[html] She slept.
Memories, small moments of her life flickered through her hazy dreams, but for the most part, she slept. The smoke had affected her head, and her heart had affected her body, and the burns had affected her life. It was all over, wasn't it? The dream, the family, the life she had tried making for herself. Mordulin would be ashamed of her now. Curled up nose to paws, the red wolf trembled in her slumber and watched the world drift in and out, in and out. It was a tide, washing over her, washing her in and out, in and out. A few times, she mumbled her daughters' names, other times, she cried out in pain and did not realize it.
Hazy green eyes blinked a few times before falling closed again, and she knew not how many days had passed. The sounds of the fire had died out, and this new world smelled like nothing she had ever known before. Maybe, Gods willing, for all her pain she would be rewarded here. [/html]
Skoll trudged with the weight of his massive friend across his shoulders, setting him down after he felt they were out of the range of the smoke. With pneumonia, Phoenix couldn't afford to be inhaling smoke...he had stayed as far ahead of it as he could. He had lost track of exactly how long he'd been moving...carrying Phoenix had definitely slowed him down. Skoll scouted around the immediate area where he'd first set Phoenix down, and found someone--obviously a victim of smoke and fire. A red wolfess he had never seen before.
"Are you alright?" he asked, concern in his eyes, morose in the knowledge that his home of three and a half years had just been devoured behind him. He hoped his voice would illicit a response. Had Phoenix been shifted, he would have been beyond capacity just trying to carry him this far, but as things were he could add one more person atop his shoulders when he departed this place, searching for other survivors. He didn't know for a certainty if anyone had died in the fires, but he had been separated from most of the Storm evacuees, slow as he'd been both on two legs and while carrying Phoenix.
[html] When Tristan had left Bleeding Souls with his sister, he had not expected to see any of the faces from that place again. He and Alarice had split ways before reaching Awenasa. She had returned home and he had turned west again, roaming as he had become used to. For several months this had been the case, several unremarkable weeks in which he functioned as he always had. Truly, he might have done this for the rest of his life.
That was until the fire. From miles away he could see it, and he knew where it was. He knew with dire certainty. Tristan did not sleep and did not stop. He crossed the scents of at least a dozen wolves but found his sister not among them. Finally, the wind gave way and he found her, curled in a ball, singed and looking worse then he imagined. Without a word the red wolf curled around her, putting his muzzle near her chin, a faint whine resounding from his chest. A stranger, massive and carrying what appeared to be a dead wolf. Without thinking, the red wolf leapt in front of his sister and lowered his head, tail high and fur along his spine tall. The growl that escaped his throat was vicious, and his pale eyes were manic. This was his sister, and no one was coming near her. [/html]
[html] She knew nothing. Not the day, not the time, not if she was even alive. She drifted still, until a loud voice brought her thudding out of her little coma. "W-hat?" She croaked, and her throat hurt so much, her body hurt so much, her head hurt, her heart hurt. She just hurt. It seemed that in that moment of weakness, when the tears threatened to pour out like rain she was given a savior all her own, a figure to comfort her. Tristan, a male that she would know no matter what, had curled himself around her and she felt his strength and his pulse and his body like a safe, warm blanket. She leaned into his touch and the two siblings remained locked together for a moment, her scorched body against his strong flesh.
Tristan soon caught sight of the stranger and stood protectively in front of her, and despite the pains coating her, cocooning her, she managed to murmur a "Thank you..." To her protector. "Sir-" her mind was too hazy to remember who he was, or why she hated him without ever meeting him- ", Do you know if the members of Jaded Shadows made it out OK?" Now she remembered her pack and her duties to them. Now her heart ached at the thought of being forced to pick between them and her children. In the end, she had lost her babies. Now, would she also lose her pack? [/html]
Skoll's hair stood on end as the other creature approached, but when he saw the physical similarities, and how the two interacted, he made the connection. Whoever these two were, they were brother and sister. Skoll turned to get Phoenix and take him somewhere where he had family to watch after him, when the voice of the female came to his ear. Did he know of Jaded Shadows? He did not...he hadn't had the time, he had been one of the last wolves out of the valley, he hadn't seen most of the exodus.
"I'm sorry, I don't. You're the first one I've seen. I was near the back of evacuation, though, so it could be that the Shadows' wolves just got out before the Storm wolves did. If I meet any of them, though, I'll let them know you're here." Nodding to the protective wolf who had tried to defend his sister from someone who looked as menacing as Skoll did, he called over his shoulder "Good luck you two."
[html] The stranger grabbed the dead-looking wolf and began to move. Tristan, who did not turn and who refused to take his eyes from the male, didn’t even look back as Fatin spoke. Not until the scarred wolf was at a safe distance did he return to his sister, offering her a few comforting licks on the face before laying down to be eye to eye with her. “I’m sure they’re fine, Fatin. Can you move?” He would move her otherwise. She needed to get off the mountain and somewhere safe. Even now his attention was entirely on her, not even giving the charred ruins below them a passing glance. [/html]
[html] She nodded as the male responded and then left. She felt a hollow fear in her heart, but understood that their chances were just as good as hers. Unfortunately, her daughter's hadn't been so good..."Oh Tristan....Amaury and Miriad, my youngest daughters....they...." She choked on a coughing fit, feeling her throat screaming up at her to just shut up and move. Wincing, she attempted to get to her feet only to find that on her back right foot, it was dangerously swollen and painful. "I can.." She would push through the pain, she had to.
Taking a few steps she cast her green eyes on him, looking beaten and broken. "Do you know where to go?" They were in this together, and she couldn't have expressed how grateful she was to not be alone. [/html]
[html] Again his muzzle went under her chin, comforting her, letting her know he was there. He was not ignorant to her back foot and watched as she moved. Advancing he came to her side again, pale blue eyes as soft as they could be despite the weathered and cold gleam they always had. “Shh,” he said gently, walking beside her slowly, at her pace. “We’ll get down the mountain. We’ll find something.” Living exactly how he had lived his life until this point; day to day and moment to moment. [/html]
[html] Her coat was now a living bed of charred flesh and dead flame. Her pelt, which had always been associated with the colors of fire, was now the remaining pieces of her battle through the fire. Sighing softly at his touch, she just allowed herself to be fussed over and cared for. She relinquished all control and power to him, and they made their way down the mountain and little more than a snail's pace. She had a feeling her foot wasn't going to look the same when she healed up - hoping against hope that she managed to look the same when she saw the other side of this mess.
A few times, she almost slipped. Each time, he saved her. Looking apologetically at him because of her foot, she knew she needed more than just her own subtle luck to survive. Tristan was her savior in this moment, and when they finally got down the mountain she watched him, sighing softly. "Two of my daughters went out for a hunt this morning, and that's when I saw the fires from the mountain side....by the time I found them, they were trapped and....it was over." She said, dropping her gaze from his. "I just barely managed to get out myself...and I don't know where the pack is, or what to do..." She sighed softly, pressing her face into his chest. "I dont know what I would have happened to me if you hadn't shown up..." [/html]
[html] Never once did he expect or ask her to do better or do anything. She had suffered, and he could see this, as clearly as he could see the burns weren’t all that had happened. Down they went, over crumbling rocks and dry grass. Somehow they found the ground and a grassy area where they settled, Tristan resting his head on her neck gingerly, as if she might break. For a while, all he did was listen. “I’m sorry. You did what you could. They’ll be in a better place, and they’ll be there together.”
With his body wrapped around her, his tail gave a feeble wag before it curled against her hindquarters. “You’re tough, you would have made it,” he reminded her, keeping his eyes on the strange forest, listening to the sounds of the unknown area. “We can look for them or we can start over.” [/html]
[html] He was as tender with her as a lover might have been, treating her like a delicate doll that might have crushed beneath his weight. Just his simple touches reminded her that she was alive, and no matter how much the pains hurt right now, she would make it through them. She smiled softly and nodded, it gave her some comfort to know that at least Amaury and Miriad were not alone. "My son Valerik will care for them too..." She said softly, and felt it in her heart to be true.
She heard his words but almost brushed them off, she wasn't sure of her survival, what if the flames had made it up that mountain? Her flesh would have been swallowed whole, and she would have joined her brother, son, and daughters in the After. She didn't want to respond to that idea, even though it had raced through her mind when she was trying to escape the fire. His final statement made her wonder though, and she sighed softly. "I....I want to find Jaded Shadows, so many there are my family and friends. But..." She paused mid sentence, soaking up the remainder of her courage to say the next thing weighing on her mind. "I want to start over. With everything....a new pack, these new lands...we don't even know if anyone else made it out of the fire....and we should push on..I should push on, just in case they didn't." She said quietly and gently nuzzled in to her brother's flesh. "I wont make you stay Tristan, but I would love it if you did....Laurent, he found his way to Jaded Shadows....I hope he made it out alive..." [/html]
[html] He had never realized how many of her children she had lost. Tristan, who had never had any, did not understand the pain on the same level. There was a fair idea, but he was also emotionally strained, distant, unlike others. What he was doing now was a remarkable thing, but Fatin was his sister and she always would be. They were not as close as he and Alarice, but they were blood bound.
Tristan’s head lifted and he pulled his head back to look at her. He remained quiet for a moment, considering, and then smiled faintly. “When you heal we’ll go look for them,” he said, pale eyes sharpening only slightly. “Laurent is probably fine. He’s been on his own longer then the rest of us.” Tristan barely knew his brother, but had a fair idea that if he had survived this long he would still be kicking. “I’ll stay as long as I can,” he added quietly. [/html]
[html] "Who knows.." She began to respond, meeting his eyes with a familiar ease ". maybe they'll find us instead." She somehow had her doubts, but only out of fear that she wouldn't see her family and pack again. It was a primal fear from experience alone.
"That's true....he's a huge thing, big as Dad is.....I'm sure he made it out alright..." Or so, she hoped and prayed. "I spent a little time outside these lands before I took over Jaded Shadows....I founded a little pack and called it Labyrinth Glen. It was peaceful, welcoming.....warm; like a family. It would be nice to see it come back to life..." With all the stragglers, there was no telling how many people would end up dragging themselves out of the woodworks. They would need a home, a place to stay. They could provided it. "We just need to find some more people, and find the place that just fits..." She said quietly. That glimmer of a dream, it was slowly turning into a reality. [/html]
[html] In his secret heart, Tristan knew it was unlikely what was Jaded Shadows would ever be again. Such catastrophes could only bring out the best in some people—stories of heroic deeds and the like. Unfortunately, at heart they were all animals, and animals lived for themselves alone. Not once, but several times over, Tristan had been forced to make that decision. That was why he was still alive.
He smiled a little at the idea she presented. Having never known a place like that for very long, it seemed remarkable that perhaps, just maybe, they could make it work. “Once you rest up,” he said gently, inhaling deeply. “Get some sleep. We’ll talk about it when you wake up.” And while his breathing feel into a deeper pattern, his eyes remained wide open. He would not risk letting anything happen to his older sister on his watch. [/html]
[html] She didn't need to be told to sleep twice. Already, she was tired again, and her lazy eyes began to droop slightly. She shifted her body over just a bit, and her body erupted into a volley of pain. Grunting softly she added a task to their duties for tomorrow "We need to find some herbs...for pain, fr healing. I probably wont be the only one to need them..." She said. A few minutes later, she was silent and her breathing was deep and slow. Sleep came to her once again, and she let herself fall into rest. Whether it was fitful or not was yet to be determined, for now though, she was safe from the pain and from thinking. [/html]
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