Dragoncrest Cliffs come into the jam or look like a landlubber

 backdated to when Kaertok and Raleska are buried.  if anyone wants to pop a single post in, feel free - i kept participation vague so anyone could pop in if they wanted to <3. i'll archive in a week or so. credits to starr for the beautiful idea ;-;

the bear had been felled, but at great cost to sapphique.

two slain, the rest wounded. a hollow victory with the most bittersweet finish.

it had been @Rosalyn's idea to take their dead and bring them to the edges of the cliff. val stood at the site where they would be interred and had his breath stolen away.

the vista was beautiful.

from this mantle of earth and stone one saw nearly the entirety of the sound beneath it. the breathtaking view took it all into account; the tall red spires of the sequoias, the hazy features of the beach below, the brilliant byzantine lapis of the sea -- and at night, an orchestration of otherworldly blue riming the shore. all there for ones' eyes to behold with wonder -- it was a shame neither kaertok nor raleska's eyes would ever open again.

val began to dig. he was one of the few uninjured that could spare his body to the task. he thought back on all the times he had dug vigorously alongside @Regin or @Chacal -- but this was no game.

today, they buried two of their family.

he was not alone in his task of gravedigger, but the soil was rough and rocky. by the time he had finished his claws were blunted and sore, his pawpads bloody.

he was silent as rosalyn and @Erzulie laid their daughter to the earth. val had never seen death before -- not that close -- a shiver ran down his spine as he watched both raleska and kaertok slip into their graves with no protest. an irrational part of him hoped they would suddenly wake up and fight it; no! don't bury me! don't put me to this earth where i will be covered and forgotten forever!

the thought that he would someday be where they were sent a mortal chill to his very soul like an arrow.

but neither protested. neither woke up from their endless sleep. when it came time to push the earth back upon them, val's face was hot with quiet tears. it felt so wrong to throw dirt atop his family. raleska had been his sister, kaertok had brought him from the caldera to home -- and now they were being battered with a spray of stone and rock like their contributions to everyone's lives were meaningless!

if death felt cruel, this tradition of burying the dead in dirt felt crueler still. val flinched for every thud of stone he heard hit his sister and caretaker's bodies. he wept for every pawful of earth he scattered over their ribcage, their legs, their faces -- until at last they were covered and nothing but freshly upturned earth suggested they had ever once walked among this earth.

val thought in this moment, he would never sing again.

Despite her feelings, despite everything, she'd thought perhaps Raleska would choose the sound.  And while she was not willing to place the graves in a place where they had not claimed, and while she was not willing to inter her daughter beyond the cliff's reach.... the rise was a beautiful place.

She watched with a hollow stare as they dug, then slowly began the process of helping to lay the bodies to rest.  Here they could take root, away from scavengers or the potential to carry disease to the rest of the pack.  And here Rosalyn could come, perhaps, in the future, when she wished to remember.

This was a distant sentiment right now.  Her mind was still in shock, and her movements mechanical beneath the lacerations the bear had given.  Numbness had overtaken the fury she'd spent and she had only the wherewithall to suggest this place and see the plan to completion.

When it was done, she would not linger except to briefly, painfully, draw Valravn (and whoever else had accompanied them) into an embrace. Then she would leave, unable to remain for long in this place of death.  The beauty of the view was for another day, one where she could even for a moment behold it.

erzulie had barely spoken since the bear had been slain. raleska had already been dead by then, and kaertok had sacrificed himself to her memory. now rosencrantz bled, burning with fever, and she was not certain he would keep earthside.
a breath swelling her flanks, faltering into a sob. the salt wind brought with it the knowledge that valravn bled, and she looked solemnly at the boy who had returned. 
and then the tears were returning; the tears that had come and gone silently as they had worked and now she stood with dirt-caked limbs and looked despairingly at the mound of cliffdust that interred raleska and kaertok. 
sapphique and its first grave.
when rosalyn embraced her, erzulie was stirred from her reverie. she glanced after her wife and then back to valravn; touching his shoulder with a spare breath and turning upon her heel to slowly traipse in the direction the pirate had gone.
unmoored, emptied and filled again with grief.

RIP Kaertok and Raleska <3 Single post for me.

Together a funeral procession carried their fallen towards the crown jewel of Sapphique’s territory. Together they dug their graves into the hard permafrost until their nails split and their paws ached. Together they mourned.

Njord watched as the mothers gently lulled Raleska and Kaertok’s bodies into their tombs, cradled by the cold earth. Rosalyn pulled Erzulie and their children in for an embrace as Njord sat close in quiet meditation. Sapphique would not be the same without the dark woman and her pale counterpart. How could it be? His heart ached for the loss of family and wondered, and wondered, and wondered how to nurse such grief.