Stone Circle bound by bonesong

the priest emerges from isolation; stepping out of the shadows of the stone circle which he’d clung to like a wraith burned by the sun.

the sun’s warmth is chillier than before, a sign of the coming frosts.

sea-glass gaze narrows and he gives a shake of his coat; unkempt and tangled with leaves. the threadbones’ song had lowered in their crescendo tapering off and freeing him from their spell.

the commanders have gone quiet and in the silence ingram is jumpy, awakened like an unsure cub stepping out of the den for the first time.

here spooky man, have unruly child

Astrid wasn't entirely certain what she'd expected today when she'd made the executive decision to wander toward the Seer Stones. Companionship as of late had primarily been found in Sven and father; the only two who, presently, seemed to be able to tolerate her existence. Rarely did she also go to Tauris and Inkeri, flitting in and out of their dens like an ogre who lives under the bridge. She didn't much mind the little ones that still nestle close to their breasts, particularly those of Tauris — at least their mouths were too full of milk to complain about her.
Today, the boar-child traipses across the fall blooms and into the open meadow, watching as the vultures swing overhead. She lopes and then slows, runs and then grinds to a trot.
When she looks again to the ground level, a figure unknown draws her gaze. Tall, ragged, dark. Perhaps if she were old enough for a concept of such, she would have thought him handsome. Hæ! she calls, unbothered and unafraid. Who're you? You look like a ghost. teeter, totter, teeter, totter as she winds closer. Are you a ghost?

<3

a voice calls out to ingram and the hellhound swings his head in the direction of the hail.

the child approaches; unafraid.

sea-glass gaze darts around, looking for a parental figure to come lumbering out of the shadowing foliage. if the other adults of kvarsheim are weary of him, it is for good reason.

and, truthfully, the only one that he could say he even remotely liked or knew ( and that in particular was stretching it ) was tauris.

i am ingram. he offers his name, smoky reticence rough from disuse; and to her questions he answers, i am many things but a ghost is not one of them.

So he was not a ghost. I'm Astrid, she replies, head tilted in a proud lift of her chin. Gunnar and Taktuq are my parents. You know my parents, right?
Certainly he did, because he was, presumably, a man of Kvarsheim; but perhaps she should just make sure.
She stomps closer to him with a heavy trudge and lumbers around him in a half-circle before easing down into a lazy sit beside him. Many things? her eyebrows narrow in intrigue. Like what?

astrid.

she's a chatty thing, is ingram's first thought. i've met your father when i joined, the hellhound offers simply. her mother, he does not know; of his own fault ingram knows. he has not been awfully sociable, even before his period of intense isolation.

though his vague answer had perhaps been meant to dissuade her curiosity, it appears to have the opposite effect.

he lets out a feathered sigh; heavy in his chest despite the lightness of it as it passes betwixt his lips.

many things that could not be discussed with one so young.

a reader of bones, a speaker for gods. the easiest, and less terrible of things that he is ( though delaney supposes that is debatable ).

He reads bones? He speaks to the gods? Pah! Astrid could hardly believe some random black-leather fool sitting about in her land was smart enough or godly enough. Did she even believe in those? Frankly, she didn't know, nor did she really care.
She flops with a loud thump into a lay, forepaws stretched out in front of her and toes splayed crudely. You read bones? How d'you do that? she tilts her head suspiciously. Can you read myyyyy bones? then, her ears come to a great swivel, a devilish excitement brewing. I think my bones'll tell me I'm gonna be, like, a warrior princess. I am one, y'know. Did you know that, mister Ingram? That I'm a princess?
She was not. He didn't need to know that.

my brain is mush from the cold i'm suffering with. please excuse this mess of a post. <3

the bones whisper, if you know how to listen to them. ingram speaks quietly; hushed as if he were speaking in a sacrosanct place of great reverance. a soft chuckle slips betwixt his lips as she asks then if he can read her bones. she is too young to hear the grim truth of it so he thinks quickly of a way to ... cushion it.

no, the bones are from prey animals, mostly. i cannot read the bones of the living.

he is amused by her grandoise.

i did not know that, he admits and then adds, oh no doubt that they would tell me such things, were i able to read them.

ur all good!! please forgive my lateness to this SOB

Awwwwwwwwwwww! her eyebrows furrow as she expels a loud, disappointed groan. Why tease her like this? Why deny her of her bone-truth?! Can you read the bones of, like, a rabbit, then? if not her bones, it would be something else's bones. She does not wait for an answer. With a devious little smirk, she rises quickly to her feet and thunders in the direction of one of the nearby food stores. No one would care if she stole one measly rabbit, right? She could eat it later, totally! She was old enough to do that now!
Swiping the carcass with a snap of her jaws, she drags it back over to Ingram and plops it at his feet with a soft grumble. Teach me how to read the bones! for she was a princess, and she deserved to know.

never apologize! <3

her disappointment is loud and pouty. sort of— but before ingram can explain that the bones he reads are special; selected for their meaning to him, she is off!

a soft sigh expels itself from betwixt his lips.

while she is distracted finding him, he presumes, a rabbit; he slinks off to grab his actual threadbones.

he arrives back only a few moments before her, tucking the rabbit skin with dried bones between his paws before she plops the meal down at his paws; a grumble in her throat.

he noses it back towards her. eat, and i will show you how to read bones, he tells her, a wiry grin tugging at the edges of his scarred muzzle. my threadbones are not any old bones, he explains, stepping back from the rabbit fur, nudging it open to reveal them.

some older than others, all of them worried with his teeth in what he called ritualistic markings.

they are significant to me. two rib bones tied to him by the very shared dna — but he wasn't about to admit that to a child. though he harbored no regrets, he is not so public about his matricide as he once was. marked for each thing they represent. he motions to the teethmarks in each bone; some shallow and some deep.

ingram looks at her then, gauging how she was following before explaining more.