Arrow Lake she's intimidating and brooding

it was strange, blodreina thinks, waking up in a new place where the only wolves she knows are the little bit of kru that'd gone with them. this morning, her eyes burn with unshed tears because she is wanlida and she doesn't cry; but there is an overwhelming rise of homesickness that is followed very closely by morning sickness ...but dragoncrest cliffs wasn't her home anymore. it stopped being her home when heda'd committed suicide and left them there: commanderless; and the new heda that rose to take her place would never be blodreina's commander. plain and simple. and maybe, she thinks, those are thoughts that would surely paint her as natrona. so let her be a traitor, then. she no longer feared the word. it wasn't like drageda'd ever followed their ways anyway so what did their version of natrona mean to her? nothing.

she stretches and winces as she realizes that her body is growing more tender. sort of like the soreness of muscles after a rigorous spar except ...different. it's a subtle difference yet felt keenly. her body is trained for war ...but it is not yet trained for child growing. it's all new to her body ...all new to her. her chosen resting place near the lake is not quiet and that is why she's chosen it. she can't stand quiet nor being trapped underground though she knows that when it comes close to give birth she will have to swallow her claustrophobia as she has time and time before to ensure the life within her womb is warm and protected ...but until that time she is stubborn and refuses sanctuary beneath the surface.

the morning is chilly, the sun peeking through the thick clouds that move to quickly obscure it and she pushes herself to her paws, stretching again. it's a few feet to the banks of the lake and she takes a long drink that is followed by her leftovers from the previous night — the fox isn't much but it's enough to sate her hunger for the time being though she finds she is often hungry more than she is not hungry these days. she will hunt again later, she thinks, after she's done a bit of patrolling. it is a familiar routine and in the face of diversity of everything she's ever known she is clings to anything familiar with ferocity.

intent on becoming familiar with those that were newly adjusting to diaspora's ways, stigmata stalked the one called blodreina with an almost urgent step. he felt most interested in her because they shared a profession, but a large part of it was also just morbid curiosity about a child-bearing she-wolf with no doting companion to speak of. it were signs like these that made him suspicious - made him believe that there were hostile foreigners looming in the distance; biding their time and building their advantage.

yet despite being unable to immediately shake his paranoia, or fully relax while there were a gaggle of newcomers afoot, the general's approach to them was tempered. he would come upon the earthen warrioress with a dominant posture, but he would not invade her space before determining her level of comfort, which he knew would start extremely low. the wolf stood back, waving his tail high, and waited to be invited forward. he knew what it was like to be displaced. to grow up knowing one world and being one way, and then to suddenly have that change... for better or worse.

he could only hope that this leg of their journey would not be like the first leg of his own, when he had been driven from the legion, as they had been driven from the cliffs.

the leader of the pack approaches her with a dominant posture, tail waving high over his back and blodreina's steps fall to a gradual cease, her body posture and head lowering with submission. she is not used to being approached like that — she doesn't remember heda ever having to assert her dominance so physically with her but she'd went from being respected as the pack's ( previous ) wanlida to being diaspora's new meat. pregnant new meat, that is. so, blodreina subjugates herself, with no other choice. she has to appease leadership, she has to earn her place here so she can ensure she has a home and a safe place to give birth.

the life within her womb is the motivating reason as to why she'd done any of this at all.

she invites him to come closer, realizing after a beat that it's likely what he hung back for. she appreciated him giving her the choice to give him the invitation because, just as he doesn't know her, she doesn't know him and if he wanted to he could've easy invaded her personal space by his right as leader alone. hello. she offers him in greeting, breaking the silence that had previously existed between them.

as invited, the hound trotted forward, bobbing his head in silent appreciation of her reception. "i hope i find you well this morning, my lady," he greeted while coming to stand near enough to share a hushed conversation with her. his silver eyes draped over her, unabashed and openly appraising. if not for the telling firmness around her midsection, stigmata would have found no fault in the earthen victress. she was an exemplary she-wolf - the kind he had been born to worship - but had been claimed by some absentee blight, and he would not be able to overlook this until she had popped.

upon noticing no blatant unrest, continued: "i came to see how you are adjusting... and to learn what more i could of you, if you would be inclined to share."

as well as can be expected, blodreina replies truthfully. the upheaval from drageda on top of her progressing pregnancy was a lot to handle at once ...despite that it'd been her choice to turn her back on the only life she's ever known. often, she wonders if it was a mistake. can she adjust to this new life and the new person she would have to become in order to assimilate herself? right now, she isn't so sure, so torn by her roiling emotions as she was. thank you for asking. she adds then, wanting him to know that she appreciated his apparent interest in her well-being. she owes them a debt. a huge one for taking her and the life she carries within her womb into their fold.

at first, she's hesitant. she spent most of her life initially distrusting anyone who wasn't long-standing kru or kruborn ... and she finds herself in the new habit of breaking all of her old ones. it's ...slow. there are things that are similar but most of this is all foreign to me, she admits transparently. but i will answer any questions you might have about me. she assures him.

"you were raised a warrior then?" he continued curiously, attempting to glean what he could of her experience through more casual conversation. "i must admit that much of life here is new to me as well. i have brought much of my old ways with me, but they do not seem to fit well with the populace here." he didn't want her to feel like she was the only one vulnerable here. he had his own insecurities, even being the general, but he wouldn't let a thing like a difference in philosophies stop him from being who he was.

"i hope things are not so different that you cannot adjust. your children will have a namesake here, if you and they are willing."

yes, blodreina replies to his first question. for as long as i can remember that's all i ever wanted to be. in my birth pack there were different ... blodreina struggles for the first time in a very long time to grasp to the common equivalent of a word and eventually settles on one, tiers for each trade. i became a gona when i earned the mercenary trade which was the first tier for mercenary. from there i desired to become my heda's cheka — the commander's bodyguard. i had to have my guardian specialty and to bear the rank i had to beat her in combat. i was her cheka for a while — it seemed like a thousand lifetimes ago now. but it wasn't enough. i earned my tactician specialty and eventually became wanlida ...the bringer of death. there's a smirk of fondness upon the kru's lips, laced with bittersweet as it was.

blodreina offers him a slightly quizzical look as he admits that even though it is his pack that the way of life here is new to him too. she found it strange and unexpected, that they share that sort of kinship. there was a part of blodreina that yearns for the past ...but she knows she can't afford to look back, to want what she had turned her back to. she'd made her choice, unapologetically, and all she can do now is go forward. thank you. you and yours have been very generous. especially given the fact that they'd had every right to turn her ( and aure ) away. it does not go unappreciated. she feels the need to say. i'll adjust. she's confident when she tells him that, knowing that with time she'll find her niche here.

i'm gonna fade here and start us a MUCH more recent thread <3

the bringer of death? stigmata couldn't help but to feel a little impressed by the title, even if it was just that. pregnancy and the stress of relocation had done quite a number on her physical presence, but there was plenty evidence still of a perfectly sculpted warrior's physique, and he did not doubt her prowess in the least. "it would be in my best interest to keep you as an ally then," he mused aloud, smirking. she would be worth keeping, if he could manage it, but she would make for a devastating enemy if tides were to turn as they so often did.

he accepted it; planned for it; moved on to the next order of business.

to her gratitude, he merely nodded. only time would tell if she was truly appreciative of diaspora of not, even if he already felt fond of her story and talents, but he expressed no such cynicism out loud - for the sake of their budding relationship - and decided instead to share his own tactical mind with her. smiling faintly, the general offered to continue the patrol with her, so that he may introduce her to the bits of border that were harder to guard, and they continued as such well into the afternoon, until he had some business or another to abscond to.