Dragoncrest Cliffs Close your eyes and sleep,

The past had been left behind to the waves. What was once an isle of a home, was now just another land beyond these wilds. Umbra, wished to call to no one, and now, to bow to none. She wanted to be a wolf of her own power, and if it came to, her own regime. Though the thought to rule was a lesser dream, for she had discovered her new home. 

Though if others tried to be near, she was ready to defend it so. Regardless, of the rules that may carry to this land.

The cliffs were high above the sea, but there was a eay down. A storm raged through, she could not discover without a possible loss. She only just moved, the seafang had no desire to lose a life now that she has arrived. The descent, she kept her eyes on it, but remained by the stormy rain, and a look down to the cliffs waters.

What a rage.

What a beauty.

it seems improbable that any jiāng would spend their time away from the water – even in a storm, the sea is the sea. even beneath the rising cliffs, seaspray glittering in the weak light, the water too far down to reach. he keeps his distance; the drop makes his head spin to look at.

he should at least know this coastline before he makes the effort to stray from it. if that affords him more time by the water –

it’s practical. he should be sure of the sea before anything else.

the shark moves along the ridge, quiet in the rain. his shoulder stings with every step; the water washes away the blood out into unbroken white. he should spend more time resting if he wants to heal; for now, keeping from more of these foreigners will have to be enough. he has no desire to repeat his encounter with owlglass’ permanent, infuriating smile.

he turns his head from the grey horizon. just ahead, silhouetted against the clouds, the outline of a figure, black as the stormy water below.

of course.

yunxu dutifully drags his well-worn bland, placid blankness onto his face, steps shifting back into a steady march despite his shoulder’s protestations. they are a good reminder to keep his teeth to himself.

Even through the rain, the smell of blood was unmistaken. She did not care for a bleeding wolf coming forth, but what she did care was the first intruder to the newly claimed cliff. She would welcome none, wanting to keep the land to herself with no one able to pass. A glare to her brow, and a light seeking through to find the source.

She approached a man, white and black, with hints of red from the nectar, "You are in my domain," she said motionlessly, but held a a dominance within her voice and stance. Tail high with a sharp look toward the yearling, giving a single warning. 

A single warning, before the storm would enrage.

the peak had been throughly coursed, and his explorations of the shared land brought him no spoor that suggested forming packs nearby.
@Wylla had spoken of the cliffs here; even during his time upon the expanse of pine-rock beach below, mahler had not been so high. he wandered toward the sea from his position upon the mountain, skirting a tangle of landscape that begged searching on another day.
with the ocean close enough to taste salt, mahler found the scent of wolfblood here as well, and padded across stone shelving in pursuit of his healer's interest.
a young man and a dark woman; she threatened the first, and mahler caught the end of her words. they rankled him. sagtannet had not moved halfway across the wilds to deal with more upstarts too close to them, and he bellowed the snarl of a challenge as he thundered closer to take her violence himself, ignoring the second male for the time being. "these lands vill belong to no one."

"They do now." Umbra snarled back, not taking too kindly to this. She only just recently had desired to claim as her new den, and no one else. Possessive, was the word. Her stake had been thrown into the land, and she wasn't too willingly to give up the luxurious cliffs.

He was a large dark man, with a lilac look. Wolves with dark hues, which she found immensly pleasing with her own; but as much as she could enjoy so, they were now counted as enemies. The kraken growled, she wasn't ready to give up her newly-found claim. Regardless of packs or not, if they stayed away, she would too.

"Leave." Umbra advised with her now narrowed look.

for all yunxu thinks of him – none of which he will say – owlglass had played at conversation, given name and greeting and smiled and smiled. he can admit to himself, privately, that the blood oozing from his shoulder is his own fault. he should not lose his temper so easily.

she does not try. yunxu has no sooner opened his mouth than she finds him; comes towards him with tail high, snapping and furious as a storm. he freezes, ears slicking back; reels back on tiptoe, keeps his face carefully neutral. biting his tongue until he has forced down the impulse that rises in the back of his mind, a silvery fin cutting the water.

he opens his mouth. he very purposefully does not think and the apology comes to his tongue automatically, but before he can give it a voice –

the snarl comes like a clap of thunder. for a moment, he is certain she is already charging. instinct wars between rising to meet it and ducking his head and running; eyes glassy and blank, his shoulder throbs with his rising heartbeat,

and something large and dark rises like a thundercloud from the corner of his eye.

yunxu’s legs take him backwards, ceding space to the storm-black wave rising between them. he has always been good at keeping to the background.

before he had come to found diaspora with the late stigmata, mahler had roved valley and taiga a lone man, free of constraints, feral. it was to this that he hearkened with a quick snap of his mentality, but this time the gargoyle had sagtannet to defend. the distance between the cliffs and the newly claimed mountain was similar to that betwixt sawtooth and the canyon of marauders.
the woman held her ground with another order, but mahler churlishly trampled the silent barrier and lunged for her, fangs unsheathed. ferocious this shadow may be, the shadowpriest was more willing to earn further wounds in service of his packland. and so he cut his muzzle toward her shoulder, gaze turned to lavender stone and tail whirling behind his hips to steady the balance.

"We could've been in peace," the kraken cackled, a smile to her lips, "you stay to your land, and I stay at mine," but by his pose, there would be no compromise. She bent low to the ground, bracing herself for his lunge of attack. To her shoulder he seized, and she made no attempts to escape his grasp, or even a motion to move away. 

The other was forgotten black and white wolf was forgotten.

Closer he was now, she snarled with a flurry of fangs. Clashing like swords, she aimed to grab at his neck, anywhere near. It was her motive for him to move closer, because the closer he was, the easier she could grasp for a gruesome move. Umbra had the thoughts to kill, but wary of what could be behind the stranger, she wanted to give a warning.

he expects her to yield.

she does not. and yunxu knows he should not stay, if he wants his search to continue without more wounds to nurse.

but his lost sisters may well be beneath the cliffs, somewhere beyond her on this rocky bluff. he is here for a purpose.

he will not be denied it.

the fin of his thoughts rises back over the water. his lips catch on his teeth, hackles rising into quills of squid ink and seafoam. he is caught stubbornly on the edge between watching and action, but there is the part of him –

she is not his parent or his respected elder. this land is claimed by no pack. the sea is yunxu’s as much as it is hers and there are places he has yet to search and with the other man bearing down, the careful part yields easy to the rest.

the sea is in his blood. the ocean is as unforgiving as its predators and the children it raises. they crash together

his teeth cut over her shoulder

the salt-and-iron of new blood rises in the air.

the young shark rises eyes glittering, the calm emptiness of his stare at odds with the growl built heavy in the back of his throat and growing and he comes around her side teeth bared, jaws open grasping for the salt-spiked line of her hind leg

fur and skin yielded beneath his teeth, giving way to a scarlet spray that tinted his lips and fired him more deeply. wretchedly she did not move; her muzzle swung upward toward the side of his neck. mahler snarled; she slashed him with her own blades, naked beneath her wrinkled lip.
in a moment all three of them bled; mahler was only dimly aware of the seasalt man and his retreat. refusing to step away from the interloper's bite, he bore the pain, twisting his jaws into her flesh, intending to lay the flat of her hard muscle open for the gulls and kestrels.
mahler set his broad paws against the earth, prepared to rip wider the rend along the curve of his neck, where the savage fool had grit through mouthfuls of graphite pelt and skin overlaid with scar tissue to the blood beneath. regroup — the thought was dashed to sand as the all-but-forgotten third swept closer, not for himself, but for the proclaimed queen of a wild cliffline that belonged to no one.
renewed, thrumming with the instinctual inclination of their kind, mahler began to tear himself loose, intending to circle, bloodstained, 'round to the woman's other side as the stranger bit toward her hindleg.

She felt enraged. Whas the gods not with her, even to this day? She felt rather confident in striving off the large, dark male of the inland. Even if she couldn't win as well as she so wished, it could still provide a warning that she was here. She growled, "what are you going to do, kill me?" she tried to mumble through the bunch of fur within her maw. A cackle, of sorts.

A chaotic laughter as another grappled onto her leg, and the other trying to free himself. It was a struggle, one attached to her shoulder, now trying to leave, and the other clinging to her leg. Umbra didn't relent on her grip to this throat, trying to close it harder and harder, as a last attempt before needing to flee. She tried despertly to make it work. Her legs tried to kick out. She hoped her grip was enough where he couldn't leave.

She felt all her attempts were futile, but the kraken tried to remain strong.

She wanted a home!

Her domain!

And she will get it!

his teeth come down on her leg and there is red welling up around his muzzle, metallic, salt-thick as seaspray and she is

laughing

like owlglass like the river

and he tries to bite harder, work his teeth tighter sawing back and forth, blood pooling over his tongue and his shoulder throbs when she kicks out, yanks him to the side and the blank intent behind his eyes cracks

he does not let go –

paws scrabbling in the mud and grass he steadies himself moves to bite down, to pull back wrench her away and towards the cliff, chest heaving, growl rising higher in his throat and still the roar of wind and waves is all he can hear

her jaws closed tighter and tighter still; mahler knew the laceration would demand the last of the herbs he had brought, and whatever else he might find on the slopes of the new mountain. such thoughts must be laid aside for later, however. the woman laughed, strangely enough; it chilled mahler, infuriated him.
his cimmerian-cloaked compatriot sought to drive their mutual enemy toward the cliff, attack intensifying. mahler fought the burgeoning agony in the tooth-clench of the wolfess' jaws and halted his pulling away. now he clicked painfully in his throat, swallowing down the gasp, a snarl winding through the tones of the other man.
rain and salt and stone; he aimed a shoulder toward the lower reaches of her throat, intending to strike her windpipe with as a harsh a blow as he could muster, held at half-length. if he could not be released, mahler would make her choice of refusal an agonizing one, ripping his own flesh through her teeth as he reared onto back-legs and came down across her shoulders with a heavy foreleg.

"Well fuck."

He spat the words out hoarsely, having been nearly stunned to see that two males were picking a fight with a lone female. He'd been minding his own business- so deeply lost in thought and miserable due to the rain that he hadn't been paying much attention to his surroundings. He felt intrigued by the scent of the ocean, and the height of the cliffs as they loomed over the raging waves below- but he hadn't expected to come upon a fight like this. 

Naturally, a more courageous wolf might've blundered straight into the fray in defense of the female simply because the fight was unfair, and because he believed women to be the fairer gender, and that they ought not be harmed. He had no idea why the fight had begun, so without any context whatsoever he leapt to the conclusion that it was an unfair ordeal- and that he should intervene in some way. Unfortunately, though, Jackalope wasn't really a man of action, and was reluctant to intervene in any way that might bring harm unto himself. Still...He couldn't just stand by while one male tried to drag her toward the cliffs, and the other posed a more immediate threat, snapping at her windpipe. 

"Are your dicks really that small that you have to fight two-on-one against a woman?" He shouted, and stepped forward, growling through bared sabres. He'd threaten, first- on the off chance they'd just take the hint and let her go.

Sunhawk heard all about the squabble on the cliff, snatching bits and pieces as he drew closer. Something about peace, and then lands not belonging to anyone. One of the voices was female. The other sounded like the wolf spoke through a mouthful of partying frogs.

Then something about small dicks. Sunhawk had never really pulled his out to compare it to others, but now his interest was really piqued. Not because of the potential to measure up against fellow men, but because if someone was hollering that ad hominem out into the wilds, chances are they were all having a really good time.

He arrived in time to see two versus one, and another wolf (no doubt the guy with the weenie-zinger) hanging tentatively back. Sunhawk sniffed the air, hoping they were fighting over food and he could make off with more than his fair share - but, it was obvious now they were fighting about... territorial rights?

Hm. There was so much land in this god damned world, and they picked this place to fight over? Sunhawk was colored extremely unimpressed. The cliffs were a very far cry from the illustriously blue shores to the south, and if he had to pick a place where boogeymen came from he would have picked here.

Standing besides the menacing Jackalope, Sunhawk gave him a grin before looking at the scuffle. "Well, don't that look like a good ol' time. Betting their teeth are a mite sharper than their weenies, though." Sunhawk took a step forward, happy to roll up his sleeves and get into a good old bar-room fight. Nothing got the blood pumping like a rowdy scuffle in a post-apocalyptic looking beach. Plus, there was a possibility he could score the lady later on. "Ready, pardner?"

With that, Sunny let out a ridiculous yodel and jumped into the fray. His teeth were sheathed, but he aimed a sharp shoulder at the nearest (Yunxu) who looked like he was about ready to chuck the poor lady right over yon and into Davy's locker.

Not on Sunny's watch. *

* Ok, a lot of things have been done on Sunny's watch. Totally irrelevant.

The bastard was trying to drag her to the edge. That was a simple death sentence, if Umbra went over, there was a small chance she would not have come back alive. She had no intention to entering davey jone's locker, and immedietly let her grip go to snarl a wrap around his mouth, to drag him away from her leg. However so many things happened at once, the seafang couldn't even process it, for the bigger, and rougher male immedietly hit her throat, causing her to gag.

At the same time, two entered the fray of madness. The kraken didn't know which side they were on, and was fully prepare to attack both of them as well. If she went, she would go out fighting for her domain. However they surprised her, and one attacked the boy on her leg. Umbra smiled devilishly, and went back to the focus of Mahler, who dared to attack her throat.

She was fully drowning down to grab at anything near his face, and preferred to strangle his throat again. Though with this tumble of madness, she wasn't sure what could be grabbed. Right now her body screeched in pain as her shoulder was on fire, and leg marked by teeth of the sea-salt man. She could only go out fighting.

im going to become Confused i think which may be reflected in yunxu’s already confusing fight posts so lmk…if you need clarification….

she comes stumbling after him stormcloud black as the sea she snarls and it rolls like thunder like crashing waves and blood like the seasalt beneath them a sunset plume in the water –

gone –

something comes screaming howling crying behind and it hits him, it comes beneath his shoulder and it hurts drags his teeth down through sea-storm flesh and skin he scrambles in the mud and rain and grass – no water no sand beneath him salt on the air where is it –

he turns

lets go

snarling through the blood on his teeth in the back of his throat sea-sky eyes blank he comes for the open throat in front of him jaws wide and hungry, furious animal instinct there is pain and this is what has caused it –

there is

blood

two.
mahler's gaze roved violently toward the strangers, only a brief moment spared to see the second barrel in, striking the man who had aided him. two; and the gargoyle filled with a horrible, sudden rage. initially he had only meant to drive her away, but with the addition of what appeared to be little more than a boy swinging into the she-wolf's corner, mahler surrendered his rein.
he had ignored the barb of the first, a figure that rivaled him in height; it was that one that the gargoyle expected to come for him now. the woman cried out. having released mahler to snap at the shadow shimmering in two tones, the eisen kept the wound she had rent away from her teeth. dark jaws flailed for him; she cut his lip, his brow, the base of his ear; fangs hooked there and tore anew.
this time, however, mahler wished to kill her, and slammed the full force of his massive figure harshly against her wounded shoulder, fangs slashing in another bid for her throat, the proud curve of her neck, her nape, advancing all the while with shoves of his wide paws against the wet ground. whatever he seized would be gathered full into the spread of his teeth, heavy crown jerking to and fro with crushing intent.
his blood dripped freely, mingling with rainwater and that of the vehement shadow he meant to snuff from existence, braced with flared hackles for further opposition from the first wolf who had arrived upon the scene of their righteous struggle.

Jackalope's shaggy hackles raised when another wolf spoke out, one with a twang that made his dark lips twist in somewhat of an inscrutible grimace, as though he was about to call the other out on account of making the lamest joke he'd ever heard. But he clamped his mouth shut, keeping the strange man in his peripheral vision. From what he could tell, his shout had had little to no effect on the two males...So he supposed he would have to step in, now. Fortunately, his 'pardner' was full of piss and vinegar- and let out an ear-piercing ullulation that caused Jackalope to curse loudly under his breath- a string of words I wouldn't dare even type out- and watch as he valiantly led a charge toward the trio of fighting wolves. 

"Oh yeah. Go for the smaller one." He grumbled to himself as Sunhawk chose the piebald yearling as his target. He heaved a reluctant sigh as he eyed the slate coloured male up, noting the thick shoulder that was turned in his direction- whether it was a warning that he shouldn't even bother, or simply a means of protecting himself from an attack that he assumed was going to happen. Jackalope might've been near the same height as the ashen male, but he was nowhere near the same weight. He didn't rush in the way Sunhawk had, though he realized that every moment he spent considering whether or not it was really worth joining the fight, the female suffered more and more pain. 

He didn't have much choice in the matter. The ashen male was posing much more of a threat than the other- in Jackalopes inexperinced opinion- so with a soft hiss of curses, he lowered his head, crouched, and threw himself into a lope, accelerating only at the last moment to avoid simply running off the edge of the cliff if Mahler suddenly stepped back. With snapping jaws, he aimed for the male's rear end- hoping to catch hold of the male near his sensitive flank, so that in the very least he might relinquish his assult on the dark female and turn to face his new foe.

War yodeling Sunhawk barreled for his opponent, missing the gem that was Jackalope's sarcastic comment as he left. "EUAAAALLIAAAA," Came the galloping Sunhawk, just in time to connect with Yunxu and be bounced off of the yearling's backside like a ping pong ball.

"COME AT ME, YA CRUSTY GOATLICKER!" Sunhawk bellowed in cheerful taunts he didn't 100% feel, ready for recompense in any moment. Recompense reared its head in the form of Yunxu coming at him with teeth (whoa - teeth? Hey, wait, why are we showing up to a fist-fight with nuclear weapons?!).

Sunhawk's grin fell and he stepped backwards. "Hey, now watch the hair --" He joked, taking another step back as the beast kept advancing. He really, really wished Chief @Revui was here, because this guy looked like he was out for blood. Sunhawk attempted to dodge the wolf's advancement, but teeth stole across his neck in a fresh rash of blood.

Staggering back, Sunhawk didn't realize how close he was to the edge. In a split second he was able to see it all: furious harpy woman, irascible stone-golem man, the pied yearling who nearly snatched his god-damned throat, the fang-poking and gangly grey male..

All of them swam in his vision for that split second before the earth totally opened out from under Sunhawk, and he disappeared right over the cliffside.

Their fight seemed to have split, now that the seafang can focus wholly onto the stone-cold man. He seemed angered by what was transpiring, the sudden backup she did not expect to get. It became a three versus two. Two were focused on Mahler, and with one trying to grapple behind, he was grabbing at her. The kraken could feel her skin rip, as he tried to crunch. Pulling away wasn't ideal, for now a chunk was now missing from her shoulder. Blantant teeth marks, and a growl hissing from her throat. 

But then she saw him. The sea-salt man cornering the hawk, and only a step too far became his downfall. Umbra gritted her teeth, a glare to the ferocious man, but broke away from him. She hoped with the other at his end it would became a distraction. Her shoulder, her leg, her body was on fire.

And the kraken leaped.

Right after Sunhawk.

He who helped her, shall have help in return.

if mahler/jackalope fight continues after this feel free to skip me until it's done :)

blood

it sprays across his muzzle under the cut of his teeth and he comes forward, steady, flat unblinking gleam of his eyes and tastes it spreading over the water –

a crippled seabird no teeth to bite no wings to fly but it panics, it staggers away and the earth crumbles out from beneath it and it

falls

the young shark’s teeth come down on empty air he wheels backwards, blood running from his chin

and the squid-ink kraken comes after a blur of furious black shoulder and leg streaming red swallowed by the wind

gone.

he turns, lists to the side, shoulder throbbing adrenaline bleeding out of him but there are still snapping jaws ahead and there is still blood in his nose, still painted over his fur and,

there is something he needs

there is something –

his jaws snap together. his sides heave. a tiny seasalt thing smoothed by the rain, stained red, he takes a wobbly step,

and his shoulder gives way under him and sends him sprawling to the ground.

things spun into chaos. mahler felt himself at last weakening from the trickled scarlet wasting his wound, mixing with the mud, falling in thick drops. but still he held, eyes cold even beneath the flicker of her fangs and the agony tightening his musculature.
anguish exploding in tight spangled whorls behind his skull as teeth cut into his flank; he knew it immediately to be the second, the hunched skinny catlike creature. but mahler could not spare even a snap for the crucial moment, holding the she-wolf's flesh clutched between jaws smeared in his own blood.
alongside him, the loud boy retreating. in the next moment, the shock of open air emptying where the shouting wolf had been. mahler; the woman ripping from his jaws to follow over the cliffline. she leapt, a blood-sullied arc of darkness in the rain, against the lash of the sea.
heartbeat thudding, threatening to slow, to weaken mahler as he returned to normalcy. but he could not yet divest himself, and with the last of his strength whirled toward his scored flank, weighted jaws clacking with the intention to crush the bridge of the attacker's nose.
mahler did not see his companion collapse.

He felt the weight of the male's body being pulled away from him, as he lifted his head in observation, causing Jackalope's efforts, too, to be paused for a breath. For all the tenacity and enthusiasm the golden-shouldered male had had, it'd done him no good. Jackalope only caught sight of his surprised expression, maw agape, as he disappeared over the edge of the world- followed closely by the dark female he'd come to defend. "What the actual f-" Jackalope protested- but the moment of distraction had been enough to allow the lavender-eyed beast to turn on him and snap at the jaw which Jackalope had left hanging open. 

He felt something crunch as Mahler's jaws snapped shut on his upper jaw, causing him to scream in agony and reel back as soon as Mahler opened his mouth to snap again. "Ahhh! Stop, stop!" He said, stepped backwards with frantic, scrambled movements, side-stepping in a ticket to put some space between the two of them. His tongue lolled out the side of his mouth, as he bared his bloody teeth in a grimace. He spat out a mouthful of blood that poured from puncture wounds in the roof of his mouth, running through his nasal cavity and out his nostrils. When he sneezed, it caused him to shreik and spray blood droplets in every direction. "Ain't gonna fight ya- I'm done, I'm done," He said, the blood and spittle foaming at the corners of his mouth as he continued to backtrack, tail tucked and head lowered. His jaw hung open still, and he simply prayed that now that whatever feud he'd had with the female was over, he'd simply let Jackalope peace out, and take off.

mahler was brutally satisfied by the breaking sound that emerged from beneath his jaws. against the spurt of red, whining, screaming. he watched as the man backed away, begging a retreat with a new submission to his bearing. "leave," mahler spat, blood leaking between his teeth, over the side of his cut lip.
lavender eyes cut then toward the man who had aided him, and for the first time mahler saw truly how rawboned and young the shadow was, a boy about the age of stag. "scheiße," he muttered, steps unsteady as he closed the small distance to stand nearer the fellow.
assuming his former assailant had turned and run off, the shadowpriest winced, groaning. a great wound, one that demanded healing, but moreover he worried for the stranger. "can you hear me?"