Bearclaw Valley What good to be a god myself, unless things can touch your heart?

Rain drummed incessantly over everything, its chill felt keenly by the supine boy. Drenched from nose to tail and caked with mud. He lay upon his belly with his legs splayed like a spider crushed under heel, tail whipping through a growing puddle, whipping the surface.

Cold and wet, yes, but to some degree numb as well. Glaucos did so enjoy listening to the rain as it fell in sheets. It was the sharp touch of the drops that felt so shocking upon his skin, almost like little teeth, but they did not draw his blood or hurt him the way teeth did.

In this manner the boy communed with the sky, feeling for once a part of something.

the motherless boy lay spread across damp earth ensconced in mud, tail splashing loudly against a growing puddle. it was that noise that first drew astara in, inquiringly.

how had the little monsters fared under averna's watch? a once over by astara's hard gaze, and it seemed they were at least not starving. adequate, given they were (as astara believed) merrick's sons.

it was only that perceived blood relation that kept astara's fangs at bay.

He floundered there a moment longer; embedded in a t-pose, feeling the slick quality of the dirt against his groin, which was unpleasant. As he grew too cold for the weather Glaucos tucked his legs back under himself, loafing briefly. He looked around at the dancing drops of water and smiled as light cascaded between them - oftentimes too fast to really see, however, the liminal light transfixed him.

In trying to focus on the nearest array of rainfall he did not notice the approaching shadow until Astara was much closer. Her face came to an abrupt clarity. Shards of color where her eyes sank in to a dark skull. Hastily the boy averts his gaze, feeling a shiver run down his nape and vanish among the chilled muscles of his back.

hoo boy i'm sorry she's a b

had her children ever been so.. slow? surely not; astara peered down at merrick's son with scarcely concealed contempt. that feral bitch had tainted her lover's blood, creating something dissolute and... lumpy.

she saw little of merrick in the boy, and for that, little worth redeeming. all the same if he was to be raised as a pawn of ursus, he was to be shaped accordingly: what use would he be to her, if he was always so soft?

a growl then to the boy who averted his gaze, commanding he get up -- he might be under ursus' roof, but astara would give him no handouts.

Instinct drove his attention to the dirt the same way instinct would snap it back, murkwater gaze settling upon the dire shadow of his once-mother; he did not want to draw her ire and yet that was all he was ever good for, to others.

Up he came. His full height showcased how he might grow: those massive paws, a too-big head and broad shoulders, lacking any meat otherwise. His haunch shiverred and the boy thought about settling back down again, watching his toes.

His tail stiffly dusted the surface of the dirt.

the boy rose; good.

for one so young, his limbs and forepaws suggested a final height far beyond astara's middling own. her gaze dissected karst silently; how much of her rook did he carry, how much would he show?

as he peered at his feet, astara drove a nimble nip at his cheek.

if he was to be ursus, he would be taught the true might of the bear; he would be taught to be a willing footsoldier.

The click of teeth, hot breath on his cheek. He jumps in his skin and with her prompting tries to raise his head. By now his tail is still and the rest of him feels like pressed clay; hard-packed and ready to crumble at the slightest touch.

She searches for her bear in him, and maybe there are similarities to be gleaned, but Karst is hardly ursine now; he shivers and wants to curl up, but does not, feeling more fear for these eyes and these teeth than anything else he's come across.

rather than play, the boy stilled.

he remained before her like a fawn, prone and terrified -- no soft love in those liquid eyes.

astara snorted, feeling something hateful in her throat. where was his fight, his will to live? was he not a beast of the bear, her rook's son? her lips curled back to witness such an inferior coupling -- that merrick had ever chosen that woman when her fruit was so evidently rotten, curdled astara right down to her soul.

she began to prowl around the boy, head low and tail held stiffly behind her. one last physical warning for him, of her intent, before she closed the gap again.

The way she moved was like the brother-sister duo except more direct, with the same menacing quality Karst guarded against. He found himself wondering in that indefinite moment between action and reaction, are all people this way?

The wraith wanted something out of him. He knew that without her bidding, without any word or action, because everyone wanted something out of him. Likewise to the children this woman sought a pound of flesh; Karst would have given it if he could, so long as she abated.

Instead she closed that gap and he had to take it. Whatever grip she sought she would have, whatever blood she wished to spill of him would be cut free, and all that Karst could do was take the bludgeon or the teeth or the hateful glare in equal measure. He was nothing—a punching bag, a child made for the sport of the others.

In any case, he did not fight back until he absolutely had to: even then it was a futile effort and he knew it, fearing the snap of his own teeth as they clattered near Astara's close jawline, as if his body were a marionette controlled by instinctual magics. It was only a moment—ignoble and righteous—in which he tasted her hot breath so close.

was that it?

seriously?

astara expected something better. she had hoped her initial assessment of this fur-bagged maggot was wrong; that somewhere underneath his dull exterior the might of the bear pulsed, waiting to be awoken.

she pulled away from his feeble counter, placing space between them again.

pacing.

thinking.

no. no thinking.

he was a slug, sapping their valuable resources.

he was, alongside his other sibling, the eternal memento of her rook's unfaithful escapades.

worse of all, he demonstrated none of the bear in him. no instinct for survival, no grit. a useless, floppy, pathetic fur-sack that desecrated the image and might of her bear by simply existing.

a great and terrible rage grew in astara. here was the living embodiment of a slap in her face, and he would not even fight?

no thinking.

astara's head lowered as her wrath rose. she turned back around to karst, her expression blank. seemingly serene, even.

not a fur out of place to betray her intention to take his fucking head in her jaws, and splatter his brain matter across the ground that was worth more than every useless iota of his stupid fucking existence.

astara lunged for his skull in a silent bid of helpless rage.

Terrified, he was terrified. Attuned to every little sound of the lurking woman's body; her breath, her steps, the blink of an eye—Karst was vigilant around the other children out of habit and now that he was set before an adult, made hypervigilant.

His chattering teeth did not stop; the sound was like castanets - then booming, so loud he knew he had to force himself to stop or he might deafen himself. He grit his teeth and tucked his chin against his chest at precisely the moment Astara lunged for his skull. He did not see her coming because he had his eyes shut tight. He did not hear the movement of her furs and the crunch of the earth until his face was wedged down in to the plush of his pewter collar; but it was enough.

The boom of her teeth clacking together over his head startled him—but more dire than that was the feeling of one tall ear catching in the hinge of fangs. With one swift movement her mouth closed and those curved incisors cut in to the soft tissue of one ear and a corner of the other; tearing raggedly as his head dropped low.

The boy was struck dumb by the surprise of it. A flare of pain came next and it was unlike anything Karst had experienced before, to that end his eyes opened wide in an almost comical expression of shock. It would be another second, maybe two, before the pain hit home — and by then his ears were filling with blood to the point of blocking out all other sounds. All he could do then was scream as he dropped lower, cowering in the dirt.

how easily she could take his skull between her jaws and fling him --

an image then of nyra, teeth closed around the ruff of her son.

astara pulled back ruefully, her teeth snapping shut. it was not karst's screams (which now flooded the glade as quickly as blood flooded his ear) that stayed astara -- it was the vision of merrick losing a son.

astara's expression contorted into one of loathing. he should have done anything besides wail -- fight back, flee -- but instead, he remained like a screaming stone, insipid and unmovable.

she found no use in staying. if he would not be roused into usefulness, astara would not waste her time further. with no remorse in her heart to cause a babe such distress, astara turned on her slinking heels and began to make for less noisy climes.