Blackfoot Forest bones

@Jinx ??? Did it work

Swiftcurrent Creek was their home. But as she set foot within Blackfoot, she had found her own. It was nighttime, and the cries lured her, called her. Yes, she responds to nothing, Yes, I am coming, I can hear you—
xxxxxxxThere was a reason that she was called, that she was summoned. Blood was pressed upon the contours of her face, around her jutting shoulders the organs of some unidentifiable being. Freshly dead, her decided sacrifice; but in her haze, she had no idea what it was she had ended, only that it had already been dying, and that she was ordered to take and consume. Her belly was full, so full; and she moved in her haze even still, possessed, a familiar touch holding her mind.
xxxxxxxLife for a life, debt for a debt, take what you take and get what you get... Get what you— she pauses, her high-pitched voice catching in her throat as she spots a screaming specter in the tree. She rushes toward it, snapping her jaws, but they did not close. Saliva whipped out from the edge of her lips, and she turns her head, something moving in her peripheral vision.
xxxxxxx(I see I see!) But what?

Jinx had not eaten for a couple days. The soreness and itchiness of the wound on her neck was so distracting that she had forgotten to. When she wandered, it was in a hungry half-stupor, body feeling cold with the need for food. Her paws took her from Horizon Ridge as they oft did, proceeding with unceasing speed to the edge of the forest which had once been hers. The Loa she had come to worship, and had taught her wolves of, were no longer there, but she still found comfort in the haunting shadows of the trees.

Her ambulation halted suddenly when she crossed the path of another wolf, white as herself, but smelling of decay rather than blood. The woman's bones seemed to poke from her skin like knives yearning to break free of their sheaths, but her belly was rounded with a recent feast, or so Jinx assumed. She knew nothing of the way one's belly would swell when they starved, its muscle no longer sufficient to keep its contents contained. Her eyes were fixed on the female, but unfocused... Until Clarice spoke in that high, keening voice she employed when the Loa were assaulting her senses, and rushed an unseen shadow.

The mad woman's head turned suddenly toward Jinx, who at last recognized her. Her head drew up over her shoulders in a gesture of shock and also anger; the feeling of betrayal she had managed to stifle over the past couple months rose in her, drenching her heart in agony anew. "You," she said by way of greeting, her tongue lapping over her jowls as she tried to decide how to act. "You left me."

A familiar face. A face that did not cause her to grimace or snarl. There were few strangers she had ever taken to, few new things she enjoyed. But she would always have an affinity toward the old. Clarice had always enjoyed Jinx, liked her. She had followed her once as her father had, but the Loa and Sos had a different plan. Clarice could not guess that the other would be upset by her presence, but when she spoke she recognized it then.
xxxxxxNo, she simply responded, I went where I was called! I did not leave you, she corrected, her tone not aggressive, nor her frame. Her tone was soft with Jinx, but still high, perhaps even shrill. Clarice believed this to be true, and so her tone was earnest; Clarice did not think herself wrong in anything she had done. All for a cause. All for the greater good. All for Him. Her eyes then looked over Jinx, and she took a step back. What she saw caused a terrifying look to cross her face, a mix of fury, hunger, and hatred until they became a single expression.
xxxxxxI will fix this, she breathed, Who touched, who hurt? Voices screamed. Do not let them get away, and with them, she spoke in a voice darker than her own, We will have our revenge.

Ah, so that's why, said her mind. Clever Clarice, obedient Clarice. So she had left Bon Dye for the very same reason Jinx had gone: the Dark Father called to her, and she heeded Him. This was excusable, then. She could not fault somebody for following their faith, particularly when it was the correct faith, for Sos and Atka were the only Gods. Atka was largely ignored in this country, but Sos got plenty of worship. Most of it, unfortunately, was perverted by heathen attempts at understanding something far beyond their comprehension... But with Clarice returned, it would not take long to correct those wrongs.

"I myself was called," she explained, in the event she had been the one to leave first and not the daughter of the Loa. "I went down the river with poppy to pay tribute and hear His decree. He told me Bon Dye would thrive!" She bit down a growl when she was reminded of how it could have been. "I returned to find all my wolves had up and left. Do you remember Hawkeye? She stole my pack and led them to the plateau on the mountains, that way." Her head twisted back to indicate the direction, and then she was distracted by the cut of Clarice's eyes toward her injuries.

Having attention brought to them made her remember them, and she winced when the throbbing pain returned with her attention. "Hawkeye's dog bit me," she said, when asked what had happened. Clarice's strange way of speaking had never bothered Jinx; what bothered her most was harming the other girl, as she had learned long ago when they were scarcely old enough to communicate, and she had headbutt her and felt immense guilt for it. "We had a truce, you seeee. My pack and hers. We were meant to be unharmed on one another's borders, so I bit back when he jumped me, but... Hawkeye forgot her promise, and sent her hellhound to kill me. I was too fast for him."

There was no point lying to Clarice to make herself seem more grand. She wouldn't tell her that Peregrine had suffered similar injury, because he simply had not. He was some sort of demigod, risen from the bowels of Sos' lair, but not blessed by Him. Clarice would only hear the lie in the voices of the Loa, and would see it for what it was: an untruth.

Clarice was a deranged lunatic. Were she stable, she would have never left, and perhaps could have taken over in Jinx's stead and enabled Bon Dye to thrive. But she had been called, and so too had her father; they had went on His sacred mission, and completed it. They were Blessed followers; they had done so much! He had even possessed her and spoke to her; it was a rarity to hear him, a true, true gift.
xxxxxxClarice licked her chops. Hawkeye. No, she did not remember her; her relevance was little to Clarice, and her life meant nothing to the fiendish girl. When she spoke of mountains, Clarice grimaced; along the way, she had met a mountainous pack of strong wolves that did not approve of her proximity to their lands. She would have cursed them, had she the time, but there were far more important things. This, for example...
xxxxxxHellhound, she spat, revolted, They will know of the hounds that place harbors! Clarice's voice has lifted, thin but firm in its conviction, unwavering in its promise—she takes a step closer now, her eyes looking to the injuries, knowing what she must find, not wanting infection to hit. She took Bon Dye, its wolves; Atka would frown, she muses, laughing strangely that even the kindest of Gods would not look kindly upon Hawkeye. Surely Sos had some cruel plans! She could not know, of course, that Hawkeye worshiped Him even still.

She laughed aloud, sharing in Clarice's quizzical sense of humour; would that Hawkeye knew anything of hellhounds! Would that the black angel of Blacktail Deer Plateau knew anything of Sos! Clarice and Jinx had grown up on tales of Sos, had been weaned on sacrifice and ritual to appease Him and to please Atka... When Clarice spat of hellhounds, and shook with mirth over how Atka would feel, Jinx joined in. Peregrine may have been blessed with some sort of strength, but a true hellhound was inescapably powerful... And what she wouldn't give to see her deranged friend unleash one on those poor heathen fools. There was no love lost on the black woman who had set her dog upon the high priestess; should they meet again it was certain one or the other would fall.

"Atka would snarl," she agreed with a toothsome sneer, her nose crinkling upward to demonstrate her distaste for the wolf. Thief her mind screamed, mindless to her own abandonment, mindless to the reality of what had happened to Bon Dye. "That woman is deluded. She thinks Sos speaks to her. Hah! As if an initiate could even fathom the glory... He would ruin her if He so much as whispered." This was, as far as the mambo was concerned, a whole truth; it was known Sos could take a wolf's body and cast their soul into oblivion if he chose. The wolves of Shearwater tirelessly worked and worshipped to earn their keep in their bodies... To keep their souls from His slavering jaws... And they knew the meaning of devotion better than any.

Her eyes glossed over Clarice as she came nearer, sticking briefly on the background before returning to the madly glinting gaze of the schizophrenic, the one who spoke with loa. "Whatever evil thing she did that day when she took them from that forest, it has deprived me. He has not spoken to me since then, He has been silent. I am lost, Freyja." Her mouth was set in a firm line as she scrutinized her childhood friend, still as yet unaware she no longer went by that name. Clarice had been called... Perhaps she would know. "I must fix this," she determined, her voice tinged with the plea of an uncertain soul, seeking its salvation in the form of her God's favour.

I don't know where this came from?

That even Atka would snarl meant something. Clarice knew of Her, of course, and respected Her—She was a God, after all, and had Her role in things—but was not for Her. Jinx was spiritual herself, trained in the arts of a man she had heard of but never known (Koios) to both lead and listen to the voices that sang to Clarice. She heard, sometimes, Atka's Loa. They calmed her without her knowing. Who would disobey a God? Clarice was truly only obedient to Sos, leashed and collared by Him, but that did not make Atka any less great.
xxxxxxBut Clarice turns truly lovely as her face morphs into a hideous snarl, her muscles coiling as though she might strike anything in her sight. NO! She shrieks so loud even her own ears ring. This knowledge, this revolting news, brought Clarice to a state of outrage. She snaps at open air, and although no care was taken in the action it was nowhere near her pale companion. She would not be! For as Jinx said, even a fraction of his voice, a mere whisper, would rend her into a thousand little pieces until she was indistinguishable from the dirt on which they stood. And to look upon Him would surely blind the woman who knew so very little of their faith... Clarice retched.
xxxxxxJinx continues and Clarice's mind is utterly silent, not even a cry from her Loa. But she can feel disapproval. It radiates. It burns. She could not cause this, she says, utterly sober, utterly clear. Her mind is so crazed that she sounds rational, sounds as though she truly knows this to be true. She has no power—I would know. It is the first time Clarice admits to having any powers herself. It was known by all, but never mentioned. Clarice was not arrogant here, only trying to get Jinx to fret less over a wolf Clarice felt Sos would one day bring an end to for her trespass. She continues, not regarding the name her mother had given her that she could never forget, but forever repressed, I do not why I have returned here, but it must be for this, for you... she is thoughtful, her ears twitching as though she is listening. She nods. We are for Sos, but I do not think it is He who is calling for you right now. When you listen, she instructs, Do not listen for only Him.
xxxxxxSos could bless as often as He could curse, but Clarice could not forget about his other half. Her soul was not Hers, and She had always kept a distance from Clarice... but she could hear the pleasant humming now. For a moment, Clarice is rigid, and appears angry. No, she states plainly, finally... but her ears twitch again, and she resigns herself. Jinx, surely, was as much for Sos as Clarice herself was; but she forgot her own greatness. Clarice was thoughtful, complacent, as she looked to Jinx... not at all herself, gone, her eyes glassy until she seems there again. But it is not her voice.
xxxxxxThere is nothing broken, my child.

I love how your characters are always the ones to give Jinx these moments lol

To any curious onlooker, Clarice would have seemed every bit as deranged and wild as a rabid dog. To Jinx, she was familiar, and so these outbursts of shrieking and heaving with disgust, while unexpected, were not alarming. Clarice rebelled against the idea of Hawkeye having any connection to the Gods, which set Jinx's mind at ease. Although the shaman's daughter also claimed it in words, the Kesuk had always known that if any would know, she would. Clarice had been gifted from birth, though it was clear to Jinx that she was becoming more and more distant from the physical world. The loa were taking her deeper and deeper, it seemed.

Yet, that was a blessing in the young mambo's eyes. The batty female went on to consider why she might be back. She correctly identified it as having to do with Jinx herself, albeit Jinx only thought this because of inherent familial arrogance. But then Clarice continued on a different tangent, one that brought Jinx's ears to the front and opened her mind to something new.

She had forgotten about Atka. Kaskae had been blessed by the Mother Bear, or so Nutaaq had said. From that day on, the mambo had more or less abandoned her personal worship of the Kermode Bear God, but she was reminded now that Sos was not the only one. Perhaps, in so stringently seeking Sos' approval, she had missed something very important from Atka.

This seemed to be the case. Her eyes alit with alarum at her friend's sudden wave of fury. Her hackles lifted into an uncertain crest, but Clarice's transformation is only momentary. She falls back into calmness moments later, and though her eyes take on a vacancy Jinx is not familiar with, the Kesuk does not notice until she speaks. The voice was smoother and deeper than Freyja's common cackling sighs and keening cries, and addressed her much differently than ever Clarice had done.

But Jinx knew what was expected of her. Instantly, she was on the ground, lowering her head in reverence to what could only be the presence of Atka, one way or another... Or else a trickster loa, or Clarice playing games. There was no way to tell the difference, but to one as devout as the young black-footed Kesuk, there was no alternative. "Atka," she cried softly, snout bowed into the V between her forelegs, "what must I do?"