Myrika is by Raze!

Her dream was interrupted by a rude shaking on her shoulder. Her name was being whispered, over and over again. Myrika was awake with frightful quickness, sitting up so fast she nearly knocked Kaena aside. The old woman took a stumbling step backward, nearly losing the burning light she held. The tawny-furred coyote blinked, her eyes unused to even the dimly glowing and flickering light of the torch. The old woman smiled, but it seemed to Myrika a grave sort of expression, made even more solemn by the criss-cross pattern of scars. A call at the borders, the Evocati explained as she led a vaguely groggy Myrika toward the entrance of the schoolhouse. No voice I know, but it calls for you.

The fire Kaena must have been sitting beside was burning low, little more than glowing embers. There was a muffled horse noise from within the barn and the endless whirring of cicadas, but otherwise, the night was quiet. Perhaps Kaena had hallucinated the call entirely -- or perhaps Myrika was still dreaming. Inconspicuously, she pinched herself on the arm. It hurt, and so she knew herself to be awake. Where? she asked, stretching sleep away from long limbs. The old woman, already settling back down beside her fire, looked up and seemed to glare, though perhaps it was simply firelight reflecting on her remaining eye.

South. It was faint. Probably by the forest. Myrika was sour at this -- perhaps Kaena was only hearing things? The redhead moved toward the stables all the same, sticking an arm into pat Militades on the head. The colt attempted to shrink away from her, but as he shared a stall with his mother and room was tight, she patted him squarely. The colt laid his ears back and bared his teeth, only to be reprimanded by a sharp snort from his mother. Myri was surprised to find her horse tacked and ready -- she tugged a strap here and there to ascertain the job, and found it satisfactory.

Leading the tall horse out of the stables and corral, she paused to thank the old woman for readying the horse before waking her. From there, it was only to quicken the horse to a fast trot. She guided the horse south, taking him along the beach. All the while, her ears were perked skyward for the noise of a second calling, though she heard nothing but the pound of hooves and the noises of night. She had plunged her horse through the second stream she must cross to reach the borders and was nearly to their skull-lined border when she smelled something that made her stiffen in the saddle.

Cahal smelled it, too -- or at least, the most obvious part of the smell. It was a stink more than anything, the distinctive flavor of long-dead, half-rotten meat. Myrika recognized this from having stumbled upon the dead in nature and did not find this in and of itself so disconcerting, but the other scents she recognized immediately thereafter were. There was blood, old enough to have dried to a dull red crust. This went with the scent of death, of course, but the underlying hint was only barely recognizable to Myri. It took her a long moment, and only with the tossing of her horse's head, his snorting and pawing, did she realize what it was. Although old as the blood and fading fast, the smell of abject terror was perhaps more pungent than all the rot and old death. And perhaps that, too, was only so terrible because Myrika recognized the faintest undertow in the air of a scent she could never have forgotten.

Myrika is by Alaine!

For one brief and very awful moment, her apprehension was such that she wished the past had never come back to her. It was a terrible thought and one she immediately banished, but it had surfaced a moment, all the same. It was the same thought process which had initially given her over to thinking the first faint wisps of scent, so many weeks ago, were merely an illusion. Or perhaps she'd attributed them a similarly scented canine, or perhaps she was just fooling herself. Whatever deniability there had been was long gone, however, with the return of scent and sound both.

She might not have recognized the once-pale figure before her, if not for the scent. Outside of being taller and far more adult than Myrika remembered, her sister was no longer pale or white. It was clear from whence the scent of old gore had arisen -- it was caked over her, clinging to every visible inch, as if she'd just arisen from a bath of blood and guts. Yet, the tawny-furred hybrid could see even with the distance some of it was Cassie's own -- pink and red streaked from her shoulder, more colorful than all the rest. The bared and raw flesh seemed to scream against the rest of her, streaked off-white and gray-brown and even deep orange-red rust in places.

She tried to urge Cahal forward, but the big horse took only a few steps before he stopped, tossing his head and snorting with increased agitation. Her dismount was ungraceful, starkly contrasted to her usual easy slide in and out of the seat. She ignored the horse even as he turned unceremoniously and trotted off, happy to be released from the duty of advancing on the gore-slicked figure. For her part, Myri could only stand as if entranced, wide-eyed and staring. The tawny-furred woman stepped forward once, stopped, and looked down at the earth as if mildly surprised it remained unmoving and still beneath her feet.

The urge to go forth was too strong to resist, then -- touched with something far stronger than a mere velleity, the hyrbid advanced with fast steps. Cassie. Her voice was a half-whine, light years away from the commanding tone an Aquila ought to take. But then again, she had no need of that particular voice now -- and anyway, when had she ever sounded anything like she was supposed to?

Myrika is by me!

She was a little girl again -- all pretense of leadership had fled her entirely. The memories of Inferni and the schoolhouse and Ezekiel and Kaena and history and family were thoroughly erased for one lovely-long moment. Though the purple-pink eyes were directed elsewhere and Cassandra had not stepped forward in greeting herself, these signs of aversion were missed or mistaken. She approached boldly, forgetful or unmindful of lost years, and even hunching more than she had in a great many months within Inferni, as she had when younger and even more uncomfortable with the space she occupied.

She reached out, and her hand hesitated with the flinch Cassie gave, but reached forward again nonetheless, to pluck a stringy piece of something out of hair that had been pale yellow once. She brushed a little bit of the grime and mud away from the upper arm that was not open and raw. Tawny hands, now flecked with bits of whatever, moved for the hair again and suddenly stopped, dropping. She recognized the futility of her gestures, for they might stand there for hours and with both hands she could not hope to clean the entirety of Cassie's pelt.

Then her sister spoke again, asking a question which brought everything snapping back into place. Neatly as it happened, Myri was suddenly aware that she was not supposed to be here. She wasn't supposed to have gone to Inferni at all, much less lead it. Her shoulders squared and she was straightening upright again, though her ears had dipped low. Yes, she said, simply and without consideration of visitation, its length, or permanence of stay.

Ezekiel's gone, though, she added, after only the briefest of pauses. There was no concealing this; the absence of his scent was palpable on even the borders, though the composition of Inferni's canine scents seemed far from her sister's greatest concern. The redhead had spoken these very words several times over the past few weeks, but never before had they tasted quite so bad, nor had they sounded quite so awkward. And quickly, too, she held out her hand and then her whole arm, not knowing what else to do but offer her home. That's what it is now, right? Home? The thought, unbidden, was deeply morose; Myrika knew it was the voice of the new stone in the pit of her stomach, the hard and uncomfortable ball consisting of her once-forgotten displacement and sense of unbelonging, old anxieties, and guilt all anew.

Come with me, she said, making valiant attempts at keeping the pleading tone from her own voice.

Myrika is by me!

A forgotten, presumed dead part of her wanted to chide her sister for even having gotten out of the saddle in the first place, but even gentle rebuke had no place here. Whatever she had learned of confidence was reduced to quivering tension, a strange feeling of palpable relief accompanied by faint dread for what must soon come in the way of conversation and knowledge. Let me help you back up, she said, and stood, to provide leverage to help the pale coyote into the saddle. Her movements had the slow and pained look that reminded Myrika absurdly of Kaena.

Shuffling back a half-step awkwardly, her nose finally overwhelmed with the myriad of scents of decay, fear, and old blood. She kept her nose still and the skin of her muzzle flat and expressionless by force of will only, and turned her head to stare for Cahal. The horse stood beside a tall pine tree, well below its lowest boughs. Though the tawny coyote called to him by name and made all manner of appeasing sounds and motions, the horse would not approach. Even as Myrika walked toward him, he snorted and tossed his head, prancing away from her. She, too, was now accompanied by those scents.

Defeated, the woman returned to her Cassandra and gave a shrug of her shoulders. The seating arrangements made with awkward and halting conversation, Myri now looked at the pale golden horse skeptically. When she got into saddle, however, the animal held their weight, and started forward with only a nudge from Myri. Then it was only to decide where they were going. The hybrid first considered the sea, for she wanted nothing more than to ride the horse into the waves and roll around in the water, but headed toward her home instead. If she had any clearness of thought, she might have at least stopped at the hospital house first, but there was no such consideration within her head.

Cahal trailed after them by some distance, occasionally whinnying his distress. Myri drove the strange mount onward at a hurried pace, though she dared not urge her faster than a walk due to the clinging presence at her back. If a fall was not among the most painful things for a sprained ankle, it might break the already swollen joint. She dared not speak, for she did not know what to say, though she considered pretending as if what she might say was too important to speak to a horse's neck, without looking on her sister's face. In the distance, the low, barely red glow of a dying fire was the only indication of the schoolhouse for some time, until the building loomed up out of the shadows. Myri considered its brick front and the embers of Kaena's fire, thankful no one had decided to hang up any skulls around her home. There was at least that.

Of the old woman, there was no sign. The seat she'd occupied was empty, and Myrika found she was relieved for that when she slid down and out of the saddle, turning immediately to aid Cassie down as well.

Myrika is by me!

The redhead did not bother with Cahal. He would not wander far, and soon enough, he would want his stable and his corral -- though she might have to catch the palomino and lead her into the lake before her stallion would approach her or the corral she now occupied. Myri closed the gate and gave a wistful glance toward the chestnut, though her concerns were elsewhere for the moment. The slumping and heavy motions her sister made almost provoked a grimace on Myrika's face, but some of the preparatory conditioning she'd received was returning. The Aquila in her, however tiny that part felt in the moment, remembered how to mask truth, and instead Myrika tried a faint smile of encouragement. Though she still hadn't the faintest idea what to say, the tawny-furred hybrid was beginning to think it was better she didn't speak. Sleep before speak, perhaps? But there was all that old blood, and clean sleep would at least allow Cassie to awake with some semblance of refreshment?

Her time in Inferni -- and even before that -- taught her enough to understand the torn shoulder and blood, the other signs of strife and struggle. The ankle along might be consequence of a fall or even a dismount taken badly, but the rest was unmistakable. Myrika was acutely aware of her home's every flaw: the beaten leather hanging across the holes where the front windows once were, the haphazard pile of firewood, the closed doors, behind which Halo and her younger cousins slept. There was a shuffling noise from the rear of the building, and Myri stepped forward to block the way toward her room. Go in, she said, indicating it with a toss of her head.

Who is that? The gravelly voice was surprisingly strong, though perhaps it was a strength arising out of fear. Kae's one eye was wide, though her scarred face seemed only terrible, as it always was. She rose out of the darkness clutching a green cloth blanket around herself. The thing was tattered to pieces and stank of Kaena, clearly a long-time possession.

Later, Myrika said, gently at first. She repeated the single, terse word more sharply when Kaena said a word or two of protest, interrupting the old woman to deliver a series of equally terse, whispered words about water and whatever was left from Halo. Don't wake anyone up, Myri said, and turned to her own room. She stepped inside and shut the door without ascertaining obedience from the elderly woman. A faint shuffle could be defiance in returning to the rear of the schoolhouse as much as it might be the following of what Myrika might later consider orders.

She stood there a second with her hands behind her, still on the door knob, and stared at the mess that had been her Cassie. There were more wounds than the recent and visible, she was beginning to realize. Letting both hands drop to her side, the redhead crept forward into the room. She stopped and looked down at the floor, acutely aware of the fact that she harbored within her home the progenitor of all that was Lykoi within her very home, and that same woman sent to fetch water and whatever else was to be had. I'm sorry, she blurted, suddenly and way more loudly than she'd meant to. And she wasn't even certain what it was she was apologizing for -- everything she'd done and hadn't done, everything she was ignorant of, lost time, everything, nothing, all of the above?

Myrika is by me!

Myrika looked around her room in vain, searching for anything which she might use to begin the process of cleaning and comforting. She had only her hands, and the hope that Kaena would do as asked. Despite her supposed title, she was not certain whether she did hold sway over the old woman -- maybe it was simply tiredness of age and lack of resistance which made her peaceful enough. She did not want the apology, but did not protest all the same, only turning away to tug the chair away from her desk with the question. One of the pelts was pulled from her bed and settled over the hard chair for some semblance of comfort. She then inched backward until she leaned against her desk.

The room was swathed in great shadow despite the wide open windows and silvery night light. Even with the lingering dimness, Myrika could still see the patches on her sister's fur, streaked gray and coal in the poor light. Yeah, she answered, finally. A year. And one week, and one day, but precise dates were something even she did not comprehend in the fullest. She slid her arms over her torso, one of them covering the patch of missing fur and red star therein. A shuffle and knock that sounded more like a soft kick sounded mercifully at the door, sparing her the conversation for a moment.

When she opened the door, orange light greeted her. A candle sat on the firewood pile behind Kaena, precariously balanced. Myri grimaced at it, but took the offered bucket and bundle, tucking the latter beneath her arm before Kaena handed her the candle. She offered nothing, and the old coyote asked nothing, though her golden eye did strain and squint to peer through the gloom behind Myri all the same. She did have the grace and good sense to shuffle back into the darkness. Myri turned, nudged the door closed with a foot, and moved back toward the desk.

She was quick to set everything down, but her turquoise eyes glanced over at Cassie, apprehensive of the words but wanting to hear her voice all the same. She pulled apart the cloth and, after setting the other contents aside, dipped the dented metal cup into the bucket, offering it out.

Myrika is by me!

Her gaze drifted over the items, less arranged than haphazardly scattered across the surface of the desk. She didn't want to look up, but she made herself do so, bringing her turquoise eyes up and toward her sister. She watched with itching fingers as some of the grime was lifted from her. Myrika wanted to help, but perhaps more compelling than this desire was the desire to avoid another pained flinch away from her touch. She dropped her hands away from her ribs at the words. The moment the pale coyote said this was the place, Myrika knew it to be true -- even before she continued to speak of Thornloe's destruction or disbandment or whatever had happened. She shifted and glared miserably at the floor.

There was no other place. She needn't agree verbally; the look she gave the old tiled floor was perhaps enough. Even if there was somewhere else to be, she would be leaving behind Vesper, friendships, a feeling of belonging she had never known before in departing, and the tawny-furred coyote did not think herself capable. It had taken long months of delaying, avoiding, and excusing for her to even work up the courage to cross the skull-lined borders. How many more would it take to leave, and if she left, could she ever face returning?

She lifted her nose from the ground and her eyes followed Cassie's motions a moment. When were you there? she asked, trying to keep the whine from the question. Is that why... she touched her own shoulder, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. The wound looked fresher than a journey of such distance, though it was difficult to tell with the muck and dirt and old blood. I saw daddy just before... coming here -- that sounded better than "joining Inferni" -- and he said he was going back. She did not want to think about that, much less talk about it, but to say otherwise or fail to say anything at all felt like lying. The last thing she wanted was to dredge up the possibility of more tragedy to her injured and tired sister, but she wanted to know, too. Or did she? She hung her head a little lower, reaching up to nervously rearrange her hair behind one shoulder.

Maybe she should have gone to Thornloe instead of here. She and their father both might have been there waiting for her sister's return. She had entertained the possibility, however distant, that her mother might well come to Inferni -- or this, Cassie's arrival. And she had been just a little fascinated, too, with unknown quantities of family, however dark they were in tales. It had been so long in getting up her strength and gall to approach, too, she hadn't wanted to walk away. Every reason she could have given, though, was flimsier than the last, and none sounded good enough to even mention. The stone in her center grew just a little heavier, and she exhaled a slow breath to try and ease it, without any effect whatsoever.

Myrika is by me!

She picked up one of the rags, bunching and unbunching it in her hands, fiddling with its edges, turning it over one hand and then the other. Maybe it wasn't so strange, but Myri found she did not care what happened to Thornloe, as long as what she cared about was not there for its destruction. With half of that sitting before her and the other unlikely to have gotten there before hand, there was no reason for her to care what happened back there. It was the past, and one she'd avoid revisiting. There was a little stab of guilt and some part of her conscience probing at her, perhaps questioning whether she really felt that way or just felt that way because she'd never been a part of that place, but there was too much elsewise to care about. It was just one other small thing and there were too many other things to feel bad about.

Her ears sank fully into the copper locks of her hair, and she was astounded to find some part of her -- perhaps the most shamed -- did not want her father back to see her where she was and what she was. But should he return, their father would seek her where she said she was headed -- Inferni. And find, should he try the borders, he'd find them saturated with her scent, lacking in Ezekiel's. Then he'd know she'd made her choice. Then again, hadn't she done so a year ago? Perhaps the long months of contemplation sufficed only to convince herself otherwise, to rationalize away that choice? East or west, ancestry or family. The change of her position might not even make things worse or better. Yet she knew, too, she was as chained to the clan as Ezekiel had been before her. Should she leave, it might even be Kaena to play the part of Inferni's Lykoi again. Or worse -- better? -- Ithiel, or Helotes, or any of the other cousins and more distant relations Ezekiel had not trusted to take his place. It was only her.

She was very quiet and still for a long moment, ceasing even the endless motion of the dry tag. Myri ruminated over her shame, convincing herself they were unwitting wrongs or otherwise explaining them away. Can I help you? she asked, quietly and in the same tone she had implored Ezekiel to choose someone else. She had asked, but she hadn't said no, either. Please?

Myrika is by me!

It was difficult to bear Cassie's gaze in a way it had not been ever before, but Myri did not look away. She had at least learned enough to bear a hard gaze, and had given one or two herself thus far -- and would have to again in the future, and worse perhaps, if she had any hope of retaining her rank. She could not and did not, however, return any of its harshness, and she hoped, none of its sadness either. Though she did not want to see her sister in such condition, the tawny-furred woman would not regret her appearance altogether. Thus she kept her gaze, and her expression reflected only softness.

I mean, she said softly, and then stopped. What did she mean? Clean away the dirt and mess, unravel time's progression, bring them all together in the cozy place they'd once called home for so brief a time? Her lower jaw worked silently with the question of what it was she meant for a moment, until she stopped suddenly. Straightening upright, she shuffled the step or two away from the desk. Kneeling slowly beside Cassie, and still moving with painful awkward slowness in attempt to avoid provoking another flinch away, she went to wrap her arms carefully around the mud-streaked torso. Though she avoided whatever visible wounds there were, she was unwitting of the many invisible ones, bruises and bumps and wounds deeper still.

She knew she could not beg for continued presence, and so did not. Instead, still clutching the dry rag in one of her hands, she sought to show contrition with contact, unmindful of the lingering grime. The tawny coyote did not seek to squeeze or constrict; her only wish was to hold. Though the touch made the sinking feeling in her stomach heavier, she wanted -- no, needed -- it all the same.

Myrika is by Aly!

Myri tried to recall, but could not, a time before when she had felt quite so prostrated and useless. She didn't need to be told there were a great many somethings weighing over her sister, for the presence beside her was different from any she recalled. Weights, pressure, shoving, kneading, and all manner of things had shaped the youth she'd once known into a cringing and stiffening creature. There were stains and marks more permanent than the temporary marks on the colorless fur and pink flesh. She did not dare ask, and maybe knew there would be no satisfying answer, only avoidance or, at best, some vague detail or enigmatic, clipped phrase. Even then, even if she knew, she'd still be helpless to fix or do.

Though her perspective was not so unbiased where she herself was concerned, Myri did not think herself so different from the canine she had been once. Maybe she was, though? Ezekiel had conditioned her in such a surreptitious way she was never even aware it was happening until it was far too late. This brought a new uneasiness upon her, though it was mild compared to the rest. Little could compete with the steadily sinking feeling, the heaviness on her shoulders that made her slouch and hunch down herself. She thought she'd forgotten, but maybe she had only buried it a while.

The quiet voice and single word did not make her withdraw. She pressed her cheek against the pale shoulder, gently rubbing her hand over an accessible and unwounded forearm. The whines and cries above her ears were audible and she herself felt like reflecting them, but Myri was required to be strong for the clan. She could therefore stand to be strong for her sister, too, and would be cried upon without venting her own frustrations. She'd hold her as long as she was permitted to do so. Still, she exhaled a held breath shakily to steady herself and drew in another just as unsteadily, only just barely keeping her composure -- and even then, on one of her breaths there was a small whine despite her efforts.

She wanted to carry her sister to the sea and make her clean again. There was only the bucket of water and useless damned rags, and Myrika did not know if the water belonging to Inferni would even be enough. It was bought, after all, with the blood and broken skulls of many coyotes and wolves both, with fire and smoke and ash, with more deaths than even Kaena could remember. And all of that -- now hers.