero.

Had it not been for the warnings and pleas, and the urgency in Delight's voice, Queenie might have furthered her conflict with the strange boys. They were insubordinate, uneducated; if she could manage to rope them in while they were still young, they might end up thriving in the Family. Those thoughts weren't present in her mind, though; for now, she was focused on doing her job while keeping everyone else from getting hurt.

Including the imps.

In response the other boy's snarl and the first one's snap, Queenie gave a warning growl and a lick of her chops before sitting down on the King Elk's haunch. What do you need the rest of us to do in the mean time? she asked, wondering if there was anything secretly expected of her.

she was silent, not wanting to say another word. while she watched the two estranged children snarl and back off, gracious kept her mouth shut and merely listened. she had no need to speak but rather listen, that was just what she planned on doing. calm and quiet grey pearls looked onto the others with a sad glint, but no sound was emitted. she waited for the others to make their move, for now she stood where she was before.

he shrugs slightly at queenie's question, too exhausted to put up a front."rest," delight answers honestly, "i'll talk more about it with you later." she'll be needed as a guard, surely, but in the light of everything, it seems.. unnecessary to talk about it right now. there'll be time tomorrow.

the morwinyon looks down at the elk's body, swollen and bloodied now by ramsay's teeth. he opens his mouth as if to say something, then snaps it shut and shakes his head, giving his wolves an apologetic look. "i'll talk to everyone later," he says, the best he can muster, and heads off, leaving the corpse to decompose peacefully in the snow (unless the boys set back to eating it.)