Snowforest Taiga breathing fire
Saatsine
Bloodhunter
mother winter.
156 Posts
Ooc — rue
Offline
#1
All Welcome 
the wind wrapped itself around gjalla like a blanket, dark curls billowing out with the force of the wind. specks of snow clung to her fur in dustings, flecked along her spine like the stars in the night.

the princess clambered through the snow with short steps, paws sinking into a fresh dusting of snow in blissful silence, head dipped low to follow tracks imprinted into powder snow. the moon hung like a faint crescent in the sky, casting a soft glow over the tops of the trees as the last remnants of daylight bid their farewell. time had slipped through her paw unnoticed, lost in the rhythm of her footfall.

a coil of tension curled around her belly with a rumble, an aching reminder of the emptiness there. sanguine hunger lingered in the corner of her mind, tugging against the chains of her attention. the soft sounds of rustling leaves and scurrying critters seeking shelter from the encroaching darkness do nothing to silence the snarl of her stomach.

even under the night's cloak, there was nowhere to hide if you weren’t as white as the snow that’d fallen. this doe would not be so fortunate.

she’d waste no time tonight, thrusting herself forward as the scent of something more hit her nose. a heady scent — musk; another wolf, a stranger. painfully unfamiliar, though not strong enough to make her weary. she closes the thought to recount later. better things to be doing, she thought.

the beast squeals nearby, so gjalla gives chase before it becomes out of reach. the doe plowed onward, but her leg ailed her. it wouldn’t be long now.

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norse;“ · common; · “valyrian;
Saatsine
Chieftain*
485 Posts
Ooc — ebony
Warrior
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#2
his disappointment in self continued, and so did his blame of star eater for not having guided him to who followed. now the scent-trails which led around their river had changed, and he sensed inside himself that she was with child.

he had lost face before her, and he would not forgive himself as much as his pride did not allow self-blame.

ahead, a doe cried out, and his instinct lengthened stride to find gjalla there in pursuit. prudently he did not speak; sun eater fell in to her left, snapping jaws to drive the creature on whatever course the woman set.

"tell me of man who come. tell me of family. star eater not speak of him before this." his face! lost; his wisdom and his power compromised. she must share in this blame; he did not know how to hold it alone.

and there was a place else for gjalla, if she would turn away from these protections into his service. into his ear. revenge to be had, but first sun eater must capture himself again in his own haughtiness.


this character is rated R

Saatsine
Bloodhunter
mother winter.
156 Posts
Ooc — rue
Offline
#3
gjalla pressed on, nose pressed low as tracks indented deeper into the snow. she was close, now. she could taste it already - driven forward with a single-minded focus. from the corner of her eyes, snow sprayed through the brush. she could've doubted it before, but that was no trick of the light.

sun eater looming closer, his great frame slipping through the trees as quietly as any predator, though she could sense a tension in him. it did not take a psychic to know why. she waited to answer, boxing her thoughts as she closed in on the doe.

it's a blur of gnashing teeth and long breaths before the doe collapses and stops its wailing. a single blue eye stares back at her as gjalla hovers over the felled deer. his statement wasn’t a question so much as a demand for answers. she felt the weight of it, his voice laced with frustration and an undertone of something deeper, something darker.

She set her jaw, her voice quiet as she settled onto her haunches. “stark,” she began, venom on her tongue. “he is her brother. was. he came for her.” morwenna, because stark had never met star eater.

her eyes flicked to sun eater, meeting his gaze for the first time since his question. “he tried to take her throne more than once. killed her last husband to avenge her children.” she continued. “they are complicated.”

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norse;“ · common; · “valyrian;
Saatsine
Chieftain*
485 Posts
Ooc — ebony
Warrior
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#4
blood splashed upon them both, gjalla spoke of a brother who had already once murdered. again came the stab of anger: he should be dead, ravens plucking flesh from the very socket of his eyes.

"he will come back." it was not a question; sun eater saw the trueness of what would be and placed his paw atop the cooling hide in thought. "she not tell me these things." and he had been humiliated by what he had desired to be mercy.

no place for it now. no place for it again. "i need bloodhunters, gjalla. you have anger for this man. i want my eyes see him dead. hunt him. you are saatsine." at last the dark hackles stood down. "man blackfell, he say he want you. i say you must want him first." sun eater offered a privilege here; she would do well to see it for what it stood to be.

his lips tightened; he did not have the words or absence of pride to properly thank the woman for an honesty his own wife had not given. it escaped him, naturally, that he himself had said nothing of his own past, the exiling, the teeth of the moonwolves.

he told himself that this was a different sort of thing. she knew of his son; he had not known she was a mother before. "what is throne?"


this character is rated R

Saatsine
Bloodhunter
mother winter.
156 Posts
Ooc — rue
Offline
#5
gjalla's tongue swiped across her maw, cleaning away the ichor smeared across her face. the doe lay crumpled at their feet. sun eater’s voice was heavy with resolve and the bitterness of realization.

“he will come back.”

gjalla nodded faintly, her gaze distant and fixed on the carcass. “he will try,” she said. “you humiliated him, she 'betrayed' him. desire for vengeance will bring him back. you should have killed him when you had him at your feet.” her words were harsh, but she meant them. no mercy for the wicked. when sun eater placed his paw upon the cooling hide, a ripple of silence stretched between them. his admission came quietly.

“i need bloodhunters—i want my eyes see him dead—hunt him.”

she needed no command, no suggestions of what to do. her anger had blindsided her, absent from the fight but here, now, it had wrapped itself around her heart and put venom in her teeth. she would poison him, too—tear his throat from his body and bring back his head. stark was a threat to them both, and to morwenna and her litter. that was enough.

her ears twitched, her head tilting ever so slightly. she would be saatsine's blade if they needed one, an instrument of death. it wasn’t a title offered lightly, and she knew it. her tail lashed once, contemplative. gjalla hadn’t asked for his favor, nor sought his approval, yet he offered her this. "it will be done." a promise. she didn’t thank him. it wasn’t her way.

her gaze flicked from her meal to the chieftain at the mention of blackfell, a faint trace of amusement playing at the edge of her mouth. “he is persistent.” she said dryly. “he serves saatsine. he will prove his worth. if he manages to impress me along the way, i do not see why not.” her tone carried no warmth, but there was no malice, either—only practicality. 

gjalla raised a brow, her head tilting slightly as she considered the question. “a throne is power,” she told him. “it’s the place from which you rule. a pack or a kingdom, it is a seat that commands respect. star eater had one. i almost had one.” she stepped over the doe’s body, predatory.

her gaze pinned him then, unblinking. “you have a throne, sun eater. you’ve built it with blood and fear.”

wow this was long... srry i was rambling

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norse;“ · common; · “valyrian;
Saatsine
Chieftain*
485 Posts
Ooc — ebony
Warrior
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#6
no it was amazing <333

"he is man like me." sun eater sneered, though he did not quite disapprove. gjalla's tell of this 'throne' was something rolled over and over in his mind, a wheel of thoughts that did not stop their lunging. his trust in star eater had been compromised; her connection to gjalla's honest scathe of tongue lifted her somewhat from this moment.

in truth, he did not know how to feel.

you have a throne.

it fired him; for a moment the beat of his heart was for the warrior before him! he did not comprehend it, only understood that he and gjalla aligned upon the tempest of the blood.

morwenna had become yikaas had become star eater again, morphing as he wished! doing as he bid; feeding the great starved part of sun eater that had come to depend upon that aforementioned blood and fear.

"make him earn. hunt this brother. come back to me. i give you new status. i give both you new name." he wanted titles. places. locales. distance; sun eater felt fear strike inside him, for he had initiated a skirmish with this misplaced mercy. the brother would return, and wisdom said he would not be alone.

"i come to you again, gjalla. i ask more things. you tell." for he had determined not to ask them of star eater now, not as she carried his young and was delicate with illness. the fighter before him would be a conduit into his own marriage.


this character is rated R

Saatsine
Bloodhunter
mother winter.
156 Posts
Ooc — rue
Offline
#7
sun eater’s sneer carved lines of disdain into his features, though it lacked true malice. he is man like me. her brows knit. stark was a man of endless ambition, of hunger, of bruised pride and foolish plays for control and power.

her tail flicked once, measured. "no, you are not." she told him. he was not like stark. not really. stark was cruelty without cause, a man who wielded power like a bludgeon, thoughtless and unchecked. sun eater was sharp edges were softened by his devotion, his fury tempered by calculation. "you have met him once. i have known him years—the difference is immeasurable." they might share the same fire, but their character was incomparable.

sun eater’s mind was a turning wheel, and she saw herself reflected in it—just a fragment, but enough. enough to know he struggled to place her, to reconcile her words with his own doubts. her tell of the throne had struck a chord, she could tell. and though he hadn’t spoken of it outright, she could see the way it consumed him.

his declaration pulled her from her thoughts. her ears flicked forward. a new name—titles, recognition, for their effort in the manhunt. gjalla didn’t flinch. a new name was not merely a title; it was a rebirth, a severing of old roots to plant new ones in fresh soil. she saw it in star eater; she was changed, reborn for her mate. gjalla had understood this was the way of the saatsine. to take the name he offered would be to shed her past, to pledge herself wholly to his vision. she wards away the urge to frown at the implication. she did not want a new name, nor to sever herself from her culture for the sake of his.

she was gjalla of house brehn, always. from her birth to her death, to her arrival to valhalla. that was who she was.

“i will bring you his head, sun eater.” her gaze cut through him, unwavering, as if to say that no name, no title, would dictate the fires that drove her. she did not need a reward to kill him.

"i come to you again, gjalla. i ask more things. you tell." 

what star eater left out of her conversations with the chieftain, he looked to her to fill the gaps. it was pragmatic—calculated. she did not approve, but she would be honest when the time came. "very well."

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norse;“ · common; · “valyrian;
Saatsine
Chieftain*
485 Posts
Ooc — ebony
Warrior
Offline
#8
again he listened, rapt as an eagle intent upon a hare. she did not compare the two; opposite, and he nodded once without a grunting sound of mild derision. they were different, and clearly did gjalla have more faith in himself than this brother.

pleased, he searched for more meaning among her words, but a slow blink brought their gazes to meet again. he had no reason not to believe her; there was some maw of yawning violence in gjalla which might well rejoice in being unleashed.

and so let slip the rein. a new title would only proclaim in formality the agreement made this hour.

his head!

a prize, and again his eye gleamed with want of her, reminding them both that his will was first. blackfell had asked, but a bloodhunter chose. "i look forward," he said with studious effort, but he felt the meaning had been conveyed.

a soft lift of his chin said their words were at an end; she was free now to go, to carry out what had been asked in whatever ways she felt fit to pursue. power indeed.


this character is rated R