Myrika is by Kiri!

The schoolhouse was astoundingly quiet. Myrika had sent them all away -- Amnesty, Oblivion, and Kaena. Only blind Halo remained, and she, as per her custom, did not rouse herself from her room. Myrika was grateful that the old woman had, at least, seen to Cahal and the horse that had carried Cassie to Inferni's borders. The blood scrubbed from her and the saddle removed, the Palomino was accepted by friendly Farai immediately, though Myri kept Eira and her colt in the rearmost pen. The sheep milled about in their small pen, one or two bleating now and again. Cahal was still in his stall -- there weren't enough corrals. She'd have to try to expand, or split the largest. Contemplating with dull and tired eyes from her perch beneath the porch, Myrika attempted to distract herself with the mundane, at least until she remembered the palomino wasn't a permanent resident and wouldn't be staying.

Then, it was only to sneak over to the side of the schoolhouse and bend over, peering down on the sleeping form therein. Perhaps she kept expecting her sister to disappear, and that was why she continually checked on her -- though logically, Myri knew the ankle kept Cassie where she was. At least, without a horse, she couldn't hope to go very far at all. The redhead watched the rise and fall of the pale chest a moment and turned back to her horses. It wasn't a minute later before she was turning around again, though, and moving to the inside of the schoolhouse. She went into her workshop and worked at cleaning the saddle that had carried Cassie here. She scrubbed a patch of dirt, and then left it where it was on the bench. She saddled Cahal and rode him out of the gate without dismounting, shutting it behind her with a foot. Keeping him at a slow -- and quiet -- walk until well away from the schoolhouse, the woman kicked him into a gallop, unmindful of his pace until they reached the trees and underbrush of the forest.

Returning from the hospital house and greenhouse with whatever she thought her sister might need and then some, Myrika rode Cahal at an easier pace, sorry that she'd driven him so hard once she saw the figure, still unmoving, within her room. She walked the stallion about to cool him down and then simply let him wander, certain he would not meander far from the village, let alone Inferni itself. The hybrid found herself thereafter hunting. Too tired to shift and back again, she stalked around in her two-legged form absurdly, frustrating herself until dumb luck presented her with opportunity. Even then, she nearly bungled it in her exhaustion, and only just barely carried the young doe back to the village slung over a shoulder.

She was presented with a conundrum when she could not remember her sister's preference as to cooked or raw meat. In the end, she ate a small meal of part of a flank after building a small fire to cook a few cuts on crude sticks, leaving the rest of the animal intact. With nothing else she could think to do, the hybrid simply slumped against the old brick and watched the embers of her low fire die out. Her limbs felt twitchy, and she thought about going to tell someone, anyone, she might be lacking in attentiveness for a few days -- or longer, if she was well and truly lucky. As she thought about it, though, the long hours since her sister had fallen asleep and the fact that she'd already dismissed the usual residents of the Village into greater Inferni kept her from doing so. Instead, she crept back inside and settled down beside her pale sister. She closed her eyes and drifted into a warm nap, though her sleep was light enough that she did not fear missing movement so close to her.

Myrika is by me!

Perhaps her sleep was deeper than she'd intended, for she did not immediately stir with movement beside her -- or it was the dream. She was back with Vesper in the meadow, but it was day instead of night, and instead of squirming and wriggling with one another, they were simply looking up toward the sky. Myrika viewed this as if from a third party, staring down at herself and Vesper for a long time. At first she thought it sweet, then became disquieted by the absolute stillness of the scene. It took her a moment to realize all was not still -- the grass around them stirred with the bay's breeze, and the clouds drifted slowly across the sky, but neither she nor Vesper seemed to move. Their lack of breath was just dawning on her when she awoke, surfacing up from the conjured reality with a little start.

The dream and its details long gone, it left only a lingering sense of panic. Myrika attributed that feeling to the figure seated beside her rather than the traces of the sleep world. She held her breath for a moment, studying the pale fur. There were visible knots of her spine tracing from the small of her back until they disappeared beneath silvery locks of hair. Myri stirred a little, as if only just waking, and pulled herself up beside Cassie. She missed a beat and started talking a few seconds after it might have been natural to do so. Hi. There's food. I cooked some, and there's some still on the deer. And only Halo's here, and she doesn't really leave her room. You don't have to worry about her. I -- everyone else found somewhere else to be today, she said, deciding that sounded better than that she'd sent them away. I didn't think you'd want to be bothered. Quiet seemed... better.

Surely Kaena would continue her nosiness, and she couldn't trust Amnesty for friendliness, let alone politeness. Only Halo could be tolerated around the Village today, and at that because she kept herself essentially quarantined. She wanted to tell her sister about these presences within her life, but she wasn't so desperate to fill silence or unthinking as to prattle off the friendships and family she'd encountered within the clan. She was quite sure Cassie did not want to hear a bit of it. The inane, then, was what she chose to speak on.

Myrika is by me!

She sat there beside the ghost now occupying her bedroom. The stillness was strange to Myrika, but not entirely unpleasant after the bustle and noise. The schoolhouse had not been so quiet in many months, and her sister's voice even seemed hesitant to intrude too much on the tranquility. At least, Myri thought it was a good sort of quiet -- albeit not without some faint sense of doom, too. She started to stand and fetch the food, hesitating on the question a moment before straightening upright.

Thank you for coming, she said, looking down at the top of Cassie's downturned head. She's a cousin. Again, the redhead paused a second longer was natural, and what followed was just as disjointed, interspersed with awkward half-pauses and rushed words. She was a leader, once, but she lost her eyes, almost died -- protecting her kid. I saved her. This last was muttered miserably, perhaps enough of an indicator regarding the cost of Halo's life, but Myri was already breaking for the door and the meat. I'll-get-you-food, she said, almost as one word. She took a moment longer than necessary to compose herself outside, and returned with a haunch of deer clutched in one hand.

Her eyes fell on the desk and the haphazardly folded cloak as she reentered. Clutching the meat in one hand, she took up the cloak in the other and held both out at her sister. I don't know if the other can be washed out... or if this one is as good, she said. Some of the things Inferni had were stained with blood, but she had taken the best of what was left. Only a faint darkness existed in one corner of the cloak, and even then, it had been ash rather than blood. In the end, though, both blood and ash were weapons of Inferni, and both may as well have soaked through the cloak through and through. Myri knew how the thing was bought.

Myrika is by me!

She tried very hard not to think about the wolves on the border, or the wolves that had attacked their home. It was easy to pretend she was alright with killing in defense -- and easier still to act. In the moment, there was no time to think and query morality whether an action was right or wrong. There was only to act and react, or die. She had not wanted this last, as any living creature was so inclined, and so she had fought and killed.

And, better than that -- she had, by some dumb luck, escaped these conflicts unscathed. Halo's wolf had never had a chance -- perhaps without Myrika's jaws, even, she might have fallen dead to the ground. Ithiel's arrows were lethal in that way. But the Boreas wolves should have scarred her; instead, she'd received only cuts and scrapes, the worst of her wounds already hidden by regrown fur. Maybe if she wore some scar, as everyone else seemed to, it wouldn't be quite so bad? It was a silly way to think, and sillier still to contemplate her appearance in such a manner after striving so long to make it acceptable -- though to whom, Myri wouldn't have been able to answer.

But as it turned out, she needn't dwell on either Halo's wolf or the Boreas wolves, for her sister left that where it was. The redhead could not decide whether this was better or worse, but was relieved nonetheless when no further explanation was asked -- and then, guilty for feeling relieved. It's okay. You don't have to thank me, she said, and then her ears went half-mast as she winced visibly. There had been too much Aquila in that -- perhaps she was forgetting how to speak as herself.

I mean, she said, shifting over so she could sit where she had before leaving the room. You're here. I'll do whatever I can. Hell, I'll sew you new pockets. She had been preparing to launch into an explanation of how she'd learned to do that to begin with when she remembered -- I do like the quiet -- and thought better of it.

Myrika is by me!

She pulled her knees up toward her chest, resting her chin on one. No trouble, she said, but it sounded meek and feeble even then. If it was no trouble, why did she feel so bad -- so strange? Her turquoise eyes alone were directed at her sister, though her muzzle was angled away and even toward the row of windows. There were other things she might attend, but nothing of pressing need. The coyotes of Inferni did not need her guidance in their day-to-day lives; the self-sufficiency of the clan was evident in the smoothness of her own transition to Aquila. Perhaps if they had been in need of strength to hold them together, perhaps if Ezekiel had been the binding to keep them from coming apart -- but as it was, it had barely seemed more than a few small ripples for the Legatus ranks to change so suddenly, and already, they'd dissipated, allowing the relative stillness to return.

Her fingers pulled at the fur of one of the bed's pelts, straightening it and plucking the stiffness from the small patch of fur. Her ear twitched with the question, though she did not turn her head toward Cassie and was now looking away, as well. Did she even have a reason? She tried to remember and recall. There were many things she might have said, but all reasons seemed flimsy and pale in response. She was still curious, she was still hopeful, she wanted to find truth no matter how harsh? I didn't want to go back, she said, unable for all her words to explain any more precisely than this. I didn't want to go forward, either, but I didn't want to go back more than forward, she could have added, but did not. I didn't want to see the same faces again, she might have said, too, but then -- her sister's face, her father's face, even the murkiest memory of her mother's face, were not amongst those she wished to shun.

She let her knees fall apart and sat cross-legged, though she hunched over her own lap all the same, making herself smaller. I stayed because... because... of Ezekiel. Halo. Kaena. Jacinto, and Ithiel, she said. There were other names -- more than she could hope to speak without forgetting some, but one she could not avoid. And Vesper, she added, more quietly than the rest. Perhaps Vesper most of all. Because it wasn't a vile place, because she'd found a startling lack of debauchery and evil; because she'd found somewhere where no one gave sidelong glances to her and grins to one another; because, perhaps most shamefully of all, she felt she'd found a place of belonging.

Myrika is by me!

Vesper, she said, answering almost immediately without any clear idea of what she wanted to say -- and, upon realizing her lack of words, stopped. Vesper is... she started, and stopped. We -- she -- another cessation of speech, a shifting of weight, an almost angry tug at the pelt. She tried not to look at the twitch and motion, keeping her blue-green eyes focused on either the pelt beneath her or the windows.

Myrika gave a slow and steadying exhale. I love her, she more blurted than decided was the best way to put it. Need she forsake family to have romantic love? Myrika thought not, but was this pale stranger family? She glanced up and looked at Cassie, her ears almost flat in her coppery hair. She did not need to puzzle this out; the painful, pricking feeling at having even thought the question resonated within her.

I didn't mean to stay, she might have said, but that would be a lie. Difficult as it was to speak truth, a lie was worse by far. I still love you, though, she added, voice small and lame. And daddy. And mama. She did -- that much was true, but if asked to prove it -- if asked to leave Inferni? Her head dipped a little lowers, the tops of her shoulders hunched almost up to the lowest point of her jaw. It was too easy to speak such, but if actions were more meaningful than simple speech, she'd proved herself a liar several times over, hadn't she?

Myrika is by me!

Although Myrika wished desperately to hear an affirmation of love in return, there was none. It was not so much a suspicion that the love itself had evaporated entirely as much as it was simple need to hear it, to be reassured of its continued existence, to bask in the sounds of very simple and very powerful words. She could not push for them, however, nor ask that they be spoken for her. All their power and loveliness would then be spoiled -- however slightly, but still permeated with that faint tinge of the false.

She might have defended Inferni and explained all she found, but she did not. I know -- it's okay, she said. Although some girlish and naive part of her had hoped for permanence, maybe some poor semblance of a family, she put this hope away and was unwilling to grieve for it just now. There was always time for that later -- as for now, she did have Cassie. There was enough awkward strangeness and lulls of silence without adding this log to the fire.

She could hear the buzzing of cicadas through the open windows, the endless song of summer ringing impossibly loud. The wordless tune sounded mechanical just now, lacking in the lazy beauty it had always seemed to hold. There was an occasional snort or bleat from the animals, but they were languid with the still-lingering heat, and did not produce so much sound as the insects.

Their noise, even, did not seem to equal that within the room. Myrika had never experienced quiet so all-encompassing before. Nor did she frequently experience such a loss of words -- one might think, with so much lost time, she could speak of the things she'd seen and experienced since last they'd spoken. At the very least, inane prattling might have provided a welcome distraction, but for all her prior babbling, nothing welled unbidden from her throat.

Cassie, she said, gently and now directing her muzzle and eyes both toward her sister. What happened? Myrika was not even certain whether she inquired on the blood and dirt and mud she'd cleaned away from the pale fur last night -- or the older things clinging to her sister, the remnants of whatever had come to pass in the long interim since she'd last seen her.

Myrika is by me!

The noise, choked half-laugh, provoked a cringe out of the tawny hybrid. She was sorry she had asked -- had been sorry long before the words left her lips, in fact, but needed to ask all the same. In inquiry, perhaps there was still some vague hope of alleviating some of what weighed so heavily on her sister's shoulders or loosening the rope that bound her nose toward the ground and kept her from lifting her head.

Her eyes roved over the smaller and slighter form. A fearsome scar across her face, thick and knotted scar tissue along her arms, and more evidence still of old injuries were new things to Myrika, but Cassandra seemed to bear them naturally, perhaps evidence of their longevity. She was not certain if she disliked the scars themselves or the way Cassie seemed to own them more. You know, she said, though her voice lacked in any scolding.

Here, she said, tracing her own cheek. Here, she touched her own shoulder, her arm. She wanted to touch the old scars on the silvery figure, but she was still afraid of evoking another flinch. Was the shoulder wound newer than her scent on Inferni's borders those many weeks ago? The thought thudded against Myrika's chest as a bird into the unseen glass of a window.

She lifted a knee and placed her elbow on it, finding her head too heavy to support all of a sudden. A tawny hand clutched at the hair on top of her head. She had not been the Aquila then; she might have followed after the scent. She might have asked Ithiel to find her. He'd done so once, albeit unintentionally. And even then, thinking of these what-ifs, Myri knew she couldn't have kept her sister here any more than she could now, not without ropes and chains. And she'd never, however much some tiny part of her wanted to in the name of safety.

Myrika is by me!

The coyote listened to her sister with half-lifted ears, glancing toward her now and again. Although the question she'd asked was answered, there was more left unsaid. Cassie provided only the driest account of what had occurred -- free of detail, memory, and emotion. Perhaps it was better for both of them that way, but Myrika could not help but shift position uncomfortably again, acutely aware of her own uselessness. The littlest part of her wanted to rage up and down the halls, pitch the chairs stacked haphazardly in the largest room, tear things down -- but she had learned some semblance of composure long before Ezekiel began conditioning her, and she knew too well the uselessness of any angry display.

She had to quite literally bite back the promise and offer of safety. The words were almost there when she clenched her jaws tight and swallowed them. They burned bitterly, but Myrika held them back all the same. She could not absolutely guarantee safety -- her time as an Aquila had been peaceful, but then it had not been very long at all, and she knew well enough the history of her clan. Try as she might, Myrika could not definitively say her clan was one of non-violence.

I should have... she stopped and groped for the words. Searched harder after the storm, taken her horse and left the farm, chased after the first faint wisp of Cassie's scent on the borders, and several hundred other possibilities occurred to her all at once. Done lots of things, she finished, morosely. I should have done lots of things. She shuffled closer, using the far arm to push herself over. The redhead wanted the closeness, but she didn't know if she dared reach out an arm and hold. She wished, too, that the asshole had followed her sister to Inferni, or chosen to attack her nearer, in the least. She would have let her coyotes string his corpse on the borders to rot.

Myrika is by me!

She listened and heard, but did not believe, and knew she was not doing enough, had not done enough -- and Myrika would not even be blessed/cursed with the knowledge of what she had failed to prevent in her inaction. She shook her head, uncertain what precisely she was disagreeing with. All of it, perhaps. All old instinct came welling up, fierce desire to protect and keep safe. And however strong it was, she still knew how equally foolish it was. They were promises none could make and hope to keep always and forever; separation and death and the malice of others were forces more powerful than the good in the world, as much as Myri would have liked to believe otherwise. She managed to fool herself sometimes -- hope was such a wonderfully powerful and treacherous emotion, after all.

I could keep you safe, she said, relenting at last to uncage the scratching, pacing, sniffing words. Nothing else would happen. She could lie, too -- however matched they were for transparency, though, perhaps Myrika's exceeded her sister's in desperation. If Inferni was so terrible, Cassie could sequester herself from its coyotes and Myrika could order them to leave her be. She could have a wing of the decrepit mansion, the schoolhouse itself, a quiet corner of the forest. All of it was lined with skulls, though. No matter where they were within the territory, they sat on its edge, grinning ferocious warning to would-be trespassers. Silly, stupid child's dreams couldn't hope to compete with the stark whiteness of bone on the border, the brilliant red of spilled blood.