Bearclaw Valley return
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#1
All Welcome 
Sif left @Isengrim in the glade, not sure how welcome he would be within the valley's walls. It didn't matter either way - the pair would soon be returning to the coast, where they had a bit of family business to attend to. With her siblings back in town, the dark girl wasn't sure she could be kept away from the waters, even by the call of her family, and a safe place to stay for the winter.

But as she entered the valley that day, she called for @Wardruna, not waiting for him to find her but going out in search of him, even though her limbs ached fiercely from her weeks alone. She'd forgotten all about her various wounds, but Wardruna would surely notice the half-healed gouge on the side of her neck, and the assorment of bites and scratches that covered her face and extremities. All were largely superficial, and would soon fade to the patchwork of scars that already covered her body.
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#2
Wardruna had noticed Sif’s prolonged absence — it was hard not to notice …but his wives were free to travel. They did not have to linger by his side twenty four seven and though he worried it was not about whether she would return or not. Wardruna assumed that Sif would always return because she had yet to give him any reason to doubt it. Wardruna is licking his proverbial wounds from his failed hunt and ignores the rumble of hunger in his belly when Sif’s call rises in the air from him. He takes a few seconds to glare a little longer at the hole in the earth that the fox had escape down into. It yelled at him and he let out a low snarl, snapping his teeth before he turns away sharply, letting his annoyance and embarrassment manifest itself in precise and brisk movements as he made his way to his wife’s call.

It did not take long before her scent becomes stronger, mingled with several foreign scents. As she comes into his view his working eye looks her over though his relief as it begins to bubble in his chest fizzles out and evaporates like a water droplet upon a hot stone. “Sif,” Wardruna greets her, feeling anger boil over in the place of relief as he notes the half healed gouge upon the side of her neck. Who dared …! Who dared to hurt her? þú ert meiddur,” He croons as he draws nearer to her, seeking to press his nose gently against her cheek in an affectionate gesture. hver hefur gert þetta?” Wardruna inquires in his Northern tongue, so ready to exact revenge and go to battle for her.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#3
The two soon met, Sif halting when her husband came into view and Wardruna approaching her stiff figure. She was still not quite sure how to touch and be touched by others, but she was learning, and her tail wagged while Wardruna greeted her.

Contrition and embarrassement flickered briefly across her face before she swept the topic away with a vague,"En tispe - " For the wound did not matter, and neither did the wolf who had inflicted it. "men Waar - Jeg fant mine brødre. På kysten." Her burgundy eyes were wide and unsettled. She looked to her husband to make some kind of sense out of this situation. His presence was comforting, but she was still deeply disturbed by all that had happened while she was away. These wolves were her blood, her family. Isengrim needed her, and Kingfisher... she needed him. He had information about her family, about Sif herself. And he wouldn't come with her like Isengrim had - she had to go to him.
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#4
i'm too lazy to translate atm so speech bolded & italicized is meant to be icelandic, lol.

A bitch. It is a vague answer and it causes a slight frown to tug his lips downwards but Wardruna respects her wishes and lets the topic drop though it is with reluctance. Sif is his wife and anyone who causes her harm would have to face his unbridled and brutal ire. Or so Wardruna is eager to believe, anyway. His gaze moves to the wound briefly once more before it rises back to her mahogany gaze. Her words draw his ears forth, attentive as she speaks of her brothers, that she found them and that they reside on the coast. There is a stretch of time where Wardruna feels nothing as he processes the information she gives him, evidently confused about where this conversation was going. She looked unsettled, eyes owlishly large and if he was looking to take any cues from her the northerner was left even more confused. Your brothers,” Wardruna repeats, trying to contemplate what this means. Is there devotion towards blood in her? He shares no such devotion to his own aside from striving to do better. Was she willing to leave him behind in pursuit of her blood ties? He cannot help but wonder next. Is it a good thing? A bad thing? Do you want to be with them?” He inquires softly, slowly, as if he is afraid of the answer, ears fluttering back against the curve of his skull in mild trepidition.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#5
Sif sat down a bit huffily and pushed her face into the fur of Wardruna's chest, not wanting to be looked in the eye right then. Her emotions were out of control, and no one should see that. Not even him. "Don't know," she replied, her voice a bit muffled. "Isen caame with. Fissaar still... um - þarna úti. Han kan lære meg om familien min. Hvorfor er jeg kalt ved sjøen."

She pressed harder against him, seeking comfort she wasn't sure how to extract from the iron-clad male. "Haltu mér," she requested, feeling a bit pitiful but choosing to wallow in that rather than reject it. If she couldn't be vulnerable here, where could she?
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#6
Wardruna lets out a soft, pleased rumble that lingers in his chest as Sif pushes her face into the fur there. She responds that she does not know and as she explains about her brothers — that one has followed and one remains wandering somewhere, Wardruna deciphers as his wife switches through languages and that presumably the one wandering can teach her about her family — and the knot of anxiety that has twisted up in his throat gradually loosens. Not much but it is enough to allow the passage of the cold, biting air into his lungs. He still feels uneasy, abruptly face to face with the realization that he doesn’t want to lose her. Wardruna draws nearer as she speaks her request in the plush fur of his chest, pressing his muzzle first against her nape and then preens the fur he finds there, drawing tongue against the wispy tendrils. His experience with women is limited to his interactions with the thralls of Jötunn’s Spine: and there had been no affection, no love there. Only feral desire and assertion of dominance. So, essentially, no experience at actual relationships. His feels for Sif were not gradual as his feelings for Addie: with Sif it had been a hard and fast fall. He feels a sudden wave of deja vú though the wife pressed against him remains, yet, undecided. Do you want to be my wife? He inquires ( because he does not think he ever actually asked her, in some context he used it as an answer to a question she had asked him ) next, smoothing another tendril of fur with his tongue knowing that her response to it would help him in deciding what to do when she made a decision …if that decision did not involve staying at Bearclaw Valley.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#7
"Hva?" Sif demanded, peeling herself away from Wardruna's chest with righteous indignation writ across her face. If she'd not wanted to be Wardruna's wife, she certainly wouldn't have returned to him! "Auðvitað!" Her face fell into a sullen, stony epxression. "Þú efast um mig, Waar? I come baack." Just as quickly, her words turned gentle and wheedling. She leaned forward to comb her teeth through the fur of his cheek. "I come baack. Stay longer."

She felt badly, now, for staying away so long. Sif hadn't meant to, exactly, but her trip to the taiga had turned into a trip to the coast, and her trip to the coast had turned into a stay, and her stay had turned into a journey - next time, she'd plan better. She'd not let others waylay her. "Neste gang vil jeg ikke være borte så lenge," she assured him, moving to clean the eye boogies from the corner of his damaged eye - she'd yet to realize it might be a sensetive area for him.
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#8
Wardruna’s teeth click together as Sif wrenches herself away from him with well earned indignation. He deserves it for questioning her …but he’s insecure enough to need to hear it. I know. I know, He attempts to pacify by admitting that he was wrong to doubt her. I’m sorry. It was a moment of insecurity but it helps to know that you want this. That you want us. The northerner offers in an attempt to justify his own insecurity; but it definitely helps to know that she did want to be his wife still. He had never given Addie the choice …until he had; and understandably Wardruna does not want to hold so tightly to Sif that he ends up chasing her away. He lets out a low rumble of pleasure as he feels her teeth comb through the fur of his cheek, appreciative of the gesture. It is fine, Sif.” Wardruna assures his wife in a soft purl. “[I]I just …I don’t want to lose you. Expressing feelings is not something that Wardruna has ever been very good at; aside from expressing annoyance and anger. They were easy emotions — there was no attachment, no vulnerability with them. I won’t doubt you again. He promises her, knowing that to be husband and wife meant to put one’s unwavering faith in the other. It was a bond of trust just as much as it was everything else.

At one point he’d have snapped and bit her for being anywhere near his left eye. The nerves are dead — he only feels the rasp of her tongue against the unmarred flesh that is caught in the ministrations of her cleaning — the scar flesh is nothing more than a patch job. It covers the wound but it is not the same. It will never be the same. He closes the eyelid out of instinct but that eye was also dead and the gesture is pointless — useless aside from eerie aesthetics. There is a shiver beneath the scar flesh, a ghost of feeling drawn from the memory of feeling but that is all the feeling is: an echo, a memory to help his brain fill in the lapse of signals. "We could make it official, beyond just the title of husband and wife," Wardruna suggests, seeking to preen the fur of what is within his reach with her so close. "if you want." He adds. His thoughts then go to Poet and Addie but he turns those thoughts away for the moment, intent to focus upon Sif. It wasn't as if this hasn't occurred to him previously — before they'd ( temporarily? ) abandoned Sleepy Fox Hollow he'd contemplated making her his wife — to rule by his side as the matriarch of the sister wives after all.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#9
Wardruna spoke sweet words of appeasement to her, flattering the girl to no end. Her cheeks heated at his earnest tones and attentive preening. She'd never been given much thought as a child, and it was strange to have someone so concerned about her feelings and wellbing as Wardruna seemed to be. That, and it filled her with a certain sense of power and authority to have someone so intent on regaining her esteem. She was easily mollified, not used to apologies and quite willing to let this matter go.

This next topic, however, intrigued her greatly. What made a marriage official, she wondered? And did this mean that they were not actually married? She certainly wanted to be married to him, and not just pretend married. That was for babies, and Sif was an adult, now. She wanted to do adult things. "How?" she asked, clearly fascinated and ready to take Wardruna's lead.
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#10
How? Sif asks him. Wardruna thinks about it. She is already a sister wife but in what way did they establish her as wife — to move their relationship in that direction? By becoming my mate,” He offers though in truth there is little difference to him between the title ‘wife’ and ‘mate’. It makes you more than a sister wife. Would things have worked out with the Hollow it would have you standing beside me as leader.” But that plan was put on hold, whether temporary or indefinitely. If I had a last name to offer you I would have you take it. but he does not. His culture did not truly have ‘last names’. He was Draugrsson and now he is son of no one. He cannot say that he is not a little bit to have parted with that legacy: his father and him had never particularly seen eye to eye and he’d spent much of his life prior to exile trying to free himself from the konungr’s shadow. It means that you will exclusively bear my children, if you that’s something you want. As Wardruna doubts that he will be allowed to breed with his multiple wives outside of their ideal pack. Basically, it means that he and Sif would be exclusive period. Where you go, I would follow. He murmurs in conclusion, hoping that he’s explained what he means well enough.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#11
Sif bit back a gasp of horror. Did that mean her sister would be taken away? She knew (or thought she knew) that Poet would still be her friend, but Addie would surely drift away from them without this bond to cement them. Did Wardruna know this? Would he really be alright with that?

Whatever the case, Sif knew she would not"We should have more wives, not less," she disagreed, something like hurt in her eyes. "For a big family. Lots of babies." Her gaze turned pleading, and she hid her face once more in Wardruna's fur, wondering why he wanted everything to change just when Sif was beginning to get used to what they had going on. "Does that mean I can't be a real wife?" she asked softly, and her voice did not crack, thank you very much.

Obviously, it had been a terrible mistake for Sif to be gone so long. When she'd left, everything had been just fine, and now Wardruna was speaking like a madman!
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#12
sif misunderstands, he realizes, and argues that there should be more wives instead of less, reasoning that it would make their family big with lots of babies. wardruna smiles at her because he can't help it — her devotion to what they have built together is endearing and reassures him that he won't lose her. it reaffirms her words. "i think you misunderstand," he speaks to her softly, words nearly a purr as he preens the fur at her nape ( or where he can reach ) as she once more buries her face in the fur of his own neck. "i am not getting rid of my other wives," he pauses for a moment to consider a way he can better explain what he means. "i will keep the kvennabúr. and you will be a real wife, sif, but your ascension to official kona means that you will be my main wife. if i was a king, you would be the queen. does that make more sense?" he inquires, ending it with a quieted hum of inquiry.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#13
Sif stayed quiet, turning these words over in her head. It sounded like a fairytale to her young ears - getting to be queen alongside her king. She couldn't imagine ruling over Poet - or even Addie - but she didn't have to be the sort of queen Doe had, did she? Maybe she'd be good at this. A good, nice queen.

"But," she said hesitantly, not quite sure she wanted to point out this truth to Wardruna, in case he did not already know, "I em dumb." She nestled closer to Wardruna, hoping this would not make him think less of her. He had to have seen that she could hardly speak, barely interact with others. All she was good for was fighting and wandering off. Surely a queen ought to know more about life than that, right? Surely, the smart and elegant Poet would make a better bride for Wardruna?
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#14
wardruna notes her hesitance and listens as she gives him a flimsy reason as to why she can't. i em dumb. it causes his breath that rises to his throat to stick for a moment before it passes in a low, small hiss upon his exhale. he doesn't like that she calls herself 'dumb' and his immediate assumption is that someone told her that, called her such a degrading thing ( the audacity that anyone would speak to one of his wives like that positively burns him ) and it stokes the heat of his ire. the northerner tempers it, allowing her presence to ground him, to keep him in check. "no you are not," he protests forcefully, wanting to be sure she heard him and believed him. "you are perfect, sif. perfectly you," he tells her as she nestles closer. "you are smart, and beautiful and kind and i —"and i don't deserve you, but he doesn't say it. she is good and pure and he ...he is corruption; he supposes that is why he is drawn to her. the darkness in him is undeniably attracted and pulled in by the goodness in her. beyond wanting her at his side he needs her there. to be the moral compass that he indisputably lacks.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.
457 Posts
Ooc — mixedhearts
Warrior
Offline
#15
Whatever Warduna thought of himself, Sif had known nothing but kindness and compassion from the man. He had become almost like a father to her, being so loving and wonderful and old. Fen had cared for her, but she'd never been allowed to cuddle him like this, and he'd been far more prickly than her sterling husband.

She sighed contentedly at his assurances, feeling very safe tucked below his chin. "Okay," she said after some time and thought. She wasn't sure how it would change things, but if Wardruna thought it was the thing to do, she supposed it only made sense to follow.
hell is empty and
all the devils are here
133 Posts
Ooc — Mochi
Offline
#16
sorry for the horribly late reply. this seems like a good place to wrap this thread up. feel free to either reply once more or archive as is! :-)

okay, sif replies tucked beneath his chin. wardruna does not speak and further but lets out a softened noise that lingers in his throat. a low rumble of contentment. the pair stay like this for as long as sif wants for wardruna is eager to give into his wife's wants, letting her decide when she's had enough cuddling. when the pair do offer the other some physical distance wardruna heaves a begrudging sigh. he would rather spend hours in sif's embrace then patrol or suffer the humiliation of failing hunts but he knows that it's a necessary evil and he must in order to pull his weight. "i should patrol," he murmurs into the cusp of her ear as he briefly draws nearer. "i'll be home in a few hours." home being the spacious den the quartet shares. he offers her a kiss to her cheek before he makes his way towards the borders.
your hands are wet
with blood of an empire.
you lick it off.