Ouroboros Spine kamma ⨰

for @Kivaluk! all other tags for ref! <3

"kingullimik."

kukutux said his title. she knew that the young hunter had walked beside @Rodyn.

she sought the winterhawk's son that snowy morning. the wind was high and blew the drifts with a savage breath. white filled the air and muted the eye.

"i have come to ask if you have considered marrying." moonwoman was blunt. a village survived when boys become men and turned their eyes to the future. she used their words to denote this.

she did not yet know that @Callyope ran with @Melaneus. she thought only of her spirit-talker girl. shamans could choose not to marry. or they could choose the spirits they would swallow.

it would be good if kivaluk was considered, even if callyope was not ready to walk as wife. kukutux must know first.

kingullimik.

kivaluk answers the summons, appearing to kukutux where she waits for him. the title brings with it a soft swell of pride and a soft pang of yearning. it reminds him of the title he might've wore would natigivik hadn't dispersed. if their numbers hadn't been too small and survival had been a question. he understands, now, with young ( though not full ) adulthood but months away.

his gaze upon her is questioning; though question morphs to surprise and then moulds itself into contemplation at the subject.

marriage. to be husband.

he thinks briefly of rodyn and the secondhand embarrasment he'd felt at the lavish proposal and wonders if such a thing might be expected of him in the future.

and while youth still clings to him; stubbornly, he knows his answer. he is the dutiful son: there was no real question. i haven't, he admits honestly. but i am willing to marry.

kukutux was pleased. it showed upon the soft white planes of her face. "this is a good thing. but moonglow will not rush you to be husband."

her breath was a column of white in the cold air. "i was wife already when i had your moons." married to the seal hunter boy, living in a small ulaq with him not far from that of her father and mother.

"if samani gives children to rodyn's hearth when the sun returns, then much of his work will fall to you for a time." it was the role of secondhunter. "you will have much status when you have only twelve moons." apt enough to marry then, if kivaluk wished.

there is some relief within kivaluk as kukutux assures him that despite his agreement to be married that it would not be rushed upon him, if only because being husband had not been in his focal points these past few months ...but now he finds himself making mental room for it alongside earning 'guardian' and 'deerstalker'. good skills, he hopes, that might entice a potential wife.

i am ok with marrying soon. he offers; ever the dutiful son. if moonglow requires it of him: he would do it, even if he feels unprepared.

if there was one thing that kivaluk learned early in life it was that it was impossible to prepare for every thing.

sometimes life threw curveballs ...and other times situations had to be jumped into with all four paws.

this segues into potential cubs between samani and rodyn and that if cubs were borne between the newly wed pair that much of rodyn's responsibilities would become kivaluk's ...if only for a time. i understand, kivaluk speaks. i will prepare for this, just in case. he assures kukutux.

a pause is given then, a soft flutter of his ears at half mast as he wars with soft embarrassment over the question bubbling along his tongue. he supposes he could use his parents' own relationship as a base for what was expected of him but ...moonglow is different than natigivik was. what will be expected of me as husband?

moonwoman laughed but her voice did not tease kivaluk. "your wife will decide this. you must think on what kind of man you wish to be."

stratos surely hunted on his journey. mojag had come home. there were enough here for a hunting party. moonglow was a place of such things 

"you have seen the things that rodyn brought to the ulaq of sun man and myself? that is a bride price. that is the first expectation. the second is that you never strike your wife in anger. many men feel this is their right. but it is not the way of this village."

raised by sakhmet and kigipigak, kivaluk was unlikely to do these things she felt. still he asked after what a husband must be, and so she would tell him. "it is good to marry a girl that you have already known. but if you have only sisters, then visit the next village. learn their ways. learn their names. be respectful. in this way, when you return and ask for a wife from among them, they will already know you as kin."

it was a lot of information and a lot of things that kivaluk must both consider and determine of himself. a loyal, supportive husband. much like his father though minus the being called away bit. he supposes that was the benefit of being born in these wilds: he could travel but not stray and his travels wouldn't take him outside of the wilds. much like i am loyal and supportive to moonglow. that bit, he thinks, will be easy. it's figuring the other stuff out.

a bride price was expected.

a golden rule was to never strike his wife — a rule easy enough for him to follow. he was not raised in any sort of abusive world and thus could not imagine being an abuser.

should i ...start asking around at the neighboring packs? kivaluk inquires, with a small contemplative tilt of his head.

"aya! he is eager, grandmother tooteega!" her eyes were swift with delight. 

"before you say a word, you must make sure that you have skins and good things to offer. spend these moons of snow learning of hunting. learn from all those in moonglow. go out by yourself and hunt alone, at night, in the sun, in the snow."

"then in spring, when the flowers and the red birds can be seen again, then you may ask."

and in the meantime, she would open her eyes for the son of her kinsman.

a soft swell of embarrassment rises within kivaluk, despite that he knows kukutux does not mean her exclamation in any ill way. he worries for a moment if he's being too eager — but throwing himself completely into tasks was how he's lived his life for a long time. he does not know any other way.

she offers him sage advice: of things he should collect for his bride price. to bide his time, to ride out the winter months and when the frosts thaw begin this journey. by then, he will be a year old. old enough, probably, to be considered for such things, even if he wasn't yet a man able to seed cubs.

a dual boon: collect things for his bride price whilst honing his hunting skills.

a thought occurs to him then, one that causes him to blanche and for a small spike in his heart rate. ajakuluk, he begins hesitantly, salmon pink tongue drawling across his jowls, ears fluttering back in consideration of his own worries thoughts; sudden as it was. what if they ask me to leave moonglow?

kukutux smiled at his kinship address.

"when a girl is married, often she goes to live with her husband's people. when a hunter marries, he brings his wife to live among his own. but this is not all the time," kukutux went on. "you must also decide that in the moons that come. will you be trader, as rodyn? travel often, perhaps have women in other places? or will you set your feet strong here in this earth and build a family, when the time comes?"

she smiled.

"you do not need to have this answers now. they will come to you when you are ready. i promise this."

there is a soft wave of relief that follows in the wake of her words, though a quiet inner voice reminds kivaluk that not all potential wives would follow the traditions of the moonwoman. and could he ask her to if push came to shove? it immediately strikes him as wrong: to ask someone to change their own traditions and to conform to his own because he was husband.

in that, he supposes he has uncovered his answer.

but he allows kukutux's words to usher away those worries and his consideration on the hypothetical scenario. these are things he could consider more seriously and ardently once the frost thaws and newlife was upon them once more.

thank you, ajakuluk. kivaluk offers softly, his well of questions temporarily run out.

"you are welcome, nuak." she was proud of him.

these next moons, she felt, would determine what his path might be. kigipigak often wandered. akkuma had sought his own path.

kukutux would only wait to see if kivaluk would remain here or search for his own way.

"go now. i will call for you again, secondhunter." her eyes would watch proudly as he went away. and then she too would walk with a head full of thoughts.