Bearclaw Valley and the space has been broken

@Aventus , if you have the time? pp of @Evien, hope that is ok! <3

her son.

her poor, beautiful, mangled son.

evien had told the fretful parents the boy would live -- that his will was strong despite the unseemly wounds within. astara did not doubt the healer's words, but she had long come to resent and distrust fate -- fate, as she knew it, eventually brought all wolves down to their knees.

that fucking bitch -- that untrustworthy, smarmy little bitch --

astara paced outside of the lodging they bedded aventus in. with each step her resolve to see nyra's head mounted on the front of their den grew.

her proud, darling, savage little boy -- he would get his pound of flesh.

Evien had said he shouldn’t move too much, but the medicine den was a sedative environment for a young boy. That was surely the point. It didn’t stop him growing bored with his surroundings after the first day or two. Soon, he was inventing games inside his mind to pass the dull hours.

But even hunting imaginary prey in the planes of his mind wasn’t enough to keep him occupied today. That was why he was on his feet, hobbling slowly toward the entrance. The sturdy wrap Evien had fixed around his torso did an admirable job keeping his ribs steady, reducing the pain he felt with every jostling step. Nevertheless, his teeth were gritted together by the time the sunlight splashed across his face.

He blinked rapidly against the light’s onslaught. It was several long seconds before he could keep them open enough to squint. There was his mother, pacing in the grass outside the den. He stood atop the mossy rise leading to the entryway and wondered to himself if he’d forgiven her yet for the intrusion of Glaucous and Astyanax. He didn’t know yet that she’d tried to be rid of them.

Deciding that he had, he whistled a quiet whine for her attention.

one lap, two, two hundred -- what did it matter? her baby boy had nearly been killed, and what was worse, by an ally.

astara's teeth gritted together. she would find nyra, and when she was done with her aventus would have a new plaything or two to play with. maybe a soft velveteen ear, dingy with blood -- or perhaps a ropy arctic-white tail -- or, if astara felt particularly violent (and murder mommy did indeed feel violent), a pair of eyes in which to chase when his ribs were better...

a whine pulled her from her thoughts of vengeance. astara looked upon her son first with anxiousness, and then overwhelming protectiveness. evien had placed something strange along the boy's ribs, and as astara pulled towards aventus she nosed it in curiosity. in absence of of speech, the blackbird lowered her head and glanced into aventus' silver eyes. how was he feeling?

No matter how much Aventus had asked for what happened to him, he would one day be eternally grateful that his pack had his back. For one who felt insignificant at times among the great bear wolves, particularly his sire, it was validating to know that he mattered more to his family than a whole alliance. If anything could feed a young boy’s ego, that could.

He didn’t know the details yet, though. For now, he was simply grateful that Nyra hadn’t killed him, and excited by the buzz of rage throughout Ursus that even he picked up on. Imagine breaking his vow to live forever by dying days later!

He flinched instinctively while Astara inspected the wrap around his torso. It didn’t hurt, but the phantom promise of pain if it was touched too roughly was enough for him to pull away. So as to ease his mother’s heart, lest she take it as rejection, he turned to press his muzzle under hers and sank momentarily into the comfort of her presence. Aventus was growing to be an impassive and sometimes cold creature, but he was still a kid. His mother’s touch was still soothing.

Words often had no place in their interactions, but he was also Merrick’s son, and sometimes it was easier to convey simple things with words. He butted her shoulder a little playfully with his head, even if he knew he shouldn’t, and murmured, bored. Evien was a great host, but there just wasn’t much to do around here. Maybe Astara would have an idea or two that his ribs could handle.

her son was not just worth an alliance -- in that way astara would sacrifice the world, oddly enough. the same could be said of avicus, while astyanax and glaucos.. eh..

motherhood had changed the blackbird; before she bore her children, she had been indifferent to them. in the weeks after, cold. but now they were growing into their souls, these tiny otherthings -- and astara witnessed it all with growing protectiveness and pride.

she pulled away sharply as the boy flinched, neutralized by his brief show of affection. that much was rare in ursus, and she licked the top of his head in response.

bored. she could not blame him. in silence astara began to walk away, glancing back once to convey stay here.

she was not gone very long, but was gone long enough aventus might find boredom creeping in. when she returned, it was with the struggling form of a toad -- it made her mouth sting and froth in an unusual sensation. while it would be most unsuitable to eat, it was a fine and easy plaything for one compromised. she chucked it to aventus and it landed heavily, one eye blinking as it gathered its legs under itself and sluggishly began to hop away.

The sweep of her tongue left a bit of fur sticking up, which cooled in the breeze and prompted him to give his head a rough shake as she left. He made to follow, beginning to pick his way down the mossy slope, but there was a firmness in her gaze when she looked back that rooted him to the spot. He wasn’t the most obedient of cubs, but there was enough sense in him to know he might be in trouble for his behaviour still, and so he didn’t move.

But she was gone a while. At least, it felt like a while to him. He kicked a pebble around for a few minutes until it became lodged in the stones, then he tried to bend painfully to drink the water trickling out of the medicine den. It tasted earthy and gross, like the moss. Flicking his tongue against the roof of his mouth, he wandered further down the hill, nearly loosing his footing on a particularly slick rock, and by then Astara was returning with something grotesque in her mouth.

It slapped the ground with a distinctly squashy sound that made him prick his ears up and stifle a giggle. What a delightfully disgusting creature! With a slow wag of his tail, he approached it with ginger steps that were still a little too fast, based on the dull pain spreading along his flanks, but he ignored that. He caught up to the slow toad and bent to sniff it, then wrapped his smaller jaws around its fat figure and hoisted it into the air.

While his bones screamed in protest, he drew back his head and tried to toss it back to Astara, as casually as if it were a baseball. It fell woefully short (he was a little too weak to throw it properly), but the result was even better. It bounced comically off a skewed rock and tumbled a few feet to the tune of Aventus cackling with glee, helped none by the weird tingling of his tongue where it had touched the thing.

when astara had been aventus' age, her favorite toy had been a toad.

once, shisu had taken the toad from her.

in return, astara had taken her daughter.

tit for tat. justice. divine and insensate irony. astara watched as her son came forth, ginger but game. she believed she might have detected pain in his eyes as he seized the creature and flung it, but it was soon replaced by mirth as the toad bounced roughly off of the stone and landed with a hapless squelch.

astara had always liked how toads made her tongue feel. she thumbed her teeth and lunged for the groggy creature, who only barely managed a halfhearted leap before he was seized in her jaws. astara had played with many toads in her life -- she knew them to be rather frail in constitution.

in short, their life expectancy once astara found them had always been abysmally brief.

it was her turn to pass the toad back. with her jaws freely drooling, astara placed the toad upon the ground and prodded it roughly with a paw. it leapt forward, indignant by the rude nudge to its bottom -- astara prodded again, this time lazily watching as it made a desperate (and dumb) dash for freedom -- right towards her son.

His cackling waned as the sensation on his tongue grew strong. It didn’t hurt, per se, but was strange and pleasant. It felt heavier than usual in his mouth and seemed almost jittery on the surface and made his saliva run faster. Nothing to be worried about, surely, or Astara wouldn’t have brought him this creature to bounce around.

He watched his mother drool heavily on the poor toad as she placed it down. Aventus, too, felt drool sliding over his gums and across his lips. He sloppily swept his tongue over his nose, leaving it shiny. He waved his tail high above his hindquarters as the toad began hopping back to him. Momentarily forgetting all about his injures, he leapt for it, only the yelp shrilly and recoil when his left side exploded with pain.

Right, right, he wasn’t supposed to move a lot. Evien would kill him for this. Aventus recovered quickly enough. The firm wrap secured his rib cage so there was little fear of the broken ones shifting and puncturing anything. Without it, he’d probably have pricked his own lung by now. Much more slowly and cautiously, he went for the toad, leaning to slap his tongue across its bumpy back for a few seconds before he pulled back one paw and gave it a swift kick, sending the hapless thing rolling back to mother. All the while, his gums started to feel numb and drool began dripping from his lower jaw.

oops, maybe astara wins worst mom of the year award for bringing her son a toy that got his tongue all hopped up and encouraged him to move. she winced as aventus yelped, feeling that shrill noise down to her bones and sinking heart -- but aventus rallied, and approached a second time in a much softer manner.

astara watched as the toad was sent flying by a forceful punt. it rotated in the air several times before it landed with a rough splat on a piece of ledge. she prowled towards it casually, peeling the groggy creature off of the stone with a nimble tooth. a cascade of drool rolled off her tongue as she did so.

turning around, astara placed the toad on the ground. similar to her son, she licked its coarse back once -- and then sent it flying with a kick towards aventus.

Aventus grinned a toothsome, slobbery grin, revealing gums that thrummed bright red from inflammation. Now it was beginning to hurt, in the tingling, aching way that exercise made the muscles sore. His saliva was beginning to bubble up in his mouth, forming a fine foam that gathered at the corners of his lips. The whole thing was rather comical to him. He languidly slopped some saliva from his lips with his loose tongue.

An uncharacteristic giggle burst from his lips when its squelchy body slapped against the stone. By now, the poor toad was so badly stunned it couldn’t even gather its wits to try to escape. Astara’s kick sent it careening skyward. On its way back down, its bulbous heaad collided heavily with a stone. By the time its rolling bulk reached Aventus, it was definitely dead.

The realization came after several seconds of sniffing and prodding. Silently declaring that it was done for, Aventus scooped it up into his jaws and, wincing with every step, gingerly paraded it around for a beat before setting it down in a pool of his own frothy drool for his mother's inspection. Almost as if he himself had slayed the thing, not its own unfortunate circumstances.

giggle, splat. two sounds that were definitely disquieting when heard in tandem; astara licked bubbling froth from her lips, neck craning as she watched her son poke and prod the now unmoving creature.

a shame. they always gave up so easily, didn't they?

astara hoped, that when the wolves came for her and it was her time to loosen the light in her chest, that she would not go so quietly as toads. that she would fight -- violently and happily -- to her final clearing.

the buzzing in her mouth, unpleasant and pleasant at once, had yet to abate. astara considered finding another, but worried for their exposure to more of whatever it was that made toads so unpleasant to toy with.

catlike, the blackbird slipped to her belly and crossed one paw over the other. content to watch aventus play (if he still did) with the toad, or simply hang out and offer him company.

With a slow wag of his tail, Aventus withdrew, leaving the toad's corpse to Astara. It was an amusing plaything while it was alive and struggling, enticing the kitten-like cub with its desperate movement, but now that it was dead, his interest waned. That was just as well, because his side was aching and begged that he lie down and rest for a while.

He didn’t want to retire to the stuffy medicine den, so he gingerly laid himself on the soft grass, not unlike Astara, and then tipped himself slowly onto his good side. It would be a while before the fizzling of his tongue calmed enough for him to drift off. During that time, he quietly watched his mother, though now and again his eyelids drooped, signalling that he would soon be out of commission for a little while.

the toad was dead and gone, as was their game.

no matter.

astara had lived her life largely in silence, and knew how to draw enjoyment from the company of others. as aventus shifted to make himself comfortable, the blackbird reclined to her side, laying across the pinestraw with her muzzle upturned to her son.

like him, she found her eyelids growing heavy -- especially as the warm of the teekon's soft sunlight pooled around her.

before long, astara was adrift in sleep.