Northstar Vale ein leerer raum

he did not know what drew him on.
guilt.
desire.
the horrid crush of some otherwordly sentiment in regards to the elf-queen and her fey court.
sternly he climbed the fineblown slopes and traveled, mountain-goat and grim, to where courtfall lay a verdant gem amid the snows.
and there mahler stopped, there his sides rove for breath but he bellowed all the same into the still-standing air, demanding, commanding, a king terrible as the one she had made consort here.

bellowing call rises; summoning andraste? or himself. or anyone. it forces melkor, rallying those that would follow him in the aftermath of the fey queen's untimely death to give pause. he doesn't know where they will go only that they must. courtfall wasn't courtfall without her and he cannot bear to stay in the stonebed where she's died in his arms. that was always melkor's way. though he returns to gravesites of those loved and lost he never lingers. the warlord of the tundra sends those beneath his now lone rule onward, to the east and the grassy no-man's land between the vale and mount apikuni where he instructs them to wait for him; knowing that he will catch up with them as soon as he tended to the summons upon the borders.

to the borders is where melkor makes his path, the other male coming into the sight of his glacial gaze. there is no recognizition to be had and melkor is as weary as he is when approaching any other stranger. ❝hail stranger,❞ the tundrian greets. ❝what brings you?❞ to these ghost borders, as far as melkor was presently concerned. too tired and distracted by the going-on's to even realize that the call had been more of a command than a pleasant summons.

a huge man, andraste's scent tied tightly into his withers, his stance, his very countenance. so. was this with whom mahler had been so swiftly replaced? nares flared, but there was something here, something amiss.
"your queen, is she present?" he asked. no words for why he had been so compelled to seek out the woman, but she had left so soon after their meet, abruptly.
damn the last needled bit of care in his soul for the succubus. not love she had drawn from him, but energies, dizzied pleasures — mahler cut away his thoughts and waited.

the other male at his borders — once were borders! — gives no name and an ambiguous response ( if it could be considered that ) to melkor's inquiry. he asks after andraste and rusted knife twists sickeningly where it remains lodged in his beating heart. melkor supposes, though, until they move, until they become something else this is a question he must face. where is the fey queen? resting where she will rest forever more: in the bowels of the earth where she will only nurture flora.

melkor, grief hitching in his throat as he tries to answer, takes a few extra moments. he is grieving widow but he is also the warlord. he has duty and responsibility to others before himself. ❝she has passed on. in her sleep.❞ to wake beside a corpse; cold and stiff in rigor mortis was not how melkor had wished to ever wake up. they were no easier to get out than it was to force his feet to carry him to relmyna's grave. his not-yet healed wedmark stings upon his ribcage as if expressing sorrow itself. ❝i'm sorry.❞ follows after a few moments, unsure how close this stranger had been with his fey wife.

dead.
mahler grew tense, silent; he stared upon the man who had loved her after, and saw in the mournful eyes an aggrieved but true affection. and so andraste at the end of her days had finally found a man who might return the sick-sweet curlings of her tongue, her lusts, her cloying needs.
clutched with an unexpected ache, mahler swallowed, dipped his head to melkor.
"i knew her as ... beneath another name."
andraste, at the last he had loved.
"i am sorry also." tied tongue; he knew not what else he might say.

❝aurëwen,❞ melkor speaks it softly. ❝i knew her then, too.❞ her knew both sides of the fey queen and loved her despite the faults — and really, who was he to judge when he had his own faults that damned him? it wasn't like he had been the most loyal, the best father; when in fact another man had raised his own daughter entirely. though quellcrist might call herself a mayfair and though melkor thinks it's only right that she does she is a fearghal-ansbjørn thru and thru.

❝thank you.❞ melkor offers softly, graciously.

and then deigning not to linger upon his own grief, steels his shoulders. ❝we aren't staying here.❞ melkor announces. i cannot sleep here knowing it is here, in my arms that she died. ❝courtfall isn't courtfall without her. i'm not sure where we'll go or what we'll become but —❞ he trails off here. ❝we'll forge a new path.❞ hard as melkor expects it to be.

mahler did not know this man, nor the depth of what he had shared with andraste. but her passing struck deeprooted tangles within them both. silent for a moment in which he offered a semblance of masculine camaraderie, the gargoyle straightened. "you seem capable. courtfall vill thrive vith you."
"i am mahler, general in diaspora. your ally," and here a humorless little smile came. perhaps it was not to be so, now.

melkor understands that mahler means his words to be encouraging but cannot help but blanch at them all the same. the truth was he didn't want courtfall to thrive beneath his rule; a pack that was solely andraste's creation. a culture and a ranking system that he truly knew nothing about. he wants to build something new with those that would follow him. though perhaps some might call him cold-hearted ( and in many ways he is ) he would rather everything be buried with his deceased wife. it was how he chooses to honor the dead. he would rather that than butcher something she worked so tirelessly for. that would be the true disservice to her memory, as far as the tundrian was concerned.

❝thank you,❞ melkor says nevertheless. ❝she called me melkor though i went by wintersbane for a long time before that.❞ melkor was fine, for now though the tundrian suspects he will not go by it for too much longer now. ❝once we are settled i will send a scout to let you know. i see no reason why our alliance should not continue.❞ melkor tells mahler with a small smile that does not touch his eyes; borne more of professional friendliness than it is mirth.

right now, however, the world is bleak and melkor grieves. mirth is hard to find.

it was time for the general to take his leave.
he gave melkor a tight bow as befitting two equals, though deferent enough to show he understood the other's authority here. "until ve meet again," mahler intoned. a moment passed; he saw no reason to tear at melkor's heart with another apology.
the other would suffer enough in the days to come, and while he had wanted to ask after her again, mahler did not.
let them turn away and be alone this hour.
if melkor had nothing else to say, the general would turn, and begin to pad back down the slopes in the direction of diaspora.