Blackfeather Woods Smells like teen spirit

@Kendra! Sorry it took me so long :P

Damien had failed again. He'd been too slow, too weak to get any prey to share with his weakening family. He was worried he couldn't help them anymore, that they were all beyond saving, that the famine would take him and his siblings without mercy. He did not want that to happen, but he felt powerless against the odds this time.

The one that worried him the most was Kendra. She was close to adulthood and still in growth, but she worried him because he feared she would let herself be dragged by darkness like Cicero. He couldn't lose any more family, or he would go mad.

The dark prince sought his sister out, but he wasn't going to be her hero this day. He was empty handed, and with no idea what to say about Pietro's death. She was the one that suffered the most, and Damien hadn't been there for her. He had agreed with Potema that the young ones needed them, so he would put a front to his responsibilities now. He needed to get used to that if he was to take Burke down and step up for the pack.

Kendra sat where her previous garden was. What lay before her was just dry land. She studied the patterns she made with a stick. After all those were still there. She wondered if this was a good spot for a garden or if she had to move it. The girl curiously looked at the soil, wondering if that would also be a specialty that would be useful to her.

Kendra was lucky to have her curiosity. It had been the girl's little ball of light that dragged her out of the darkness. The girl watched a crack and then moved her paw gently over the soil. When she did suddenly something green and tiny popped up. The girl instantly let out a gasp and brought her muzzle closer it. Probably looking strange that she was looking so closely at the ground. An ultra tiny baby plant!!!! The greens were coming back!

Ah! There she was... At first sight she didn't look like herself. Kendra's nose was pinned to the ground and her tail wiggling up in the air... Had she gone completely mental!?

"Are you alright, Kendra?" asked a worried brother as he approached with a confused, but friendly face. And then he got it, and things changed. THE GREENS WERE COMING BACK!

Damien's own tail went crazy when he saw the tiny little baby plant popping out of the dirt in front of Kendra's curious nose. He rushed to see closer, and couldn't believe his eyes.

"Was it you?" the dark prince asked amazed, which didn't happen very often. If this was real, then it meant that the forest was starting to heal, and that there was still a chance to survive the famine. If only they could hold on until the real prey was back, then they would soon regain their strength, and recover the pack to it's grandeur with him on the lead.

Kendra looked up when she heard footsteps. It turned out it were those of her brother. The young girl's tail started to wag harder. Kendra let out an excited woof when Damien seemed pleased too. The girl looked down at the plant again, wanting to protect it forever. She was going to guard this tree. Most definitely. "Yes. I am. I found a baby plant! Though I am not sure if it was me," she spoke quite modestly.

With an arrogant brother she had been quite the opposite. She did not have much arrogance yet. She had been a rather sweet girl, quirky but sweet. She could use more of that arrogance that littered the spiderlings' nature. "I wish Pietro could see this. He thought badly of plants, and now everyone sees how important they are."

Damien's nose harassed the bay plant for a short moment before he realized he really shouldn't kill it if he wanted things to go back to normal. He pulled back, still very excited and licked Kendra happily -an emotion that felt almost unnatural of him. "Of course it was you! You got the green thumbs from mom, baby sister!" he claimed, and nudged her little head again just to make sure jut how proud he felt about that.

Kendra's next statement was a bit different from Damien's previous mood, which caused it to change rapidly into a darker state of mind. His tail stopped waving slowly and his eyes weren't shining anymore. "I'm sure he would be proud of you, Kendra," Damien assured her, sitting down and trying to look more approachable by lowering his ears a notch and adding a faint smile at the end of that sentence.

Kendra's excitement faded a bit when Damien mentioned her mother. Her tail sagged a bit. The girl did not know how much she looked like her mother, even though she was growing more and more into her mother's curves and height. Only the eyes betrayed differently. The young girl smiled sadly at Damien and shrugged. "I wouldn't know if that is true," she admitted. Her father didn't talk much about her mother, and well, she sounded like a goddess.

"I don't think he would be. He was self absorbed like you. He loved me, that I know, but he thought plants were stupid. This might have changed his mind though," she spoke her thoughts out loud. Kendra usually spoke what came to her mind. She looked at her brother, though she was more than happy he was spending time with her.

Kendra seemed to have no filter in her speech, and it reminded Damien of another sibling who seemed to have dealt with the same case in his younger days. It did not pain him to know that Kendra thought Damien was self-absorbed, he knew he had been a shit brother lately, but it sure made him feel guilty.

The dark prince sighed, feeling the last smudge of the joy the baby plant had brought him fade away.

"I am so sorry Kendra," he said, somewhat steering away from the conversation. "I should have been there for you when Pietro left us... I was a terrible brother to you, and to him as well." he admitted feeling a knot forming in his throat. He lowered his head then to Kendra's level, looking beaten and regretful with dull eyes and flat ears.

The girl slowly shook her head. "You have not," she stated. "You have not been around, so therefor you were not really a brother in my eyes." That was probably making it worse. What the girl meant by it was that she hadn't missed him. Like she kind of couldn't miss her mother because she had never met her.

"But the apology is accepted. I do see you as a bother now, so you better be there for me from now on," she spoke and then gave him a lick over his cheek, mindful of not stepping on the little sprout. "I planted these with Cicero! I need to tell him!," she hummed.

Kendra said exactly what she was thinking, the exact way she was thinking it. It hurt Damien a little, but he was relieved to hear Kendra accepted both the apology, and Damien himself as a brother again. He would make sure his promise was not neglected.

The dark prince received Kendra's lick joyfully, landing one of his own between her ears. She was the new light of the pack and Damien had to make sure she was with him all the way through the crisis he was about to try to fix. Damien knew that Kendra loved her father, and Perhaps Damien would be tempted to get out of his way about the old man for Kendra's sake. He just chose to not think about it in that moment.

"Cicero would be thrilled to know the plants are growing back," he told his little sister, "Would you like to see him?" the dark prince offered. He was still housing Cicero in his den as an attempt to treat his poor state, but he thought it would be good both for Kendra and Cicero to see each-other. Maybe she would remind Cicero that there were things worth living for, and seeing Cicero would help Kendra feel more at home among her siblings.

Kendra looked at her brother, still a bit clueless to the power shift in the pack. Frankly the girl lived in her own world. She was becoming more independent. And she also knew her father was busy, usually too busy.

Yet, having Damien offer her to go see Cicero, she could only agree. She liked both of her brothers, and although she missed Pietro, Cicero and Damien were good replacements for now. The girl was glad that she was not alone in this moment.

"Yes! Do you know where he is?," she questioned. Because she did not know where to find him, Cicero was always tough to find.

@Kendra I'm gonna take advantage of the opportunity and fade the thread with them going to see Cicero, hope it's ok!
This will be my last post, be ready for a new thread!

"I should warn you, he's not doing so well since the plague..." Damien tried to explain, hoping to soften the initial shock of their encounter not knowing whether Kendra had seen the prince of riddles recently. "Follow me," he said, and got up to lead Kendra to his den, where he'd been housing Cicero for a couple days now. He feared what Kendra's reaction would be after seeing Cicero's current state, emaciated as he was, but he believed company would do both of them well. In fact, it was good for Damien himself as well.