Sleeping Dragon what you need is an older guy,

if u have time <3

@Sivaak, blood-drinker the black-scar had called her; sobeille's gaze swept the full of her battle-heavy figure. the scything scars. the gruesome glint of her glittering burgundy gaze calling to mind blood in moonlight. such a deep and immeasurable color.

i been t'inkin'. a dangerous concept. when my season comes -- here she glanced at the woman to measure her reaction to such a thing -- i want to be findin' a man dat brings me strong daughters. 'ow do you know which one t' pick?

chani had said she would race the men. sobeille envisioned she would fight her suitors. but what of sivaak? how did this fierce muradoii measure men when they were, at times, so lacking?

always got time for sobeille!!

sivaak snorted, the sound sharp and derisive, though not without a hint of amusement.

you fight, she said bluntly, as though the answer were obvious. you fight them, strange girl. make them prove. weak man cannot give strong daughters.

her voice now rough and edged with disdain. men are good for one thing: what they give. after that, they are nothing. you take what you need, then send them away. no room for their pride, their noise. only strength matters. if he cannot prove it, he is not worth it.

sivaak tilted her head slightly, her gaze narrowing as she regarded sobeille. you will know which one to pick. when his blood stains the ground and he still stands, you will know. but only then. no sooner.

you fight them, strange girl. a sense of relief came to sobeille, who had felt foolish uttering such designs to chani that bleak day in mid-fall.

chani's solution had been so elegant, and here sobeille was, suggesting barbarism in the face of polite company.

but sivaak had more in common with the daughter of the shoreline than sobeille had with chani - for all their shared blood, a world of difference lived within them.

this, among many other reasons, was why sobeille did not yet run.

what 'appens if 'e overpowers me? sobeille mused, knowing she was but only an average fighter. she'd failed to kill either mae or cygnet and such failure festered within her.

and she was small -- woefully small -- which left something else troubling unsaid. wat if 'e -- here a great welt of some unbidden emotion rose in her; of disgust and anger and shame.

she fell silent, her masked face one of careful thought. 'ow many children do you 'ave, sivaak?

sivaak’s crimson eyes rested upon sobeille, great contemplation upon her scarred face. expression unreadable but heavy with thought. if he overpowers you, she said, he proves himself strong.

she pauses for a moment, head tilting as if mulling over what she'd say, and then her teeth click. she says: but that does not mean you are weak. and at sobeille's great hesitation, the disgust that screws up her face, sivaak knows what has bled her mind then. it is a rancid possibility, but one all too possible. a cruel obstacle. but one that could make a girl stronger. better or for worse.

then you wait. and when he sleeps, you kill.

and that is that.

the question about children gave sivaak pause. she said nothing, and was nothing, for quite some time, staring off into the distant horizon, a face full of no emotion and repulsive scars. and after a long silence, she says: none. but not for lack of trying. no man has yet bested sivaak... she trails off. that sivaak was not related to.

in sobeille some dove of hopeful thought took flight — and the first of a darker ideal nestled in that suddenly vacant space, its black tendrils outstretching their cnidarian arms around her.

knowing she could not bring herself to love a man, sivaak’s words burned within her.

she was not weak.

as silence draped around them sobeille followed the scarred hunter’s gaze. she wondered of those scars; how each one had been laid or earned — and the fates of those that pressed their permanent mark on something as tender and enduring as flesh.

then sivaak spoke again. feeling an alien flutter in her chest, sobeille turned her chin. is dat who gave you dem scars?

considering the question, the bluntness of it sparking the faintest curl of her lips—not in anger, but in something darker, something amused.

some of them, she rumbles, and says: others... men who thought they were strong. fools who didn’t know when to run.

her tail flicks, a sharp, dismissive motion as her gaze turns back to the distance, the faintest glint of something—pride, perhaps, or satisfaction—shimmering behind her scarlet eyes.

the sea gave me some, too. but the worst scars are the ones no one sees, strange girl.

not for the first time did sobeille marvel how men made maps of women’s bodies.

she thought of firemother and how the men had forced her body to change. women were always altering their shape to accommodate the men around them. if it were not for the expansion of their womb to house the life inside of it, it was in the arch of their spine to allow men to move within them.

it fascinated her to learn that these scars came exclusively from men; did women not fight?

or perhaps, women were more calculated with their actions.

an immense urge compelled her to reach out for sivaak’s fur, trace the lattice framework of scars over her polar pelt; to run her senses along each ridge and peak, down into valleys of knotted flesh that showcased the body’s profound ability to overcome.

but she did not, for an instinct within her told her it would be received poorly.

what must it feel like for men to possess another’s body so fully?

what kind of scars you be havin’ dat cannot be seen? sobeille asked, wondering if sivaak’s soul bore the same gristly texture as her skin.

sivaak pauses at the question, her crimson gaze flicking briefly to sobeille before shifting back to the horizon. for a moment, it seems as if she might not answer at all.

the kind that break you, she says. scars on skin, they heal. they stay to remind. scars inside... they do not heal the same. they stay raw. they eat at you.

her tail lashes once behind her as she shifts her weight, her muscles coiling with restless energy. you do not see them, but they change you. they make you hard. or they make you nothing. sivaak chooses hard. always hard.

in that drawn silence between them sobeille heard many things. the flutter of a distant woodgrouse. the lonely call of a faraway elk. wind coming down from the headlands, dying in shivering gasps among the rustling pine needles of giant pines.

sivaak’s crimson gaze rested on some distant horizon. sobeille wondered what she conjured in her minds eye; what phantoms lurked there, pulling taut the invisible framework that made the enigmatic and unknowable sivaak.

who did dat to you? she finally breathed, wondering how deep the muradoii would have to bury her past to never feel it at all.

sivaak does not answer immediately. her gaze remains fixed on that distant point. but the faint tightening of her jaw speaks that she had listened.

she dismisses the lingering specter of memory. they dead. some not. does it matter?

her crimson gaze slides to sobeille then, sharp and searching. you ask much, strange girl. why? you want scars of your own? the faintest curl of her lip suggests humor. it is one of few times she will spare it.

another lull; sobeille wished to crack open that enigmatic mind and see every spark as it ran along the muradoii’s neural archway; what she would do to know of such power.

when sivaak’s gaze slid back to her, it carried bite to it. sobeille stepped back warily, tail stirring once by her hock. of course it matters. she lifted her chin just enough to signal her resolve: no — i be wanting to know ‘ow to never let one get close enough to leave traces of themselves on me. she motioned to the scar on her lip, the missing fang too: already dey leave these things on me. no more.

her eyes flick to the scar on sobeille's lip, the gap where a fang should be. she huffs quietly through her nose.

stay faster. stay stronger. kill before they touch you. her words snap like bone. hesitation kills. mercy is weakness. strike first.

then silence. then, she concedes.

rhyak. my brother.

her tail twitches, a bitter snarl twisting her lip before it falls away into cold indifference.

i was bloodchief. cragblood mine. wolves feared me—sharadoii, lanzadoii, all of them. my raids fed my wolves. we took what we wanted. but muradoii do not let strength go unchallenged. my brother... he want it all. he turned my hunters. led them against me in the snow. loyal muradoii stood beside me and fight, but we not enough.

there it was. the first lesson held like a glittering pearl in the center of her palm. edicts her soul had been aware of, but had no way of articulating.

strike first.

her gaze solemnly traced the lattice-work of scars marking the muradoii's proud face. rhyak. a backbiter. sobeille's insides twisted to think of what she'd do to jadou, tousaint, or lafayette if they followed in rhyak's footsteps.

sivaak had taught her many things, but now it was sobeille's time to impart some wisdom. sivaak knew how to draw life from a body by violence. sobeille knew a far more subtle method, one that as of yet, remained entirely undetected by those in sapphique closest to her.

it was sorry circumstance that sivaak had been routed from the muradoii camp by her own blood - yet sobeille considered herself fortunate to have come across her.

is he dead?

sivaak’s gaze sharpens, narrowing at the question.

no, she growls, the word heavy with restrained fury. her tail lashes once behind her. not yet.

a tense silence lingers between them. sivaak doesn’t look away from sobeille, crimson eyes glinting like fire beneath frost.

rhyak breathes. for now. but breath is not forever. his time ends.

her lip curls faintly, revealing bloodstained teeth. i be there when it does.

a shared understanding took its first breath in that moment, routing up through sobeille’s ribcage and settling somewhere dark around her heart.

she sat down, tail curling around her toes in the perfectly perfunctory way she’d witnessed in prettier girls.

’ow do you plan to do it? her eyes rested upon the caribou-killer with lamplight intensity.

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her muscles grow taut with simmering rage. just the thought of butchering her brother enough to bring her mouth to a boiling water. she pants.

slow, she croaks. i rip his gut open with teeth. eat his dinner from his stomach, string his innards out to bake under the sun.

her gaze shifts to the distant horizon.

i make him beg for sea to take him.

the imagery sivaak's words conjured stirred something within sobeille: something fluttering and warm and --

her gaze flicked to her own belly as she ran a paw along it absentmindedly.

as if it were her own intestines strung out like guttering garland on the snow.

dat be a slow deat'. sobeille reflected solemnly, placing her paw back in the snow. an image so strong it could be a memory came to the forefront of her mind: the face of a wolf, blood sluicing between bared teeth.

but it be what 'e deserves.

sivaak watches the younger wolf paw at her belly, her own curiosity piqued despite herself. she snorts softly, stretching out with a lazy shift of her massive frame.

strange girl smart enough to not get gutted. she muses before lowering her head onto crossed forelegs. learn from best.

her jaws stretch wide in a bloodied yawn before she settles, eyes half-lidded but still keen.

wrap up here?

yes! ty for thread as always <3

the face held in her mind's eye faded, leaving sobeille troubled. as she glanced to sivaak and saw the great huntress yawn, she suppressed the urge to do the same.

learn from best, sivaak suggested -- and sobeille believed she detected a hint of bemusement in it.

that, as it turned out, was exactly what she planned to do. mimicking the caribou killer, sobeille sunk into the snow and curled around herself, listening to the snow as it droned on.

and at last, she drifted to sleep.