Ankyra Sound Now it’s two long years of waiting around to die

He killed her. Raleska accused in a dark tone, confiding to her brother @Illidan with a resolutely hardened stare. It didn’t matter what Vercingetorix claimed — the fact was Raleska did not trust him. He was their enemy, he had always been their enemy.. her gut clenched as she thought of her mother somewhere alone in the woods, besieged by the dark specter who had just been waiting for the right moment to strike..

And they had stupidly given it to him. Raleska cursed and grieved for her decisions, wishing she had done more or disobeyed her mother and come along. She had failed to see the worst possible outcome, and now Rusalka was hurting for it. I’m going to go find her. Raleska announced through gritted teeth, her tail lashing in agitation.  In the meantime .. I think you’re .. She paused, unable to even say the unthinkable.. He needs to be placed under watch. We cannot trust him. I suggest @Svalinn and @Vengeance be told to watch him while I’m gone. Her throat constricted as she thought of her errand.. She fervently hoped her suspicions were not true, but it was unlike her mother to not return, and of all the wolves, Vercingetorix stood the most to gain from her mother’s demise.

she seemed so certain in her first statement that illidan almost believed her, but he forced himself to be grounded – to think rationally – in spite of the emotions that had bubbled up inside of him. he could not help but think of their father and how he had died out there without anyone beside him. the young ghost did not wish for this to happen to his mother. they all had their flaws. none of the wolves of rusalka were perfect, but he wanted them to succeed in spite of that.
 
a heavy sigh passed through his lips, sinking his shoulders. raleska had good intentions. she had grown very opinionated since illidan had first returned to his family. he was proud of her and all that she had accomplished. there were times when he wished that he could stand as strong as she did; to be so firm in his beliefs that nothing could shake him. as it was, he was much softer than she. this was not likely to change.
 
“it doesn’t make sense, raleska… why would he kill her and then race back to us with some story about how she killed a pup and went crazy? if i was going to enact revenge, i definitely wouldn’t trot back to the pack. i’d get the fuck out of there and never look back,” illidan remarked to her, his eyes searching her own. he wanted to believe that there was no way verx could have killed caiaphas. he also wanted to believe that there was no way their mother had devastated another child in her act of revenge.
 
he breathed heavily once more and shook his head. “she had plenty of reason to hate easthollow for what they did. she had plenty of reason to seek out a way to make them pay, but we won’t know what happened until we find her.” he knew that this was an absolute truth. his sister made mention that she wanted to keep eyes on vercingetorix for a while. illidan wasn’t sure if this was the best choice. he did not want to the dark male to feel as though he was unwelcome – not after he had been accepted into their ranks.
 
“no final decision will be made until we’ve uncovered the full truth of what’s happened,” he told her in a firm voice. “but, i do think that you should go out there and search for her. i’ll remain closer to home and try to talk more with our former dragedan friend. i’d like to know where his head is. i don’t want this to devolve into a risky situation. if it’s possible to make friends of our former enemies, then it is an outcome i would prefer.”

He did not believe her. Raleska’s features fell, and the flick of her gaze betrayed her distaste for Illidan’s attempts at rationalization. They looked at the world through two grossly different lens, which caused Raleska to struggle with how to articulate her stance. 

Don’t you see? She asked, shaking her head as Illidan attempted to place logic into their discussion. It’s not just mom he wants revenge on. It’s all of us. He is going to pick us off, one by one — and we were stupid enough to give him that chance. Her teeth were set on edge, her long ears pulled back. It was the perfect opportunity; kill her, pretend to come back as a friend, and put a rift between us all.  He is not anything but an enemy, he will always be an enemy. Raleska had seen Drageda rip Eurycrates in two; she had seen what they had done to Rosalyn, and she herself had been bloodied and dragged across the cliffs like a common dreg. She would never forget any of it — and she would never forget that Vercingetorix had played a hand in their suffering, too.  If you are smart, you will place him under watch. If you do not tell Svalinn or Vengeance, I will tell them myself. The girl had resolved to search for her mother the second Vercingetorix had returned without Caiaphas — but she had reined in her tongue, loathe to discuss any sensitive information in front of what was so clearly a Dragedan snake.

it was frustrating to come to terms with the fact that he was not nearly as hot-headed as his sister was, and certainly did not react with the same sharpness that his mother did. this meant that illidan was in a world on his own, most of the time. while he preferred to keep his mind rational and approach his problems using only logic, this was not the method that his sister was very fond of. it seemed that she was doing everything she could to convince him of her reasoning. challenging as it was, illidan would not allow for his emotions to overtake him. the more she tried to convince him, the more he was growing frustrated and overwhelmed.
 
“no, it’s a complicated plan that you have cooked up because you’re upset and worried about her,” illidan growled softly before turning to his sister with a cold expression. “if you’d stop with these angry battles, you might be able to see just how absolutely childish all of this sounds.” the words came out far angrier than he had anticipated they would. part of him envied her ability to sink into her feelings and hold fast to her opinions based around them. the other part of him was so bothered by this, that he was losing his grip on how carefully he could keep his cards to his chest.
 
raleska was quick to state that vercingetorix would only ever be an enemy to them. illidan spun toward her, bristling. “he will only be an enemy for as long as you treat him that way. your hostility will be the reason we see issues from him. you cannot push and prod at others and then expect them to pledge their loyalty to you, raleska,” the young ghost snarled to her. “you cannot make him into the man you think he is with your anger, no matter how much you would like that.” the painful truth was that as much as they all wanted verx to be a villain, he had not done anything wrong to them in the time that he’d been there.
 
the dark girl went on to say that if illidan was smart, he would put the former drageda wolf on watch, and that if he didn’t, she would do it. this seemed to be the last straw that he could hold upon his back. illidan froze in his tracks, looking to her with a weary rage that had sprung up from these last few words. “you would be so selfish that you would take away two of our best members from the borders in order to follow after a man you have no proof against? i will tell them that they are only to tend to our claim, and you will go and search for our mother before making any more demands.” the way his words were placed was done in a tone of finality. he would not have raleska jeopardize the entire pack – erzulie’s children – because she didn’t trust a single member. they had much larger worries on their plate.

Raleska endured Illidan's raking commentary, rueful at best and grievously wounded at worst. Any time she thought of some retort to fire back, its acidity withered on the tip of her tongue. This is what he wanted, the two of them to fight -- he being the enemy of course.

Illidan might try to hammer his point home, but Raleska was no nail to be pounded mutely into wood, never to poke its head out again. She trusted her gut, and she would not silence it -- Vercingetorix was an enemy to them, the same way she was an enemy to her prey. To trust him would be to place your trust in a snake.

Once Illidan was done a silence stretched out between them, long and as large as a looming leviathan. Raleska did not break it. Instead, she gave her brother a look -- an inscrutable one -- and then turned promptly on her tail.

She might love him, she might believe he believed he was right -- but Raleska would never sacrifice her own instinct to please another. Not even those of blood.