Moonspear blood of the dragon

I HAVE HAD WINE. AND. HAVE THIS. pack meeting thread! will tag y'all in the morning. vague! @Nikai @Alya @Lyra @Arcturus @Dirge @Vela @Yama [JARILO IS ALREAYD HERE SO NO TAG <3 ]

 

Several days had passed since the passing of... 

Still she could not bear to think it. 

But know it she did. And it was with that knowledge in mind that she had spoken with her brother, her sisters, her mate. She would need them all in the days to come... and they would know the proper order of things when she retired to the whelping den, as she must. Hydra knew that day was coming, and it was for this that she summoned her family to her in the evening—each and every one of them.

He answered his sister's call quietly, and alone, surfacing from the thickest stretch of woods he could meld with.

Jarilo's rebound was very slow after it all, and what immediately followed, but he could cobble it together well enough for the purposes that needed him now. Every day moved forward, each after the next.. and where his parents could no longer stand proud, it was going to have to be up to them, grieving or not. And, Hydra's puppies were close. He could only afford to suffer so openly for so long.. though he had never known a loss like that one, and hoped he never would again--for what else could rival the two wolves he idolized the most? He would rather not find out.

So he arrived, and threaded his way straight to Hydra for a fond, reverent greeting, then he slid off to await the others once he was done. This Ostrega wasn't feeling very sociable lately; it showed, but he was getting through it.

Only when Nikai showed up did he realise how far Alya's sister must be along. He showed up alongside @Alya, his mood quiet and demure; he had no place in all of this grief, it wasn't his. If anything, he was a little relieved, but he would never tell anyone of this. Nikai took little space for he felt it was not his place, and instead offered a quiet solace for his mate, should she need it.

Upon their arrival, Nikai waited for whatever news Hydra might share with them.

As much as her grief weighed on her, Alya was aware that she had taken Nikai from his family to a place full of unknowns, where he would surely be at a disadvantage with his missing leg. It was looking as though they might be staying for longer than she'd thought, and the guilt of that -- coupled with her guilt for having been gone from the mountain so long, only to come back and witness this -- was almost overwhelming.

She leaned into her mate, taking comfort in his strong, steady presence. Not the same sort of strength that she and her sisters possessed, but a strength of character that she was coming to admire more and more. Alya felt that she, more than any of her siblings, had the tools to wade through her grief to the other side. How could she not, with such a wolf beside her?

The dark woman flashed a grateful glance in his direction, but her attention was soon returned to her sister. Her queen.

He did not stray far from her these days. Not with all that had transpired. Not with all that would come to transpire. A strange sort of silence had fallen over the mountain, a palpable grief to linger and lurk at every bend and shadow. The world around him had been a very mute thing for the last several days, but the tension that had electrified the air now laid absent.

For that he was thankful, even if it's absence was solely because of a tragedy.

When Hydra's call rose, he found that he was not quite as ready for it as he had anticipated. Aware of the changes to come, eager for them even, he had to steel his resolve. Indifference had worn itself onto his expression by the time he had come the gathering group; he gave them passing glances as he gently made his way to Hydra. He offered her a soft touch of affection before finding somewhere to settle close by. Once the others arrived, the show would begin.

The howl fell on deaf ears, the sound registering as little more than just that: a sound. She couldn’t comprehend what it meant, not consciously, but it was enough to kick autopilot into gear. Without even realising what she was doing or where she was going, Yama’s legs carried her towards the gathering of wolves. But, when she arrived, even the sight of them all gathered there wasn’t enough to restart anything; she was absent in all senses of the word aside from physically.

And although she stared in Hydra’s direction, she did not truly see—not her, not her family members, not anyone. Yama was simply not there, not how she’d been before.

Vela had been quite numb even though she was glad to be with her family. When Hydra howled it was automatic for her to respond. The whole atmosphere was wrong. Not as it was before. Vela trotted up to the group and glanced at each of their faces. She frowned at seeing Alya with a male with three legs. Not sure what she was seeing in this male. Still, she had the same with Hydra and Dirge.

Vela's face was stoic. She had shown more than enough emotion lately and most of these wolves she didn't really know. Hence why Vela moved to stand by her brother Jarilo. She could tell that he was heavily affected and was one of the few she was willing to give her support.

arcturus, much like most of the souls on the mountain, was grieving. without his mother to ground his frayed emotions and his father to chastise him for displaying them, arcturus had regressed; much like yama, he now moved without expression, and seemed that the lights were on, but nobody was there. 

he sat alongside his staring sister, here in body — but his mind was elsewhere, sorrowed by his family’s ruin.

When everyone arrived, Hydra looked them over. Each looked understandably worse for wear, and her eyes were not as hard as they often were as she reviewed them. Her gaze lingered upon Alya, and soon @Lyra was among them, mute and watchful in the backdrop. Hydra's eyes moved to her, and then, passed over the rest of their family. The life within her shifted, and she was reminded why she called them to her. 

Having already spoken with Arcturus and Dirge both on the matter, the last thing for her to do was announce it. With a breath, she began: Though our mourning has yet to end, time still goes on. So too shall we. My children are coming fast due, and I need all of you, now more than ever, to protect what is to come and what shall soon be. In my absence, while I whelp, my mate shall rule alongside me; Arcturus will be my second. Things will be different, now. While my cubs are young, we will not have visitors within the territory; any who are within the boundaries of our territory will be pack, and pack alone. Hydra did not suspect this to be challenged; they (her siblings, young and old alike) all knew how protective she had been over them. Her ferocity extended to those that would soon make their way into this world. She waited, watching the features of her family for any sign of discontent.

With tired eyes, he tracked the arrivals of the others. Vela's warranted a cant to his head when she came closest to him, but ultimately, he decided he very much welcomed his littermate's company--despite the distances that had spanned between them lately. For half a second there, it almost seemed like before to him; maybe like before she had gone even, before the family had splintered worse. He blinked this away when Hydra spoke, and he was all ears.

He didn't find it in himself to disagree. In fact it was all in line with what he had expected and roughly operated with anyway, now without their parents. He had come to respect Dirge enough and naturally fell in line behind the more experienced male, plus Arcturus had the moxie, with a bit more stability than Revui--so that was an inevitable position being filled by someone they could hopefully trust to fit into some respect nicely. Jarilo said nothing, only nodding softly mostly to himself.

The oldest son didn't have the energy right now to consider his precise place in the grand scheme yet, too distracted by what hurt him still and still adjusting to the shift of Hydra as their peak, with Dirge beside her. There was a lot that needed to situate and settle around him before he could know for sure what he should do. He did wonder what she meant by things being different now, if it only referenced the obvious that he could discern, or if there was more--which certainly wouldn't surprise him, considering lately. He would have to wait and see.

But, he trusted her, and not only because his parents had groomed her for this. He wasn't blind to their treatment of her, how she had handled it, grew with it especially in his more recent moons.. and especially since he liked to consider himself close enough to their mother to understand--he was never near in the same way that Hydra was for them though. Jarilo could only imagine what else had come before him, too.. but it had always been pretty obvious to him growing up that somehow, this was simply inevitable.

Now more than ever and after he saw what they had done to each other, he had to trust them, and her, Hydra, with all the support he had. This was what they had wanted so that was what he would protect.

He knew what he had to do in the meantime; it was going to have to be a lot like last year, just more vigilant, more keen, and with less room for error now with puppies back on the mountain. At the very root of it all, they were suddenly down two experienced wolves this summer and with a lot to defend here soon. Not only were they in charge of strengthening Moonspear's numbers, strength, and reach simultaneously, but they were left to guard the Spear now too.

Nikai smiled lightly as Alya leaned into him. Then as Hydra took the word, he fell silent and just looked at her and listened. Hydra took control of the pack in the wake of the death of her parents, which seemed a smart move. Nikai was glad someone stepped forward, because he certainly didn't want to and didn't think he'd be strong enough for it either.

Hydra immediately lay down the rules and that was good. Nikai, too, was struggling to find his own place in all of this, but at the same time he was glad at least that someone took control. It would be very different from Easthollow, but in this state of emergency, perhaps that wasn't for the worst.

It would have been a lie if he hadn't anticipated something akin to clamor to arise at Hydra's decree regarding him. If it were to, it had yet to, but his gaze swept crisply over the gathered lot. He knew which would not stir to this information, knew with whom he had curried some favor, but there would always been some dissenting party in their midst.

Alya, he thought, his gaze crossing her and Nikai to look beyond them to where out focus avians stirred. She had never favored him much to chagrin and amusement alike. Nikai seemed more levelheaded in that regard, perhaps he'd rein her in. He couldn't peg Yama's reaction, not yet, and decided to not think on it. He barely knew her, thought her a reclusive wraith among her kin. The others he had some sort of accord with.

Inevitably, he brought his attention back to Hydra, and his gaze lingered over the swell of her flanks. For their sake, he hoped not to deal with the unyielding; it was an unnecessary strain, and they'd had enough of that lately. But the notion lingered at the back of his mind. He'd keep his nose clean.

just realized alya was ppc, my bad.

throwing in a reply to keep this moving; hop in whenever! i'd just like to get some of our older threads concluded <3

hoping for some sort of reprieve in this gathering, arcturus found none. around him somber faces assembled, each with eyes tinged in grief. he found he could not look any one of his family members in the eye -- otherwise, that roaring swell of anguish came back.

so he focused instead on hydra's words; they way they filtered off into the cold mountain air. he listened for signs of dissent, murmurs of distaste -- listened for any shift in weight or rustle of fur -- anything that might distract him now from what -- and who -- was gone.

Just wrapping this up :)

With no dissent seen or otherwise, Hydra nodded, satisfied at least by this. The meeting had been brief, and to the point—necessary, at present, for minds engrossed in woe. Her decrees uncontested, Hydra looks to her family and dismisses them with a nod before moving away herself to continue to prepare her whelping den.