Ankyra Sound lieder und gesänge

for @Kierkegaard <3

today the forest was his wanderlust. the red boles beckoned to him and he answered, for the promise of music was surely hanging among the heavy trees. the sound of the ocean at his back, mahler picked an easy path into the embrace of the sequoias.
their scent engulfed him; their height humbled him. the musiker was a creature unused to being dwarfed by others, but in the presence of such monoliths as these, he could not help his outward show of submission. he was a wolf content to be dominated by the waking world around him. too cold yet for bees or flying things, mahler paced slowly through the forest, searching for the coloful glint of courting birds, for there he would find this year's spring music.

There had never been a more tired and haggard creature than Kierkegaard – at least, not on those shores. His limbs quivered with each step that he took from the grotto and into open pack terrain. The sun was quick to light his jagged ashen fur in light, and he blinked against the harshness of the rays. Since his return to Grimnismal, the ghost had not left the confines of the grotto and its protective darkness. Caiaphas and her growing belly had been his company, but he had preferred it to anything else the others would have offered him. The silence had been far more appreciated than the companionship of the other pack members.

The trees stood out against the rocky background. On slow and struggled steps, the haggard creature limped his way toward it. Close ahead, there was the shape of a familiar figure, but as the wraith drew closer, he found that it was not Wylla but an unnamed male. Stiffening at the scent of this brute, Kierkegaard clenched his jaw tightly and continued to limp toward the trees without another word.

it was an exceptionally careworn spirit whose tread caused mahler to turn. he regarded the limping gait of the man, the ragged fur along his shoulders, the shadowing of an otherwise dove-grey pelt. a skeleton, a geist who trailed into the redwood and drew behind him the musiker. aware that his presence would not be well-received, mahler followed the other at a polite distance, arching to the right as they walked in silence between the sequoias.
he could not truly say what compelled him to tail the verfolgt creature; only that in time he paused and turned his ash-lavender eyes upon the rough-edged man, wondering what tragedy had befallen him.

For a short distance, the stranger followed Kierkegaard. The injured ghost did little to dissuade him, but he did not feel at ease having the unknown so close to his back side. Turning his head a bit, the ashen fellow saw that his companion had trailed to the right to keep a respectful distance. The fur along Kierkegaard’s shoulders danced like quills against the bleak backdrop of the wood. He continued to take a few laborious steps into the thick of their small forest and then he paused with splayed ears and a stiff-legged stance.

“Don’t need a shadow. You can come on over here or piss off,” he growled to the other wolf. Turning his head, the ghost latched his molten stare on the other male’s face and waited expectantly for his pack mate to decide. Kierke would not have cared either way, but he was growing uneasy with the company of the unnamed brute and his quiet, distanced follow.

the man gave a sharp and cold invitation, and mahler swept his own ears forward, searching the harrowed features of the pale beast before drifting forward a polite distance away. noting they were well-met in height, though mahler lacked the other's battle-tested and fierce appearance, the musiker relaxed the tension along his shoulders.
dipping his muzzle in both apology and deference to the other's rank, mahler cleared his throat. "if i may, vhat happened?" he felt directness was the best approach in this instance, for the silent music of the pale man's bearing appealed to him. what aria was writ here?

The stranger emerged, and Kierkegaard found himself marveling at just how similar this brute was to their strong-headed leader. At least, his appearance reflected a strange kinship with Wylla, but his voice spoke a tale of long-distanced travel and a tongue that was forged through another language. The ghost regarded him with a careful expression before he dipped his head and allowed for a laxer air to their conversation. As the stranger drifted closer, Kierkegaard caught sight of the pale violet in his gaze and breathed deep in a sounder comfort that this wolf did not appear to be related to Wylla at all.

“Fall from a cliff,” the ghost responded with a small shrug that ached his shoulder. “Washed up about a week later.” As always, Kierkegaard was a man of few words and he wasn’t fond of delving into the subjects that closely related to his mistakes. Then, with a quick twitch of his dark lips, the ashen creature gestured toward their pack and fixed Mahler with a glinting gaze. “What happened to you? What poor fool convinced you to join this crew of sea dogs?”

mahler watched the man as he spoke, explaining the origin of his injuries. a cliff, spat back from the sea. there was a swell of admiration in his breast for the strength that must be in the pale man, to survive such. he was not unaware of how the old warrior regarded him, as he knew now he resembled wylla, at least in some fashion. the musiker was too proud to conceptualize that he was not, after all, unique. 
if the man's age showed, so it was plain that he had not lost his wits; this was no doddering elder mahler now beheld. the feral, searching light in the falcon-eyes proved this, and the dappled komponist straightened beneath the scrutiny. what had persuaded him to join? mahler recalled no strong draw to this place, save for how he had been accosted and found wanting at the borders. 
and here his own mouth quirked with some small humour. "vylla," mahler answered simply, for it was the only true reply.

Kierkegaard could not hear the thoughts that fluttered through the music-maker’s mind, but he would have disagreed with them if he could. It had not been strength that had pulled him from the ocean swell, but the calling of a spindly hawkish woman. This was a truth that he would never share with another soul, but one that he thought on with grave attention. The determination to return to Caiaphas had been all that it took for the ghost to live again, and to walk back to the sound with only a battered frame. The wounds would heal, and he would not need to provide explanation for his stiff-limbed gait or the large gashes against his shoulders from the jagged rocks below.

The response from Mahler left Kierkegaard with a small gaping mouth and raised brows. Wylla had been what had convinced the brute to join their brood. While this was only moderately shocking, he could not account for the desires of others. If the stranger had been drawn to their fiery leader, there must have been sound reason behind it. Nodding his head solemnly, the ghost offered a shriveled smile. “Good enough reason, I suppose,” he remarked in a casual tone – as casual as he could.

“You hungry?”

mahler did not hide the smirking expression that flitted across his face at the other's consternation. for once, the judgemental beast did not mean it in such a way. he found that the pale man was well-suited to mahler's taste for company; he only assumed he was the same when the grizzled fighter's tones sounded again. a nod; the stippled wolf crossed what was left of the distance between them and made as if to fall into step alongside the zeta. where the other led, so would his subordinate follow.
the scent of the witch who had so horrified the musiker was tangled thickly through the pallid pelt of the other, but it gave mahler only a momentary pause. perhaps their thoughts in passing moments touched the same wavelength of 'taste,' but it was a notion quickly dispelled. he turned the hard lavender of his gaze to the warrior. "mahler," came his belated greeting.

“Kierkegaard,” the old brute returned with a bob of his head. Years had allowed him many chances to speak his name, but it had been a rare chance that he took them. It caused him to wonder if the male he walked alongside had taken a similar choice in holding his given moniker close to his vest, or if Mahler was indeed what he had been called since birth. The ghost would have assumed the latter, given that the newcomer did not seem as though he was keen on verbal tricks. It was this reason that he seemed to take well to Mahler’s presence; verbose gestures were often lost on the mercenary.

Trekking inland, the ghost sniffed out one of the caches he had assisted in filling with fish and small game. The brute poked around in what was left before fixing his companion with a questioning glance. It was as if he was asking, do you prefer fish or rabbit?

kierkegaard. mahler would have stumbled had he not bitten the inside of his jaw to spark awareness of his almost-misstep with a bloom of pain. it was the first word in the tongue of his past he had heard since arriving in the teekon; in silence he pondered this. the pale brute was as opposed to rambling as was mahler himself; in time, the sable man let tension ebb from his shoulders and kept his eyes from their desire to appraise the pale man with a deeper look.
in answer to the question held in the ghost's piercing eyes, mahler gave a small smile that faded from his lips quickly, climbing into his expression and lighting his somber features with some small amusement. "fische sind besser," testing the aged warrior and his name against the guttural memory of a language mahler found himself hoping was shared between them.

The inquiry was answered in a tongue that the ashen ghost had not heard in many years. His ears swiveled atop his crown toward the sable brute, and he flashed the other male with a sharp, fiery stare. The fur along his neck and shoulders seemed to bristle slightly, giving him an appearance of a ragged, quilled monster. Kierkegaard drew his tongue along the whiskers of his muzzle before he snorted in response to Mahler’s statement. It was false, at least as far as the mercenary was concerned. With a curling smirk, the wraith bent his neck and scooped a large fish in his mouth before turning and tossing it toward his companion.

“Nein, fisch ist für...“ but his words failed him, and he furrowed his brow into a tightly knit line that sat across his orange-gold stare. “Spindly dogs,“ he then concluded in English, lashing his tongue against his muzzle once more with an amused smirk. It was meant as a jab, but the hound did not much care if Mahler preferred tree bark to rodents; Kierkegaard was only interested in getting a rise from his company. The ghost reached into his cache and pulled a hare from it, clutching the catch between his teeth.

mahler's lips twitched at the other's stare, seeking to hide a smirk over having seized the attention of the pale krieger. the lavender stone of his eyes traced the pallid railspikes of fur that had awakened along kierkegaard's shoulders, but he evinced no movement at the gesture. a dance here; music in the shock and the unsurety of each one's reaction to the other as the pair continued to glean details from those proffered between them. 
when the rugged brute's lips dared a small curve, thus did mahler follow suit, lifting a broad dark paw to shift the fish toward himself. his jaws parted to taste, but up came his dark-masked visage, ears sweeping forward with an intrigue he did not this time attempt to hide, the rusted words of his mother-tongue on kierkegaard's low tones. the musiker's eyes lit at once — he accepted the ribbing of the pallid fighter with a snort of faux indignation.
unbeknownst to anyone who was not mahler, he had ranked those in grimnismal by seemingly arbitrary fashions; what mattered only was that aside from wylla, kierkegaard alone had ascended in the dappled man's esteem. he prised flesh from the fishbones for a contemplative moment. "they remain in you still, kierkegaard, words from the old country." mahler paused, choosing his next words carefully — he was not a creature who oft spoke in longer sentences than was necessary, not due to inability, but rather to his own prideful choice. "i could help you remember, maybe. if you vanted."

The wraith made a comfortable place and dropped down to rest his weight against his elbows while he worked against the frame of the hare. His yellowed fangs plucked and pulled away at flesh until he had reached sinew, and only then did he begin to truly eat the thing. All the while, Kierkegaard left his gaze to linger on his companion. Mahler was a strange one, to bring up word of their home land. The mercenary had never been fond of calling any one place home, and certainly not where he had been born. There were few things that he had no choice in, and that was one of them. Still, the way that Mahler spoke hinted to a fiery passion regarding their commonality.

After mulling over the offer, the old hound shrugged and frowned. The hare was clasped between his front paws as he pointed his muzzle toward the sable man. “Don’t much see the point. Can’t say I’ve got many years left on me,” Kierkegaard admitted with a careless cant of his skull. While he had never been one to take to the idea of an intellectual journey, his body had fallen into less than favorable condition in regard to physical power. “But, if you’d like, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt none.”

kierkegaard did not evince a singular bit of delight at, in mahler's opinion, a selfless offer of time investment. rather than irritating the musiker, however, he found himself seized with an internal swell of glee at the stoic nature of their kind. to show excitement was the jester-trick of any beast — to remain steadfast was a mark of an intellect for which mahler had no name.
he supped a bit at his own table before sitting up, turning aside the bone-studded carcass with a lazy gesture of his broad dark paw. "you are to be a father, yes?" mahler began, in as conversational a tone as was easy for him. which was to say a warmer monotone than before. it was also what he wished to use as a signal to kierkegaard he wished to begin the pale warrior's reeducation immediately. "ven you answer, say ich werde bald vater sein."
a pause, an engaging cup of his ears. "please, of course. ven you are ready, kierkegaard."

The specter nodded his head in response to the inquiry that fell from Mahler’s lips first. His eyes studied the other man, watching his mannerisms and the way he held himself. The other was welcome, he had decided, finding that the companionship of one so alike should not have bothered him. Finding himself more at ease, the ghostly figure watched as Mahler began in how to state that he would soon be a father. The words were forced to be pieced together in his mind, and even then they were so foreign to him that he was not certain he could fight the embarrassment of speaking the language.

“Ja,” he remarked in a rumble. Then, the ghost fixed the other male with a burning gaze and tried for himself, “ich werde… bald vater sein.” It was rough, challenging for him to work his way through it when he detested spoken word as it was. Looking at Mahler, Kierkegaard canted his head to the left and waited for his criticism.

"gut," mahler murmured in a voice a shade warmer than before. his lips evinced no humour, yet his eyes seemed to hold a momentary encouragement. kierkegaard had struggled, his throat not fitting the heavy glottal tones any longer, but the variegated musiker had rather high and immediate hopes for his most unlikely pupil.
straightening, the man regarded the pallid warrior and his tilted head, slowly pursing his lips and cocking his own skull to the same direction. he knew not why he pursued the sensation, simply that to follow suit was satisfying in a small way. "vould you like to continue?" mahler murmured soon thereafter, enjoying the odd feel of what it was he had done with his head.