Noctisardor Bypass i am blood and blood and replay

@Morwenna

he has hunted with @Sega, following the old caribou trails and filling in old coyote dens with ice and snow. working, tirelessly. diligent, begrudgingly, under the guidance of the young chieftain.
now he takes the rest of the evening to himself. traveling west, away from the taiga and into the valley beneath. long legs of a caribou hunter carrying him, and his scarred head held high upon the shoulders of a knight.
torn between two worlds, though he is scarcely aware of it.
he knows only that as he travels into the bypass, skirting down the rocky mountain side which surrounds and down through one of many grottos, something sets him uneasy.
something. or someone, maybe, watching him. and the young soldier stops, those paws of his coming to a halt upon rock and snow. yellow eyes cutting, narrowing as he puts his head upon a swivel.

morwenna's fur pouch was heavy with the herbs she’d managed to gather. she was thinking only of returning to the den—of warmth, of waiting, of praying blackfell would bring her daughter home—when the wind shifted.

a scent.

not male threat. not stranger. not ghost.

her boy.

the world dropped out from beneath her.

the herbs spilled from her jaws at once, scattering across the snow. the caribou pelt slipped from her shoulders in the same heartbeat, forgotten, useless—nothing mattered but that scent, that impossibly familiar thread of him woven into the winter air.

c’ed’e—

her breath broke around the name, the syllables a mother’s gasp, a prayer, a wound.

she ran.

the bypass blurred beneath her, the cold searing her lungs, her paws slipping and catching on rock and drift. she didn’t feel any of it. she climbed the ridge, heart pounding too hard for her ribs, and skidded to a halt at the crest of a deep snowbank.

there—

a shape cut from strong young bone and winter shadow, scarred, tall, carved into a growing boy she did not yet know but recognized with her whole soul.

her boy. her son!

she reared instinctively, one paw lifted in the air, unable to take a step closer, terrified he might vanish if she moved wrong—if she touched him too soon—if she dared believe this was real.

her voice would not rise, would not form words, but a sound escaped her.

a small bark. soft, trembling.

the sound only a mother makes when she finds what she thought she had lost forever.

her tail quivered. her lifted paw hovered midair. her eyes shone with a sharp, wet fire.

it is lightning. electric. there is noise to the left of him, and the pale wolf turns with cold eyes and lifting hackles. there is the sound of wet, snowy rock and skidding paw upon it.
the thundering of a wolf fast approaching, and sky eater prepares for a battle. but it does not come. instead, he blinks, and within that small margin of time, a woman appears.
a woman that has haunted his dreams for the whole of his sentient life.
there is a small breath from him, as well as frog-blinking as he stares at her. moreso, a gawk. the racing of his mind, as well as the beating rhythm of his heart in his chest.
he feels many emotions, but most prevalent of all: anger.
anger at seeing the woman who had abandoned him. the woman who had betrayed his father, the whole of the sun clan. and she is looking at him with stars in her eyes, as if he's something beautiful to her.
the boy lifts his lip and snarls.

she did not flinch at his snarl.

she had expected it—deserved it, even.

the boy she had carried beneath her ribs now stood before her as a young warrior, carved by another man’s teachings, another man’s laws, another man’s wrath. he had his father’s fire in him; she saw it in the stiff line of his shoulders, the violence trembling beneath his skin.

but he also had hers.

the starbright shape of his eyes told her that.

morwenna’s lifted paw trembled, then slowly lowered. she sank to the snow—purposefully, carefully—her belly brushing the cold earth, her head bowed in a gesture so rarely offered it hurt her bones to give it.

submission.

a mother’s plea, not a wolf’s defeat. a simple teaching she'd learned from her husband, that she would guessed passed to the angry boy before her.

her voice was small, soft, a sound she had never made for any creature but her children.

another quiet bark.

gentle. coaxing. the shape of his name wrapped in breath.

he watches as this putrid, pathetic excuse of a woman lowers herself to her belly. dark belly to snow, pressing and submissive and everything wrong about it settles harshly on the dark lines of his face.
the lanzadoii on his tongue is rancid.
what did my father see in you, he begins with a slow stalk forwards, but he doesn't come close enough for her to touch, that you are so weak? no, he does not want to be touched.
even as he looks upon her, both the shadow of her cruel lanzadoii husband and her slaughtered brother. those sulfur eyes follow the crowned ridge of her head, settle upon that star in the center.
star eater.
traitor.

she saw the shift in him—

the arrogance, the hate, the way he stalked forward as if he were king and she some trembling thing beneath his heel.

and in that moment, something ancient and sovereign in her spine snapped back into place.

he came just close enough.

she moved like a blade unsheathed.

with a burst of the strength she had left, morwenna surged upward, fangs flashing white-hot as they closed around the thick fur of his neck. not deep—not lethal—but enough to break skin, enough to spill the truth onto the snow.

her son’s blood met the winter air.

her paw slammed down between his shoulders, forcing him into the drift with a thud.

she stood over him, panting, her own blood smeared on his lips from the struggle—

the mark of his mother, unmistakable.

do not, she hissed, voice low, dangerous, regal, dare speak of weakness. not to me.

her grip tightened for half a heartbeat—not to harm, but to remind.

your father taught you only the shape of strength. never its cost.

she lowered her face to his, eyes burning like cold stars.

i am morwenna. your mother. crowned in blood you have never spilt. you speak of treason?

a scoff, sharp as frostbite.

you know nothing of loyalty. or loss.

her paw kept him pinned, not cruelly, but undeniably.

look at me, c’ed’e.

a command, not a request.

i survived what would have killed your father. i survived what stole you from my belly. i survived every man who tried to break me.

her breath ghosted over his muzzle, fierce and trembling.

and i will not—will not—be called weak by the boy who carries my blood.

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she catches him off guard, and white hot embarrassment flashes behind the eyes of the boy. wild-eyed, suddenly, as his own blood begins to welt up at the nape of his neck where she had struck him.
but he is eclipsed by her anger, shocked by it, and sedated. watching from the corner of his eye where his head is pinned harsh to the cold rock floor, top lip twitching into a curl upwards.
teeth revealed, but not turned upon her. he burns with how he is suddenly obedient, enraptured by the words she spits. they register within his mind.
the lanzadoii—drakaryn prince gnashes at her. you lie! he accuses. because there is no concept which exists to him that his father, chieftain of the saatsine, had been deceitful.
he knows only what was raised up into him. and that is the long march, and the cruel salt of the sea. wolf blood, sea blood. but as he looks up at her, those cruel staring eyes reflect back nothing but southern royalty.
you are not my mother. my mother was muradoii! he writhes in her grasp, pulling himself out from beneath her. though some minuscule streak of noble blood in him does not allow him to lay his own blows. instead, he takes several steps backwards, though his posture is inflated with anger.
star eater was a traitor to the the sun clan. proof that an outsider will always be an outsider! you are deceitful! you are the reason we split apart! he heaves.
he makes a mistake. the next words from his mouth are heinous, vile. spoken with the same revulsion he feels for her.
all for the cock of a cur.

morwenna advanced the moment he tore free—
one step, then another, each one a queen reclaiming the ground beneath her son’s trembling paws. when he spat his venom, she struck.

the back of her paw cracked across his muzzle, sharp and royal as any blade.

and what remains of your father, boy? her voice thundered low, cold, unshakable.

she stalked him as he backed away, her fury a living thing in the snow.

nothing.

her snarl split the air—raw, righteous, heartbroken.

nothing! he has left you nothing! no crown, no clan, no truth worth carrying.

her chest heaved, but her voice sharpened to a lethal, queenly bite as she stepped into his space, forcing him to feel the weight of her presence.

but i am here.

her paw hit the ground between them, hard enough to send snow spiraling.

me. another step, eyes burning into his. i am the one who remains.

his insults slid off her like arrows against dragonscale—until the last one.

the vile word. the stain of a man she had never chosen. morwenna froze.

then her fury changed shape— from explosive to devastating. a winter storm collapsing inward.

she lowered her head until her muzzle nearly touched his, her breath trembling with wrath and grief braided tight.

you dare speak to me of betrayal, she whispered, brittle as ice cracking under weight, when your father stole you from my breast before you had even opened your eyes?

her stare did not waver.

you dare name a muradoii as your mother? a scoff—not mocking, but wounded. then tell me, boy—where is she now? who stands before you? who bleeds for you?

her voice thickened, nearly breaking—but not bending.

i have crossed death itself to stand here. and you look at me and see only the lies a coward fed you.

her jaws clenched, the fury trembling through her shoulders.

your father feared me. of what i could've become. a beat. that is why he took you.

she inhaled sharply, fighting the ache in her throat.

and you— her voice cracked open, soft and feral—

you are so much mine that even now you do not raise a paw against me.

the truth of it shone in his eyes. and she delivered the final blow softly:

your rage is my blood speaking, c’ed’e. not his.