Nova Peak schädigen
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Ooc — ebony
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Private 
future dated & vague smh

mahler had only called to @Wylla in regard to his departure after nyx and the girls had been taken from their borders. he had offered no more than that, and now with evening light pooling upon the horizon, he limped back in silence across the foothills and did not seek her out.
he expected her ire, her demand for answers. but he had none to give. the long trek had strained the barely-healed wound in his flank, and now only time would tell if the injury became a permanent impediment to his gait.
the fire of tears scoured his face; mahler forced back the hoarseness of a sob and lay down slowly before the mouth of the cave in which he had recovered before.
thade had returned, but he had lost ciri and elke to a new sort of future, one engendered by his own personal failure.
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Ooc — Chelsie
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She'd thought long and hard, and decided that she hadn't done a single thing wrong to deserve Mahler's ire. Having thus concluded that his clipped howl before he left was unrelated to her, she'd gone about her duties guilt-free, tending the borders, filling the caches whenever she caught anything worth saving, and spending as much time as she could spare with her children. Both were more free-ranging now than they had been, however, and weren't always around, which left her a lot of free time to explore.

Something always brought her back down to the woods and the cavern where both leaders had nursed their wounds from the cliff. Today, she was surprised to find Mahler there. No ire, no supposition about his departure as she padded through the trees. She had no idea where or why he'd gone, and as long as it didn't concern her, she didn't much care. Had he left Sagtannet in a time of strife, then maybe, but even with one eye she was plenty capable of holding down the fort and supplying the pack in his absence. Only a question posed unassumingly from between two proud pines: fun trip?

Stupidly, she still had yet to realize Nyx and her daughters were gone.
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Ooc — ebony
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the salt had dried by the time that wylla found him. the cheeriness of her voice jarred mahler from his grim dissociations, and he pulled his lavender gaze to look upon her pretty sharpwit face. the edge of his jawline twitched in response; the gargoyle pushed himself upright and blinked.
how could she not know?
but the ever-present machinations of logic began: given their historic distance, wylla might not have noticed the departure of nyx and her daughters,
their daughters —
his vision blurred suddenly; mahler lifted his chin, cleared his throat. "nyx has left sagtannet. gone vith elke and ciri to live at moonspear." a credit to him that his voice remained steady; a spark of pride that he was able to keep from looking at her. words hung like carcasses in a lean-to, freezing in the wintertide of mahler's tone. 
he knew if he saw but a hint of anything resembling pleasure in wylla's gaze at this moment, he might very well depart sagtannet himself, unable to be bound furthermore by bitterness to their new claim.
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Ooc — Chelsie
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But Wylla felt not only the flood of pleasure to hear that Nyx was gone. She felt relief; it lifted like a heavy blanket from her shoulders, spreading warmth through her core and down to her toes. The Ostrega's shadow had ever touched the corners of her mind, making her uncomfortable in her own home—a home she oft felt she'd done significantly more for than her golden counterpart, though it was impossible to say what Nyx had contributed prior to Wylla's arrival.

If it was up to her, this would have happened ages ago. Because Nyx had birthed cubs in her pack, under her rule, without seeking her permission as leading female. Mahler's inexplicable fondness for the woman had been her only saving grace, the cause for her avoidance, and the very same had ever haunted Wylla with the fear that she and hers would always have to contend with—and come second to—Nyx Ostrega. Her imagination was quick to run wild, as it always had, and she always felt justified in believing that Mahler secretly loved Nyx and her pups better than he loved her and Phaedra. And Thade, she mentally reminded herself. Mahler had said otherwise time and time again, but she could not trust him in this.

That fear had pressed her down like a thumb and made her future unpleasant to consider, and now it lifted and made her feel lighter. Empathy wasn't her strong suit, so she didn't care for Mahler's heavy sorrow in the wake of it. Would he have moped if she left with Phaedra or would he have felt relief that there was no longer a secondary obligation? Not that she would have ever done that. Phaedra needed her father, whether or not he truly needed her back. But Wylla had always felt that since the birth of Ciri and Elke, he saw their daughter and her upset as more of a burden than a choice he had made outside of a contract, and found his joy only in the former.

(Wylla imagined a great many things and drew many conclusions, and every one of them was spiteful and biased and largely untrue).

Good, she said firmly. I always knew she was good for nothing. It's high time you saw it, too. Bet she planned this all along. It would explain why her scent was never strong on the borders and why her presence at Nova Peak felt so scarce. Still Wylla remained oblivious to the part she'd supposedly played—she had, after all, done her utmost to avoid them rather than harass them.
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Ooc — ebony
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even when he expected nothing from wylla, she found new ways to steal his breath with her cruelty, the ignorance of his pain. or perhaps it was not ignorance after all; perhaps there was some semblance of vengeance beneath her wicked little tongue.
whatever the barb she meant to work beneath his skin, the she-wolf found her mark. disdaining the lioness before him, accusing her of things she had not done. mahler's jaw tightened visibly along its heavy line; a swallow bobbed his throat, and he forced down the lips lifting to show the yellowed rounding of his teeth, the warning growl that threatened to cascade.
"this is vhat vill happen, vylla," mahler spoke almost in an overlap of her last words, lavender eyes translucent with the nothingness warring behind his eye-sockets. "i vill leave at regular intervals to visit my daughters in moonspear, and you vill never mention nyx to me again."
not if she wished to keep him, claim whatever victory came to her small hard paws by way of nyx' departure. and mahler too tired and choked with lasting bitterness to argue further, to allow the wagging of her lips more nonsense. it was him who had done this to wylla, he knew, however; it was he who had driven nyx away, and with her —
with her
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Ooc — Chelsie
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She expected some kind of outburst, some solid proof that his relationship with Nyx meant more to him than she did, but instead he thought to command her. By the time Mahler finished speaking, Wylla's eye had grown cold and she had drawn herself to her full diminutive height. She'd put up with a lot of his shit as his co-leader, comforted their daughter when she felt abandoned, searched for their son when he went missing, tolerated the presence of Mahler's paramour and bastards in her home despite the inherent challenge it presented to her, guarded and fed him when he was injured.

But this was a step too far.

I will do whatsoever I please, she retorted in a voice comprised of chipped ice. You will not presume to command me. Not anymore. I held my tongue except when it came to your treatment of Phaedra and myself, but you will not silence me in favour of those who abandon this pack. And if you don't like that, then go to Moonspear and stay there. Clearly that was what he wanted, for even now he would prioritize his contract over his pack, and she was disgusted by it. Disgusted by him.

Most of all, disgusted that he still accepted no fault in any of this, for if not for his actions and his inability to move past his pride and his oath, she might not have had reason to despise Nyx or dismiss her offspring at all.
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Ooc — ebony
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mahler scoffed when she had finished, alabaster tendriling from his nostrils. "you have never held your tongue a single moment, vylla." hurtful now, but she had put her sandpaper palms under his skin and turned it over. "it vas you who drove them out, do you not understand?" weighted tread; he was standing over her now, granite hackles flared and rippled to the base of his tail, which lashed frenetically at his haunches.
"she left because she knew you did not tolerate them. you vould not even allow me to tell phaedra they vere her sisters. you kept them upon the outside of the pack, vylla. and i vill not forget it." in the end, it had been elke and ciri who had suffered the greatest, and would continue to suffer.
"you bend my ear vith your hatred of them, but they exist. i am not favouring outlaws over sagtannet, vylla; i am committing myself to children i brought into this vorld." surely they deserved that; surely she would understand that. but he could not make her see this contract with nyx was expired, and it was to their cubs he was bound. no matter if the lioness took another mate, elke and ciri belonged to him, and mahler was the only father they had known. 
he had neglected them all, and so as always the gargoyle stood holding his rightful anger and that of wylla above his own, righteous and justified as the sun was sure to fade before darkness. 
but this time mahler could not simply swallow that bitter pill, for wylla had not even the decency to allow him a sparse peace after losing his children to moonspear. "is that vhat you vant?" came the roughened creak from his barrel chest, a hinge pried piece by piece off the old rotted wood where it had settled.
stonelilac searched sunflower, phaedra's eyes fletched shards of their intermission. "tell me that it is vhat you vish. tell me you vant sagtannet for yourself. i shall give it to you, vylla." agony haunting the shores of his faces. "do not make me choose. i vould rather be a vagabond between here and moonspear than choose between any of my children."
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Ooc — Chelsie
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Regarding her? I kept my peace, snapped Wylla, or I'd have loudly made it known what a slight to my authority in Grimnismal it was that she fucked my brother without my permission and how uncomfortable she makes me as a result. That insubordination still rankled even now. Maybe Nyx had made a mistake, but if so, she seemed to hold no remorse whatsoever for it. At least that was what Wylla had to assume, because, The least she could have done was apologize for that, but not once did she seek to make amends for her disrespect. Not once. She just did the exact same thing here and still never approached me. Wrinkling her muzzle, she growled, but I kept my mouth shut on all that because your agreement with her was important to you.

But wait! There's more! Wylla expected to stand here and listen while Mahler defended Nyx until the earth stopped turning and their lives ended, because she was so completely convinced that he was in love with Nyx and not her and was even now manipulating her emotions, but even she hadn't expected to be blamed. She visibly gawked at the accusation, which helped to keep her from being cowed when he loomed over her. Excuse me? she said lowly.

I did nothing to them, she snarled. She shouldn't have been surprised. She'd built Nyx up to be this covetous villain in her mind, of the scheming and undermining variety, so much that she couldn't believe she hadn't suspected that Nyx would spread complete lies about her. I never so much as set foot near them or flashed a fang at them. Not welcoming them with open arms and not being involved with them is far from not tolerating them. She has no clue how I feel because I've never seen or spoken with her. She'd kind of given Ciri that look that one time, but she'd forgotten all about it because it was so insignificant in her eyes, and Mahler himself would've seen that his daughter was perfectly unharmed when she visited him. Besides that? They simply hadn't existed to her except when Mahler's split attention caused harm to her babies. Calling them her sisters would have hurt Phaedra more. It would have made her feel replaced. If you think it's selfish that I would not let you do that to her, that's fine.

But don't you dare accuse me of keeping them on the edge of the pack, Wylla seethed, bristling before him, practically rippling with violent energy. I am one wolf and I never forced anyone away from them. Ensuring their introduction and integration was not my job, I had my own cubs to rear, and there is a whole pack here who might have pitched in besides me if they'd only known them. That's all on her. She played you for an idiot. There was at least a small chance that Ciri and Elke could've endeared themselves to Wylla if their presence in the pack was stronger or if Nyx had ever reached out to make amends. Not that Wylla was an easy wolf to approach, but she was hurting, too, carrying wounds from long ago that might have been patched over with an apology.

Truly, she wished she could bask in the glory of chasing out her rival as she had wished to do on many an occasion, but to be accused when she'd done nothing but try to respect his agreement with Nyx rankled. That wasn't good enough for him. He needed everything to go his way, according to his plan. Well, she was done with it.

No peace to be had for them. Chaos yawned between them like a chasm, and she wasn't sure they ever could bridge it. She didn't know if she ever wanted to. She'd opened up to him and let him into her heart, and all he had done since entering it was inflict pain. It's just a contract had turned into I will defend them against you and blame you with the benefit of the doubt and it hurt so badly that he would accuse her of driving them away without doubt, instead of blaming them for leaving, that she found her eye was wet with tears when he asked if she wanted him to go. All she'd ever wanted from him was a little respect, validation, and care.

It's not like either of you ever gave me a chance to make anything right, she spat. Not that she would have made the effort herself. That ball had always been in Nyx's court. You just believed her immediately, which says a lot. Nyx never even came to me about her problems, but you're so quick to blame me for everything. If there was even any love between them anymore then she believed it shattered in that moment. Her single eye burned on him. For all his grand proclamations of it, she didn't think he knew the meaning of the word, at least not when it came to her. He seemed far more invested in his love for Nyx and their children—the way he defended her and never doubted her intentions spoke loud and clear to Wylla.

Whatever he was doing here, she doubted it was where he truly wanted to be. Phaedra and Thade were here, while Ciri and Elke were there. I'm sorry she took them from you but that is not my fault. It's hers. You don't get to blame me and I won't let you invalidate my feelings any longer. If you can't handle that then go. Huffing, she paced a moment and then spoke again. You could have stayed there and visited Phaedra and Thade. Obviously you don't respect or trust me. Why even come back?
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Ooc — ebony
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mahler, having not known the true nature of wylla's previous relationship with nyx, seized upon it with a fierce surge of annoyance. while he believed that the little wolfess had been threatened by his previous agreement, was it not she who had become eisen with he and wintersbane? what did nyx have? nothing, nothing beyond the spare reach of his affection and the daughters he had sired.
in mahler's mind, wylla had never intended to forgive the golden woman, inasmuch as she would forever hold his mistakes above his world-weary head. that enough rankled him, but moreover, it was her belief that exclusion was not harmful. inward furnace swelling, lips thinning further as wylla flung her words toward him.
snippets of ice, of her own barely veiled anguish, and the overwhelming sense of fury that clung limpet-like to every castigation. she was ruler here and nyx was gone, returned with elke and ciri to a true experience of familial love he had never been able to deliver to her heart even despite all his wishes.
"you do not think their leader refusing to recognize their existence was a burden, in some vay? you do not think that they vere old enough to know how much you vent beyond yourself to ignore them, vylla? that they knew so clearly their place here, and that it vas low?" eyes narrowing. "your contention vith nyx in the past does not matter here. this is vhy i did not vant to hear your endless grievances! they never stop. they never cease." 
for that, after all of it — this was the sum of mahler: dust. 
when she had finished, and he heard the breath come again, sweeping into her throat, the gargyole found he had nothing to say.
"i asked you to be my vife, vylla. and you said no," he discovered all the same, a thrumming pinprick of memory cutting from behind his ear. "i offered you the legitimacy i offered no vone else, and you turned it aside." he turned now his lilac stare to the cold climbing forests of the peak. "it seems, vylla, that you vill not believe a vord i say unless i discard everyvone else for you."
the twist of her blade, that he should stay in moonspear. "she does not vant me either," came the respondent edge of chillweather warning. "believe me or do not, but it is the truth. there is not some ... grand conspiracy against you. only a woman who feared you in every way and my own failings, for vich i have paid dearly. i am happy to pay for my sins, desperate to atone however i might, but i have never lied to you, vylla. not vonce. you knew vhat it vas from the beginning, and yet you still chose me."
his gaze turned back to her own by now. "sagtannet is vhere phaedra and thade were born, and it is vhere i vant to be! not there." mahler no more desired to be one of hydra's subjects than he wished to be here upon this cold ground clashing with his co-leader once more. his arrangement with nyx had been before before before; before she had ever come back, and for the first time he felt regret rise to choke him.
"you insult me at every turn, vylla; as a father. as a man." a swallow, a light, wormwood chuckle, a blink that angrily sought to burn away the gathering saltwater in his eyesight.
"the irony is that you are right to do so. i deserve this. all of your slights, and your anger. they are mine to carry." accent thickening as if that were somehow possible beyond the already muddled baritone. "and i admit this, freely. alvays, vylla. and to her, as vell. both failed by my selfishness, and our children most of all." a breath. "but they are all mein kinder. i love them more than i love you."
"so vhen i make my decisions, they are vith them in mind. not you. not nyx. them. my decision is to stay in sagtannet because i believe it is best for our children, and my decision is to remain as much in the lives of elke and ciri as i am able." a steadying inhale of cold air. "but i do not ... i do not need to stay here as your fellow leader." 
a twitch of his lips; he pulled his gaze from her own to earth. "it is clear ... it is clear you have no respect for me because i have given you no reason to respect me. you think i am an idiot, at least." searching down, drowning in the hardbit canary depths of her single beautiful eye; oh, she was so deeply, hatefully, bitterly beautiful to mahler, always, a star burning superior in the cold expanse of the darkened skies beyond where he was able to reach. too good. too —
"and it seems ..." had he ever struggled so before, blindsided by his own grasping for composure. "that ve, you and i, have the ability to create vonderful children, but nothing else." not a home. not a partnership. something like love too bordered by thornways, something that attempted so feverishly to be what it could not.
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Ooc — Chelsie
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She did her very best to listen, really listen, without interjecting while he spoke. There were half a dozen moments where she yearned to cut in and argue, but she didn't. Or couldn't, more like. Every new thing he said left her either more dumbfounded or more hurt than the last. On some level, she acknowledged he was right. It was undoubtedly difficult to live in a pack with a leader that wanted nothing to do with you. But she believed it was even more difficult to feel secure as a leader with a known rival in the pack and a healthy fear that one day that rival would decide they deserved better and her position would be threatened, not only by Nyx, but by her daughters as they grew up. No, she didn't feel bad for it at all. She understood that Ciri and Elke were innocent and hadn't deserved it, but that wouldn't have lasted.

If only she was a little more clever, she would've realized that winning Ciri and Elke to her side would have been the easier method of ensuring that Nyx could not rise against her. Alas, all she could foresee were two children who would grow up to disregard her authority with the same flippancy she felt their mother did, and that was not something she could tolerate. Besides, it wasn't like she'd spent any time with Marble or Calcifer or Astraeus, either. She was a busy wolf with a son who'd been missing and a daughter who was deeply trouble. She didn't have time to coddle all the children and make them feel wanted.

There was a lot more she wanted to say on the subject of Nyx, but it was all wiped away when he went on to tell her he loved them more than her. Oh. Ouch. By the time he finished saying what he needed to say, there was a wet track down each cheek. Even the socket without an eye still produced tears, although only her remaining eye was able to sting with them. It took her a long while to muster together her words into something comprehensible. So long, in fact, that she almost considered turning and walking away without a word, the way he had done many times to her.

When your children grow up, she began, in a voice that was raw with emotion, and find mates of their own and sons and daughters of their own—

tiercel

—and they don't think about you anymore, or they do so with disgust and disappointment rather than the love you wish for—

TIERCEL

—I would be the one still there, standing beside you. Always. The last word was choked out. He loved them more than her? Wylla, on the other hand, loved Mahler as fiercely as she loved each of her children, in a different manner. If she chose him for her life partner, then she would choose him even over her children if she absolutely had to. It would be an agonized decision that might tear her asunder, but she would choose him. When they grew up and spread their wings and soared and left their mother behind, she would love them no less for it. That was the way of life. But she would choose her partner. He would always be there even after they were gone. Even if they grew to hate her. Even if they never thought of her again when their own lives became too busy for them.

I refused because you asked at the wrong time, in the wrong way. You insulted me with it, Mahler! He'd asked her to be his wife to legitimize their litter because she was insecure about Nyx's. Not because he loved her and wanted to spend his life with her and only her. Maybe he did want that, but it wasn't why he'd asked at the time. She believed now that he'd only asked because it was a convenient way for him to tamp down her jealousy, perhaps so he would not need to bother proving to her that he meant it. It wasn't right. Since then, he had not bothered to ask again in the right way, and she had long given up any hope he ever would.

Nothing left for her to say to make him see her side of it. He was resolutely on his own side. So many words she could've thrown at him, but ultimately it would make no difference. He'd shoved his spear through her heart wholly and completely. A sob bubbled past her lips. I didn't choose you in spite of your plans! We made a mistake. I made a mistake! If I knew— if I had suspected— I never would have— if I knew this was how you would treat me, if I knew you would never stand up for me but would belittle me and invalidate me instead, there would be no Phaedra or Thade.

She fixed him with a long, hard, hurt look and hissed, All I ever wanted was to feel secure. Loved. I never asked you to discard anyone. I just wanted your love to mean something more. You could never even do that for me. I deserve better than this. She deserved to have wonderful children with a man who loved her and cared about her and stood by her the way she would stand by him when they were grown and gone. She no longer thought it could be him.
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Ooc — ebony
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when your children grow up
astarte. brumous. saint. 
they had not grown up, had they? mahler watched as if through a vintage-wrought lookinglass, old warping over memories dredged up by her words.
two sons, a daughter. one son, still. one son, gasping his last; marigold reaching for him, reaching —
her lips forming his name.
and how he had clenched with pain and with terror of the fever, of the black liquid that had risen like silt inside her lungs and poured into her mouth —
and he had run away.
and they don't think about you anymore
but phaedra did not think of him now, did she? even as wylla railed at him, and he listened, chained to this earth and this moment, mahler knew he was completely unaware of where their daughter tread. and astraeus — and 
i would be the one still there, standing beside you. always.
mahler could not conceive of loving anything more than the first breath of a child belonging to him. he had sought midwifery for this simple fact alone: that it was an act of god and the most reverent experience a man could ever share. and he! blessed three times with it, with three children and two, and two — he loved them more because he had not failed at loving his offspring, only their mothers. 
he saw now the rotted core of himself, chewed wood falling away as he grew starveling beneath her tears. again. her tears, which he had caused — again. helpless with the inward masculine instinct to sweep her close, stilled by the sheer hateful act that would be, to pierce her heart and then make some grandiose show,
over and over and over again.
"a mistake?" and his voice cracked, for "loving you vas never a mistake for me, vylla." a mistake? were their children the same? did she in this second feel the deathknell of regret? "not a mistake. but it clearly vas something i should have kept to myself." 
he had wanted to tell her in the snap of her teeth to find another wolf, one who would be the things to her he could not; offering a moth-eaten pauper's strand of threadbare love, and he agreed! at once, in the same fractured tone, "yes." she would have been insulted had he suggested it, but here now, the word deserve and his own name scratched out.
"yes," he said again, and slowly. a wind, climbing the spine of the mountain, pressing suddenly, harshly down upon the individuals therein who stood in another long and pregnant silence.
how long had the first lasted, wylla staring at him, one stricken eye and the other sacrificed in service to this fucking unendingly cold place. to him. the emblem of her love, ripped from her head. and he, offering nothing in return for that.
"you do." again his lips felt molasses, but he experienced the trembling begin in his gut, dread and torment clustering together like pine sap in the low reach of his throat.
had nyx left because he did not love her? mahler had not allowed himself to think that. but he had not loved takiyok either, had felt some great sensation beneath his breastbone for her but believed it to be inferior to the same for wylla. she who had defined the word. and in loyalty to that, he had relinquished all else — even his daughters.
if nyx had left upon her own word and this unspoken want, then full circle it had come. mahler proving his allegiance to this woman over and again with gestures and deeds and decisions that left him raw, but did nothing for her own spirit. he did not think he could ever speak in the language wylla desired, for in his mind he had worked himself to the rawboned scars for her. built walls between any other and his own heart, cut them off, sent them away. set her apart and aside and greater than all else. for that she was, even as she stood tiny and harrowed and infuriated. 
taken his daughters to moonspear voluntarily.
their names beat upon the plantwood core of his heart.
her own hovered upon his mouth.
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Ooc — Chelsie
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Regret. Yes, indeed. It was her oldest and most familiar friend.

Wylla regretted so much of her life, it was a wonder she continued living it at all. She regretted the fateful hunt that had separated her from Lusca and Ingram at the age of 6 months, forced her to wander alone and grow into the hardened and suspicious creature she was even now. Regretted the founding of Grimnismal. Regretted permitting Caiaphas to live there and whelp there just because she had raised Lycaon. She regretted storming away from that pack in a fit of rage. She regretted Raptor. She regretted leaving Swiftcurrent Creek, and she regretted leaving Keokuk Glade to search for Tiercel.

She regretted ever finding Mahler instead, and she regretted staying in Diaspora with him, and she regretted falling into his arms when winter's frenzy came upon her. She regretted allowing him to seduce her with whispers of love and she regretted waiting so very long for him to show her that he wasn't just screwing with her head when he said he loved her. Yes, she had made a mistake in believing that he was capable of the kind of love she'd dreamed of as a very young girl. What man who made pacts on the lives of children could be capable of such? If she had foreseen where they stood now then she would have fought her nature and denied him, let him fulfill his pacts without her, and had no part in it.

But Phaedra? Thade? Even Tiercel? Even if the three stood before her intent on tearing her throat clean out, she could never regret their lives. She would have waited until such a time as his contracts were ended, when he was free to give them his all, and not pulled in multiple different directions. Or she would have waited long enough to know that his love and her love had different definitions, and perhaps the father of her younger litter would have been someone else entirely.

A gust tore at the thin fur around her face and she shivered, but held fast to the ground. She needed to. If not for the grip of her paws on the soil, there was no telling how long or how far she would've wandered in her sorrow then. No telling if she would ever have turned back, or simply walked until she forgot where she'd come from and could never find her way back. For everything that Mahler had ever done to try to show he loved her—every wound he had carved into his heart, every barrier he had erected against all others—he simply could not comprehend what it was she really wanted.

It was simple, really, but they were two worlds apart. She wanted him to come home to her at night, every night. She wanted small gestures that showed he thought of her even when he was away and busy. She wanted to feel more important to him than his duty and obligation. She could not see the world the way he did. She was desperate for security most of all—the last time she felt sure of her place in the world was when she was a child. Nyx's only relevant crime, in truth, was that her contract had made Wylla feel uncertain of her place in Mahler's heart, and she had yearned for him to show her she had nothing to fear. He'd offered words instead. His gestures were valid ones but they were not ones that Wylla could see or feel, and so she did not know the lines he had carved into his heart in the name of setting her apart.

She'd only witnessed the way he grew angry when she asked for proof of the love he claimed to hold for her, felt the stab of his accusations, felt slighted and belittled when he stood against her rather than with her, and watched the way her daughter withdrew into herself and become an unhappy shell of who she might have been if not for damnable duty. Felt the sting of it when he'd asked her to be his without a proclamation of love. Just more duty in the promise of a title. Felt the deeper cut when he never asked again and never made more of an effort, but continued to show his love in ways that she read only as dismissive and unfeeling. Even now, she could not see his actions for what they were in his eyes.

He had sent his daughters away with Nyx and felt he had proven that he put her above the others tenfold in doing so despite the hurt it raked across his soul, returned because it was best for her and their children, and she felt only that he now blamed her for daring to feel hurt that the simpler, warmer gestures of love had never been given her, and blamed her for things she felt were well out of her control and hardly her responsibility.

She didn't know what she expected. Maybe an apology for the way he blamed her for the loss of his daughters, for she could not see into his head to see it the way he did. Maybe a declaration that he would do better, followed by actions that showed as much. What she did know was that she could not, in good conscience, raise any more children to be hurt and disappointed the way Phaedra had been. The way Tiercel had been, before her. If she was to ever have children again then it would be the result of a proper relationship, one proven in deeds and not words, one she could rely on. A man she could lean on. Someone she need not doubt. A proper foundation.

Do what you want, she said lowly, brokenly. Stay. Leave. It no longer seemed to matter to her. What fleeting future she'd glimpsed with him where he would make no more pledges to other women and would be hers alone in body and spirit was as good as gone. He didn't seem interested in rising to her standards for her mate, and she wasn't going to lower them, not when she felt so alone and scolded for having feelings he didn't like. She'd hoped, once, that he would do his duty to Nyx and their daughters but would prioritize his heart's family and she'd hoped that the coming spring they might welcome cubs born of love and stability and a promise to one another, without the trouble of outside obligations. That they would stand together, mutual. Not this.

Now, she supposed she needed to decide what to do with the rest of her life if there was no romanticized version of Mahler left inside him who might fight for the love he felt, for she would commit to—and give in return—no less. Maybe there wasn't even any love anymore. Maybe they had finally burned one another to ashes and there was nothing left at all for either of them to give.
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Ooc — ebony
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ich hätte dich anlügen sollen.

about his contract, about the existence of his love; secreted nyx somewhere off before their daughters were born, covered her as if the trio of them were a secret. he had not wished to do that; he had reared elke and ciri first upon sawtooth, then here. they knew him as papa, dad — he had given them the gift of his words, and in that task, had alienated wylla and phaedra from his very self.
the incompatibility that was so riftlike between he and her was not surprising. it was the chipped, harsh edges of it, as if they had both woken to their resentments of one another. wylla, her love unrequited. mahler, his own unremarked. both searching for validation in one another while the ways of their affections varied so greatly.
by this time and this year, mahler remember little of his own father. it was only marigold for whom he delved so stridently for, limping back to that particular hallway of dusted memories. but what did remain, the musiker knew to be faded remnants of a bygone day: you must always tell her the truth.
but what had truth ever done for him? and where had truth ever taken him? down a thousand bitter paths. away from marigold. he knew every name of those he had wanted to love and did not; he knew but one name that had inspired him finally to open again, and it was her own. 
mahler, having watched the solemn ocean gather between them these past long months, now waded to the far proverbial shore and watched the waves flock over the remaining bridgework. he would not love her beyond his heart for his children. she would not accept that for what it was. 
it would be settling, then, for wylla, and his soul ached with the longing to kiss her. inexplicably; to dash the tears from her fineboned face and take her into the age-old way of things, the matching of body to spirit.

es ist zu lange her, seit ich dich berührt habe.

the last, to clean her wounds, and before, her devotion to his own.
but beyond — repelled by her hurting shield, not comprehending her sudden lashes, or attempting to know them, he had not tried to love her. not in that way. she did not wish even his kiss. and so he had held back from her. put aside the base desire and striven to become more for wylla. yet he had only lost himself in the doing of it. 
another hurt then, that he had applied himself wtih diligence to the daily life of the pack and forgone all others, though she had rejected his first offer. spurned by it, she had said. and that mahler did not understand, and had grown too numb to consider exploring it.
for what he now contemplated was the darkest image of another man,
a better man,
embracing wylla, calling with her into this air and among the tall forests of this place. driving any memory of the gargyole away and —
mahler wanted to gasp, for he could not abdicate the thought, and fixed in his mind the nature of the very loam, the pebble pressed into the sole of his right paw, the cold clawing at his flanks; gorge rising, head swimming,
i deserve better
mein gott mann, du wirst sie jetzt wirklich verlieren.
wylla and the soft voice in the back of her throat for another; wylla and the gilded vein of loyalty in her for another;
if he scarce moved it would decide what he did not. a breath as the shattered vase of her voice dripped into the fragmenting pieces of him. 
"i vant," husky and barely audible above the now-keening wind scudding its claws along the ice toward the peaktop
you, he had said before. he had said it had said it, and had not kept it. even if the desire existed within him, he knew he could not repeat it a second time for already it would be a doomed sentiment.
"i vill," and voice broke again, lip twitching upward in disgust with himself as he rolled his heavy muzzle away from her chastised, chastising expression and into the teeth of the coming storm itself.

ich möchte dich anflehen.

ah, but she deserved someone who did not grovel, who did not grind himself so far into the dirt that he must wallow in it as if he were mad. mahler set his jaw, blinked at the bitter salt that had not departed but would not fall. 
"i vill stay until you choose another."
lungs nearsplit with the effort of reining back his own sobs; but this time he would not be the one to turn the line of his back to her; another contract, the only damnable thing mahler could ever feasibly write, and wylla's departure ink on the waiting line. unfair of him, so it was, to force her the rest of the way; he knew he knew he knew, but the sick lurch of the sneering image in his mind kept him moored, that fantastical, horrible dart of lightning down the center of his mind that had hurt him with its lurid nature.
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What did he want? Why had he come back here, really? Not for her, she thought, not anymore; he was too wrapped up in Nyx, she bitterly imagined. Too concerned with her departure and her hurt feelings, and he had proven as much by pointing his finger at her. Did he even know how hard it had been for her to ignore them instead of harassing them? The price she'd paid in self-esteem to respect his wishes when it came to them? It was the best she could do; anything else and she might have snapped at them, and he would hate her even more. No, of course he didn't know. She'd never told him. He had never asked.

I vant. Wylla flipped her ears forward, searched his carved stone face with her single eye, and waited. Waited for him to tell her that he wanted her to leave, or that he wanted to remain for their children but wished no partnership with her in leadership. Waited for him to reclaim his pack from her grasp and denounce her. Waited for him to tell her instead that he wanted to leave Sagtannet and wander in between because it was easier for him than to spend one more second in her company. He must have found her despicable, she thought, to think so poorly of her.

I vill. Wylla held her breath and wished that he would tell her he would be a better man. A better partner. She waited for a vow that he would cherish her. She didn't want him to turn his back on Ciri and Elke, not truly, no matter how she felt about them—she remembered wishing her own father had been around when she was young, and resenting that he wasn't—but she wished he would say that his time with Nyx was at an end. Would he visit her as well when he went to Moonspear for his daughters? Would he whet his appetite with her body? How many times had he already done so?

I vill stay until you choose another.

The best thing Mahler could have done then was beg. It was cruel of her to want that from him, but at least it would have been an indication that he valued her. Those words fell like a guillotine, creased the skin just before her nose, shot lightning through her yellow eye. Had he begged, she would know he meant it. Had he begged, she would know he cared.

Is that what you want? she quietly asked, poised with finality on the tip of a knife. Or was it he that wished to find another and was looking to soften the blow that way? Surely both of them could find other options given enough time—she believed he already had his lined up, and she could think of at least one wolf who would be a loyal father if nothing else, for she did not love freely nor easily—but if there was even a sliver left to salvage, even a shard of him left that respected her and wanted it to work and could change for the better...

It was idiotic of her to think it would be worth it, she knew that, but she waited all the same.
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he did not know what he wished! he did not know what he wanted! mahler, a man of middle-age, with four
do not forget the first
children, had never chiseled out what he wanted the future to resemble. leadership for years, his own land. apt at staking his claim to a piece of rock, skilled with his defense of it, knowlegeable of each small growing green thing and their useful properties. 
"i vant peace, vylla. and now i do not ... i vill do vhat i must to accomplish that." 
ciri, her small, hurt features. elke, more wondering — gott hilf mir — he had left them both in moonspear, had left them there, had thrown them away, and his heart began to race.
what if he returned -- no.
no, he could not abandon sagtannet as well, nor thade, nor phaedra. 
in the turnings of his mind, the gargoyle knew it was finished. why did she keep him here, ask after his wants as if she had not spent her voice upon telling him the myriad ways he had been so selfish with them.
mahler near wished that wylla would only tell him what he must do, and he would find it done. but she stood instead with that string of words stretching between them
is that what you want?
jaws wished to offer it back, to parrot it into her upthrust ears and —
i deserve better
"i do not vant to be an obstacle to your life." a stumbling block, something to which she felt she must tether herself for the sake of their half-grown children. he had erased her regard for him, and so he did not, did not know why
she asked what he desired.
he felt as if he were winnowing to nothing, chaff forced away by the breath swelling her flanks. in entirety, a surreal portion of stained-glass rupturing from a second-story window. lavender eyes were upon her own singled gaze but mahler was unseeing, hovering in two parts. 
"what i vanted has hurt you." rote, mechanical. "it does not matter what i vish now, vylla. it is your choice." please do not ask me again, the begging curled in the hollow of his throat
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Once again, she expected something more from him, a gesture worthy of a best-selling romance novel or critically acclaimed film. Once again, Mahler let her down. She felt like such an idiot wasting her time on him, forever and ever waiting for the proof of his singular love, and finding nothing but disappointment at the end of every ribbon of hope she extended toward him. He didn't want her. He didn't want to be better, he didn't want to make it work. He only wanted peace.

Maybe he would find his voice again when she spent time with men that were not him, but it would be far too late then.

What hope remained to her flatlined, leaving her gaze matte and unfeeling. The obstacle is gone. You hurt me over and over because of her. She almost laughed. She was making excuses for him. You're an idiot, Wylla. Mahler himself was not the obstacle, merely everything he'd done in service to the real obstacle, the one whose mere presence was enough to damage her self-esteem so thoroughly. If not for Nyx then Mahler would not have stood against her on so many occasions, would not have made her feel like she and her emotions were worth nothing with every breath he spent to proclaim the other's innocence. If not for Nyx then she would not have felt so insecure in the first place. She'd known the Ostrega's outer beauty. She'd been jealous of it from the moment her first heat found her so long ago on the cold, harsh sand. Comparatively, she knew she was a rat, now more than ever with that haunting, empty socket.

Women were such fickle and petty things, and Wylla more fickle and petty than most, and she had let that get under her skin enough times that he'd gone and fallen out of love with her, and now all he wanted was peace. Not her. Not a real family. Not a future. Just peace.

It matters to me, she told him flatly, so tell me if it does to you, or don't. I don't matter to you. We don't matter to you. Just his peace with which he could visit his children and spare no emotion elsewhere. She knew, now, how it must have felt to be Takiyok. She understood, now, why the winter-white woman had left Diaspora. Very well; if he did not want to breathe life into his desires now, then let it be done. He need only say it, and she would spare no more energy on fruitless endeavours with a man colder than the mountain stone, nor would she allow him to put her down ever again.
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pain girdled into confusion as her gaze slid to a blankslate state. again the question, and mahler was incensed by it, by her insinuation that he did not care. and her reference to nyx as an obstacle, when it was only he who should bear her wrath. "i did," mahler rasped, words stolen from his jawline in a wisp of white steam. "and now she is gone."
mahler did not enjoy the glissade of dubiety that raved in the back of his mind; that he did not understand. in this interlude alone he felt as he had bent so very hard he might snap, his vertebrae spilling onto the winterhaunt soil of their mountain. 
he had no pride left to give wylla, no comprehension of what it was she so needed from him. demanded from him. 
and now, standing in her minscule frame, demanding if this unknown, unseen thing mattered to mahler, when to his heart she had never defined what it was she needed — only that he had denied it to her.
did wylla mean herself? was that the note of it then, that she must hear from his lips that she mattered — how! could this woman not see the things he had done for her? what more did she want? what more did he possess?
his stoneflower stare flecking with ice. "the night she told me that she vas leaving and taking the ... taking them vith her," he swung his scarmarked muzzle away, gaze away,
"she — she vanted me to ask her to stay, i see now. she told me she vould go to moonspear, and i said —" a bitter, hoarse imprint of a laugh, "i told her that i vould take her there." the immense cruelty of it relived in shifting chesspieces upon the floor of his broken spirit. "because i loved you, and because i knew there vas nothing here for my daughters, and because i vanted her to be free of me. and because i vas selfish, and knew if she vas gone, maybe then i vould have a chance at your forgiveness."
"and before that," mahler sped on in his stony voice, pocked with the pebbling of unshed tears, for they existed, but he was a man, and with a man's greatest flaw: pride. "before that she vanted me to love her back. she said that i made her feel alive," why did he say such things, rushing out of him like swampwater, "and i told her she vas good to me. good to me." a headpat on an expression of love. "because my heart belongs to vone." he paused, fixed the she-wolf with a ponderous stare that at last hid no resentment.  and before that, takiyok, for whom he would always harbor a marrowdeep and guilty affection that simply could not be what she wanted. ketzia, and before that, ruenna, all dashed first by his unsurety, then the eventuality of his ignorance of how best to love.
"now nyx is gone. elke and ciri, gone. it is just us here, vylla, just us and our children and the place that ve built together." hurting now; it crawled into his words. "and you stand here and you say 'does it matter to you?' after you throw my contract vith nyx at me again." 
"but you vill never forgive me. and i have nothing else to give you, vylla. i have been devoted to you in every vay that i can think, yet it is not enough." and he did not think it ever would be, not by the glacial sun blazing in her lovely face.
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Minutes ago, Mahler had said that Nyx did not want him.

Now he spun a tale of how he had spurned her love in some valiant effort to claim Wylla's forgiveness, all because he loved only her. She read no devotion in his words, only that lie. She does not want me. And yet, she wanted me to love her back. She said that I made her feel alive. In the end, he wondered how she could not see what he had sacrificed for her, while confirming her very deepest fears about Nyx, and about him, as well. In every word, she imagined regret. The taste of that lie was bitter on her tongue.

Ah, if not for Wylla, he would have been free to ask Nyx to stay. Or, at the very least, he regretted allowing Nyx to leave. He regretted not returning her love! He made her feel alive, did he? More than he did for Wylla; Mahler made her feel wretched. She wondered if he regretted every little thing he had done since she wound up at Diaspora and merely kept it all to himself, every chink in his opinion of her, until they stood here, and he told her he had done it all for her, and in so many words, admitted that he regretted everything.

(At least, that's how she chose to take it.)

I never asked for that! she snapped, the fury blazing up in her breast again, swallowing her hurt and her indignation and her hope entire. You stand there and say you let her go because you wanted my forgiveness and you love me, but then you accuse me of ruining your life or whatever point you're trying to make. You just said she didn't want you but oh, wait, nevermind, yeah she did? Do you not get it? Based on what he just said, Nyx would've swooped in and taken everything from Wylla if only Mahler had said yes to her, and now Mahler was as good as telling her that he regretted that. That made her stomach churn. She thought she might be sick.

I wanted comfort. I wanted reassurance. I wanted you to show me that I mattered by holding me and telling me so, coming home at night, soothing me when I feel insecure, not these ridiculous ways that make you resent me and make me feel guilty for daring to have feelings so you can keep on doing the same shit and resent me even more. I just wanted you to give a fuck about me when I was hurting. Support me. Stop for two seconds and realize the effect your choices had on me. Anything. She couldn't do this anymore. She was going to throw up if she kept on much longer.

I did forgive you but you didn't even notice. That hurt most of all, that she had gone to the cliffs for vengeance for him and lost her eye in the process, spent all that time guarding him and feeding him and watching over him when he was injured, cuddled with him and professed her love again on Nova Peak, and he never noticed any of it. He just kept doing the same idiotic things, putting Ciri and Elke ahead of Phaedra in her eyes, resenting her for not wanting to be involved with them, feeling strained because he had put them all in this position. You're too busy blaming me and resenting me and regretting things and standing there telling me all about it, as if that's supposed to make me feel loved and cherished and wanted. Nothing like making choices that you regret and building resentment to show someone you want them around, am I right?! Nothing like reminding me that I signed up for this and have no right to complain, except I had no idea you could make me feel so shitty! She wondered for a moment, absurdly, why she even bothered trying to explain how she felt. He would invalidate that as well with his pride. Tell her how he had sacrificed so much and she was just so ungrateful. All it does and has ever done is make me feel worthless and despicable. I have plenty of that without you. You... you of all wolves should have my back, but you never do.

Although she had always torn him down, as well, but she wasn't the one who had gone and tangoed with another woman and gaslit her about what was going on between them and spent the past six months holding her concern about it against her. He thought of it as a head pat to dismiss Nyx, but hearing him say "you're good to me" would have rang so sweet in Wylla's ears. He just didn't get it. He never would, and she felt foolish for hoping.

I'm done, she choked, swallowing down the nausea, turning away, preparing to find somewhere in the forest where she could weep far away from him. She didn't know why she'd held out for him to spill his guts and tell her that it did all matter to him and he did want to work on it. She didn't think he was even capable of it.
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spurned again, mahler was unsure of how much venom from wylla he could bear any longer. but thus he did, molars grinding in the pocket of his jaw as she laid bare all his shortcomings once more. he had meant to impress upon her the nature of his devotion, but it had been another mistake; fodder for her ire to catch and consume.
all her grievances poured betwixt them like poisoning oil, and mahler caught his breath between the fire of wylla's sentences. so belatedly he saw now the way in which she had so needed him to love her, and the way he had chosen to show it instead. even their brief intermission in tense words after he had returned from the cliffside, and she had come back again in her own way. mahler had not trusted it, had expected the lurking miasma of her own misery with him to eke out again.
and as he bore her words, mahler wondered with a great spreading immobility if he was not made for that sort of affection. his belonged to the land, to his children, to his protection of sagtannet. it was his own shortcoming to analyze but in the interim between his endless thoughts and introspection, he had lost her.
she was cobwebbed with the hundred wounds mahler had pierced through the thin smokescreen of what he had offered as love; he saw it and the blackening valuelessness of it.
nyx did not want him, he believed; she wished the parts of him he could not surrender, and so it was only a fantasy, an idealized version of the careworn man who had sired her children. the love — he was unsure if he could even call it so when so much had embittered the word — shared by mahler and by wylla had almost always been fraught with contention.
and the root of his resentments trailing back to himself; her words had torn down the stones of him one by one, and though his anger was true, the eye of the storm was his own sin.
icewrought winds flowing through the evergreens.
as if slowed, mahler watched through blurred vision as she turned away
— the press of her small paws against the hard earth, the cold grace of her being — she was not going to come back/a final departure/a goodbye threaded into the tension of her small silver frame.
mahler's broad paws flexed against the taiga; helplessly, dumbly, he watched wylla began to fade, as if she were some specter he had not meant to behold, and the stone depths of his cold heart ached with a sickening slash.
"vylla," softly at first, and then again more loudly; he came after her, for mahler could not bear to let her go; it would be the end, the end; i'm done resounding in her ears, and a choking sound welling in his throat,
her name again; and the blind stumble of his granite build after her as she began to tear from his spirit a portion of it shaped in her likeness. words evading him after his discontent and her wrath; he wore one scar of her teeth upon him already, invited more, if only she would stay, stop, stop"please."
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It was all she could do to keep her eye on the path, which blurred and swam before her white paws, colours smeared together and textures blended into nonexistence. Some instinctual knowledge of the terrain kept her on track so she didn't trip over a rock or slam into a tree in her haste. She was grateful for that, because she was much too focused on holding down the contents of her stomach as she sought to get away, away, away

I alvays vanted to see you again.

Stop.

Your only wrongdoing vas that I could not forget you.

No vone has ever distracted me from you.

Stop it! she screamed at herself, flattening her ears and clenching her jaws as her sorrow spilled from her eyes. How stupid she had been. How childish to let herself fall for it. For him. It had been so easy in the beginning, before there were any children in the equation, to let his words tantalize her secret, romantic heart. Before she'd even known it she was coerced into thinking of him in ways she had never wanted to. But as soon as kids were involved, as soon as he went through with his plans—

loveless contractual arrangements, he had said—

—that old green-eyed dragon had rooted its claws in her and never let go, and the reassurance she had desperately needed that she was only seeing specters in the darkest corners of her mind had not come. His romanticism from weeks before evaporated, replaced by pride and ego. He had instead left her to fear the worst, whether he knew it or not. Had becoming a father planted that seed in him? He had been so humble before, so warm, or maybe she had only imagined it.

Vhat has this changed for you, Vylla?

Shut up, she urged, stumbling over an errant rock and faltering. Pebbles skidded out from under her paws as she dug them into the ground to hold herself steady. Her gut churned dangerously. She swallowed thickly and shook her head. As if she could just shake off every emotion, don a cloak of indifference, and move on.

I love you so very much, Vylla.

STOP. The world spun in front of her.

Vylla!

Her ears flipped back disbelievingly. She had imagined it like all the rest, but then her name came again, louder, and the fumbling sound of paws on the ground. Wow. First he more or less gave up any semblance of trying and said he had nothing left to give, and now he came stumbling after her and calling her name? What more could he possibly want from her? He'd already crumpled up her heart—

Please.

What?! she shouted, whirling around to fix him in her tear-streaked sights. God, she couldn't take any more of his excuses and his cold logic and his resentment.
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he had not expected her to stop, to do more than whirl away or shrug him aside; point her teeth at his woebegone face and torn out his eye in retribution. but she only stood in a trembling furor of wretchedness; mahler watched as a tear traced a canyon through the velveteen fur upon her cheek —
he ached down to the pit of his bones, hurt in shards, not for himself but for her; coming unraveled from the choking creeping vines that had climbed the whole of him and enfolded him within a blackening dome of rancour.
— heartsong reaching for the moment that she had found him again, or perhaps merely stumbled onto the hollow 
wir hätten dort bleiben sollen
but he had wanted more and more, had wanted to act in the name of his dead brother. stigmata: he still wore that loss so naked in his soul even now.
a second's realization, that mahler had allowed himself to be driven by that sense of failure, that he had allowed stigmata to die; it had beckoned him to retreat into contractual agreements and ambitions that claimed unfettered wildernesses — in the name of the ironstar.
the hollow. mahler knew fiercely and with a great spearing of regret that he should have not left that place, that he should have remained there with wylla in the first filigreed fairy-ring of their recognized love,
but that had been the first selfishness; to move onward and upward, to put the word of a man who had abandoned them over her own. mahler, seeking a brother in the heart of wintersbane, and while he knew it would not be as it was with the basilisk, discovering a respite there. and when that too, had faded, mahler had still not turned to wylla and put her upon the inward promontories of his jagged trust. 
love, then: the conquering of one's self, sisyphus beneath the ponderous brutality of his own expectations. the capturing of things and places. the hierarchy rearranging lashlike and hidden behind his skullplate. bound to himself, unsaid, a series of processes he had always taken for granted.
and wylla, shut out and out evermore, for in turning off with a click the affections he had for all others, mahler had muted his response to her as well.
and he saw it — now! — in the crystalline underbelly of that tear, the curve of it melting against the edge of her small chin —
a funeral dirge with black roses drifting their petals across the pathways of his mind.
aber jetzt ist es zu spät
all this seen in but a fraction of time, as wylla's single eye simmered with a tribulation of tangled emotions.
"i vill show you that i can be better."
the sound muffled to his own ears and scarcely he felt the movement of his lips, a proclamation mahler did not know the end of; 
not the barest etching of hope left in the charnel house of him, but the naked bones of the sentence flaking to ash he swallowed in the following second; a tension as the shadowpriest turned to decamp and let her finally away from the suffering cloy of his presence.
when wylla took another — he yearned to put the shifting shadows of that image from the eye of his mind — in the snows melting to green springtime buds, mahler would depart.
but until that day arrived, he would not remain at sagtannet without working toward atonement.
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Ooc — Chelsie
Guardian
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#22
Wylla readied herself for more explanations, more daggers for her heart veiled in proclamations of things he could not promise. Instead, Mahler said that he would show her he could be better. She yearned in her heart to believe him. After all this time…

She could not.

I need to be alone, she mumbled, but it was hardly necessary. Mahler, too, seemed intent on leaving this accursed ground. When she’d asked if his trip was fun, she’d meant nothing significant by it, or at least not the wound she’d unknowingly inflicted; she’d had no reason to suspect whatever ire made his voice short had anything to do with her.

Now she had fucked it up again, and him, too. She left broken pieces behind again, like she did every time. This time, she wanted to pick them up, but couldn’t. Nor could she imagine moving on to another. If she did, it would be mere duty, as damnable as his own sense of it, and she was not the sort for that. She loosed a breath, slipped into the trees, and disappeared.