Noctisardor Bypass yuljeda

for several moments, heda paced back and forth outside the den, trying to gather what to say. anselm's scent still burned in her pelt, though it was beginning to wash away with the unending rain.
when she could be alone with her sister, she motioned, eyes a gentle plea. I'll tell you everything.
"anselm and i — anselm hated that ava and dinah and i were in the hollow. he made that very clear. when i," heda faltered, unable to look at @Druid through her own frustration, "when my time came, he — i think he — he didn't want me near etienne. maybe in his mind keeping me himself was one way to do that."
heda ran a paw across her face. "he told me to — he expected i would end the pregnancy. i never quite told him i did, and then i just lied, because i was upset he asked that. it was a relief to leave the hollow behind, druid, and — i didn't expect to see him again, or for — everything with glaukos to happen. i didn't expect him to actually want the boys, druid. he's avoided me and treated me like — well. and that back there, it hasn't been ongoing. i don't think either of us expected it. anselm just recently started to talk to me at all, i —" what a mess!
"i didn't expect to see him again. so i said nothing." and now heda was silent, unable to look at druid in case she saw anger there, ironically enough.

It wasn’t long before her sister came to find her. Druid took a steadying breath and nodded when Heda motioned her aside. She took a seat, staying quiet and giving the other woman the floor. A few things jumped out at her, though she did not interrupt.

“…he didn’t want me near Etienne…”

“…he expected I would end the pregnancy…

“…he’s avoided me and treated me like—well…”

None of this shed any light on why she and Anselm should be… bushwhacking. Druid’s face scrunched, trying to make sense of that, of any of it. She replayed Heda’s words in her mind and was only left with confusion and an uptick in her distaste for Anselm.

What I’m hearing is I need to kick Anselm’s ass, Druid said very dryly, for lack of anything better to say, maybe right out of Rivenwood.

Was that going to become Rivenwood’s tradition: Druid throwing out badly-behaved men, one by one? It made her think of how she’d mistrusted men in her youth, in large part due to Mahler’s desertion. Like father, like son?

Shaking her head, Druid spoke up again to say, But you two were about to…

it was the wrong thing to say.
heda had lost caracal, had lost glaukos, and now anselm's presence near her was suddenly in jeopardy. had she the ability to articulate her dozens of snarled feelings, she might have recognized that the early, abrupt death of her husband so soon into their marriage and their time as parents had left her with a clawing emptiness that formed itself into a desperate codependency on the men who were close to her.
druid only wanted to protect her. heda could appreciate that even though her unexplainable panic. 
"yes. we were." heda ran her tongue over her teeth. "we can hardly talk to each other but — there's something...there." something deep and twisted, the soldering of bones at birth. "i look at him and i want to — try again," she admitted, leaving out the parts where anselm had blatantly rejected her bids for partnership. "i don't know what he wants. maybe that's all he wanted, but i —" wanted to give it "— maybe that's all we'll ever have." how pathetic to voice that she would settle for essentially nothing but a rough, near-frantic coupling in a dark forest. 
how pathetic to realize that she would have made only that connection become their sum, if only anselm would realize she was good for him.
"i'm lonely, druid." her sister's love and the unconditional affection of their puppies was not enough for heda, and it made her feel monstrous to realize that.

She could only think, Why? After everything you just told me, why—?

“I’m lonely, Druid.”

Reaching for Heda’s paw, the gray Den Mother sighed. She considered her words, brow knitting slightly. She thought she understood what Heda meant, though she also thought her sister was not only settling but something somehow even worse than that.

I don’t think Anselm is a very good man, Druid said frankly. I don’t think he’s evil, just like I don’t think Glaukos is evil. But between what you and Etienne have told me, he’s…

Druid trailed off, her face doing something very funny. Her lip lifted, one eye scrunching. Anselm was the last person she’d call a catch. So why on the gods’ green earth was everyone in love with him?

"the same thing mahler did to us, he did to anselm," heda murmured quietly in defense of him, but after that silence followed as her sister's weird expression proclaimed that druid did not agree.
however, speaking on the past was dangerous in her state. 
something worrisome pinched her brows together. "what did etienne say?" heda asked, a worm of dread inching its way into her belly as she squeezed druid's paw and the words she hadn't been meant to hear replayed in her mind.

That doesn’t excuse him, Druid pointed out gently. We don’t treat others like garbage just because of our pasts. Heda, you’ve been through things a hundred times worse than any of us and you’re still full of grace toward everyone, even men like Anselm and Glaukos.

She returned the squeeze, taking a moment to reflect on the particulars of her long discussion with Etienne. There were things she couldn’t mention, but many more she could.

For starters, Anselm takes Etienne for granted. He’s not the only one—I’m guilty of it, myself—but Etienne cares for Anselm a great deal and he thinks Anselm hardly cares about him. You know, he mentioned Anselm’s past too, how he’s been hurt. But that doesn’t give him the right to hurt others, Druid repeated.

She paused to mull again, paw still clasped with her sister’s. Etienne thought Anselm felt strongly about Heda. “Perhaps ‘love’ is wrong…” he’d corrected himself, before producing, “Infatuated.” He was clearly open to sleeping with Heda—Druid grimaced a little at the mental image—but it sounded like he wasn’t very good at actual relationships.

Druid wanted to tell Heda that apparently Etienne thought he was capable of great violence if he found out the truth about his friend. Apparently he made nasty remarks about Etienne’s grandmothers. But she couldn’t tell her sister these things, without betraying the Oak. Her lips pulled into a moue of frustration.

I just know you can do better. You deserve better, she insisted, tone still gentle but growing more emphatic. She let out a blustering breath before concluding, And take it from me: just because he fathered your kids doesn’t mean you have to end up with him.

heda found she had no argument. she could pipe up, insist that she'd had caracal and the nearness of the redhawks — what if anselm had never possessed that? how old had he been when mahler left him behind too? 
but when druid spoke of etienne, heda shifted uncomfortably. "he told me he doesn't think anselm considers him a friend, just tolerates him."
she sat with that for a minute, then glanced at her sister with a despondent tinge to her gilt gaze. "but i want it to work out. i d-destroyed my family, druid. i-i got into my head, and — and i was punished for it."
only ava, dinah, and ana had ever come back. and now dinah was gone. tears overflowed; "i don't deserve anything, druid," she almost sobbed, fighting so hard for control that her jaw clenched.
"i want it to be better for my boys. they need anselm, now that they know him. and i want to make it work for them, no matter what."

That was just what he’d told her, almost word for word. Druid nodded her acknowledgement but said nothing. Even when the silence stretched, she didn’t break it. She sensed Heda wasn’t finished. Her sister had yet to acknowledge Druid’s revelation.

But she never did. And the words that came streaming out of her were confusing to the point of distraction. Druid’s face contorted even as she reached for her sister, pulling her into an embrace. She bought herself a few seconds to try to parse Heda’s words and come up with something comforting to say.

That’s just not true, she refuted, realizing it worked as a response to more than one of the other Den Mother’s statements. I know it’s not the same thing as having a husband but you have me. Your boys have me too. I know I haven’t been the best mother figure but I promise I’m doing my best, particularly now.

We don’t need men, she wanted to add, though Druid said nothing more.

Heda’s svelte figure felt taut and trembling in her hold. Druid gently tightened her forelegs around her slim middle, an unspoken gesture to remind her sister that she would hold onto her no matter what happened. If that included breaking down in her arms, then Druid would be right here to hold her up.

"i have you," heda whispered, allowing the tension to dissipate from her body as she wound her own arms around druid and sighed against the slender shoulder. why wasn't this enough for her? why couldn't she just be happy?
why did she feel like she needed him?
it wasn't even in pursuit of happiness; heda didn't think anselm could give her that, or wanted to make her happy. but what mattered was the unit she'd had before; her heart circled that loss a thousand times a day, unable to make sense of the grief that did not stop.
after a long series of emotional moments, she gently pulled aside to meet their gazes once more. "thanks for listening and not — judging me. god knows i do that enough to myself."
wanting to do something in return, she said, "i've got the first wake-up tonight, all right?" she said of their restless kids, smiling a bit to consider theirs as a sisterly pair.

You have me, Druid reiterated for the nth time, clicking her tongue before adding, Of course I don’t. You shouldn’t either, though I know we tend to be our own worst critics. Try to be kind to yourself, okay?

She gave her sister a last squeeze before they separated. Druid felt better for having talked to Heda about the matter, though a look of consternation passed over her face as her mind turned back toward Anselm. Didn’t Heda know she deserved so much better than him?

It wasn’t her place to push that rhetoric any more than she had, so Druid simply nodded and smiled when Heda volunteered to go on call tonight. That felt like a friendly conclusion to the conversation at hand, so she turned her attention to the children in question, keeping an eye on them even as her thoughts slowly churned.

"i will." and she meant it, even if all the pain collected in her gaze for a moment and forced her to glance toward one of the babies.
observing the pups always made her feel better; it reminded heda that she had a purpose beyond her own sorrow, a reason beneath her existence.
she did not let herself think of anselm for the next several hours.