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The sun was just beginning to set, painting the ocean a shade of deep blood-red. The sky was brilliant orange, as though it had been set afire, and the crimson disk of the sun was sinking slowly below the distant line of the horizon. Glancing toward the east, everything was dark and bluish-purple, like a giant bruise on bared flesh. Seagulls screamed and shrieked in the sky, swooping over the waves and flocking in droves, fighting over fish and crabs. Jael lay on the rocky shoreline, resting his head on his forepaws and watching the birds in their loud interaction taking place in the air above his head. Finally, everything settled down and the gulls found better things to do, vanishing into the growing darkness until the next morning. Repetitive, that was their purpose in life and it seemed so worthless to a creature like Jael. But was his purpose any different? He ate, he slept, and he repeated the process over again each day. Perhaps one day he'd throw "mate" into that theory once he was older, but until then he did nothing with his life. He didn't even have a proper name, other than the title his mother had given him before he'd been stolen away from her.
He didn't belong in Inferni, and he knew it. Gabriel had been courteous enough to allow the vagabond puppy a place to stay in his pack for no other reason than their shared bloodlines, overlooking the fact his father was a blood-traitor and Jael was more wolf than anything else. But he doubted he would stay here forever, if even long. Maybe he would one day seek out Colibri, if she was even still alive. He'd seen what Vitium had done to her before they'd been taken, and he hated his sire for it. The thought burned through him like hatred, causing a vicious desire to tear something apart to rise in his blood. His siblings were fools, so blindly following their father to the ends of the earth. Mother had loved them--father had introduced hatred and despair into their lives before they ever needed to know about it. Life wasn't sunshine and butterflies, but there were standards Jael believed should normally dictate existence, and Vitium wasn't one of them. [/html]
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For nearly fifteen minutes now, the doggish hybrid had been watching the boy. The peculiar color of his fur, that remarkably immaculate alabaster, it spoke of the wolf mother that had sired the trio. Gabriel knew what that color meant, if his assumption was correct. And if that was the case, then the misfit half-breeds (all of them more wolf then coyote), would find their family close by. It still amazed him how despite all they had been taught, and all they had seen, his brother would take up with a wolf. Not only that, but he would do so and fill his children’s heads with such stories and send them to the place which had exiled him was mind boggling.
The hues of the sunset offset the boy’s coat, turning the pale fur orange-red, a color not unlike that of his eyes. Pushing himself up, the charcoal-brushed hybrid made his way down the rocky cliff-face and towards his nephew. “Did you find your siblings?” He asked as he closed the distance between them, four legs moving at an even, almost lazy pace.
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[html] http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee19 ... _table.png); background-position: bottom center; background-repeat: no-repeat;"> Darkness was settling in like a blanket across the shoreline, enveloping everything in velvety blackness. The moon was just beginning to rise over the trees, a pale disk white as Jael's fur, not quite full, but enough to brilliantly illuminate the world. The youth was unaware he was being watched for quite some time now until Gabriel crept into his range of awareness. His voice spoke out, breaking the silence that had fallen since the seagulls had vanished and Jael's head turned toward the doggish male, watching his approach. "Yes," he admitted, though their encounters were never what the boy would have hoped for.
Enigma as always hated him for his white fur and wolfish build, but Jael couldn't help how he was born. This was what his brother needed to understand if they were ever going to truly become family. Like when they were with mother, before anything had tainted their innocence. Gaze sunk when the Aquila stepped close, remaining on his leader, but not meeting his eyes out of respect. Finally, he said, "If you don't mind, could I ask you a question?" Vision flickered upward briefly, actions always underlain with a sense of awkwardness until he could find his place in the world.
"Why did you let me into Inferni? I know we're related.. but your brother was exiled. And I thought Inferni despised wolves. I can't even pretend to be anything else but a wolf.." he finished, each word sinking lower and lower until he could barely be heard. Jael hated that he hated who he was.. and why should he? Other than Vitium's word, Jael found no reason to find wolves evil. He wasn't evil, as far as he knew. [/html]
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The Aquila’s eyes studied the youth as he might observe a prey animal or unfamiliar stretch of water. It was a predatory instinct, to observe and look for any and all weaknesses. Like his mother, Gabriel’s eyes were those of a raptor, and he had survived this long because of such impulses. He cocked his head doggishly at the first question, and then frowned at the second.
Drawing his legs under his belly, the three-year old sat on the cold, rocky sand. “All three of you are more wolf then coyote,” he stated plainly. “I don’t know what your father told you, but Inferni is not looking for genocide. Our goal has always been to be able to survive—wolves cannot accept that. They, as a whole, are driven to eliminate the weaker predator population. Its genetics,” he added, smiling in a peculiar way. Wasn’t that what the madman had told him? That yellow eyed brute of a cat, who by all rights should have been dead, yes, those had been his words. “We do what we must to survive.”
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Warily the boy watched as Gabriel made himself comfortable near Jael as he explained his purpose and intent. And in his own way, he realized he had known the answer all along without being told. He had known the truth without the direct guidance of another, and it had been proven in the words he'd thrust unwittingly at Enigma. 'Wolves ate coyotes.' Wolves sought to destroy the smaller predator and the rival to their food and land supply. This was why coyotes and wolves naturally hated each other and for the most part, probably always would. But Jael was the cruel predator and the destroyer, according to genetics. His siblings wished to be the lesser beings and hide in Inferni's ranks, but their blood and family was obviously more wolf than anything else. This implied they had other, wolfish family out there than the coyotes that lived here.
"So blood was stronger than instinctual hatred?" Jael concluded, faintly touched by such as notion as his own siblings preferred to hate him rather then love him because he looked the most like a wolf out of all of them. Vitium was a fool in his eyes, attempting to convert them to such ignorant beliefs. A single wolf alone couldn't be a threat against a whole pack, but what didn't say he, the wolf, wouldn't one day turn against the coyotes simply because of jealous nature? And yet Gabriel knew this and overlooked it simply because he didn't turn away family, as he'd stated when Jael first showed up at his boarders. "Your father was a wolf, wasn't he?" the boy tentatively asked, recalling that his own sire and Gabriel were full siblings with both parents exactly the same.
He was curious now about the rest of their family, and what other blood he shared. He didn't overlook the coyote lines, of course, but he wanted to know more and everything he could possibly learn about who and where he'd come from. [/html]
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Red-orange fire burned against the clouds, painting peculiar shapes and lines against a now navy blue sky. The sun had just begun to sink into the ocean, and the colors were almost too remarkable to bear. As beautiful as such a thing was it was not as striking as the sunset in the west. Gabriel had spent every evening watching it, amazed by God’s creations and how He had managed to make such a world. One ear, tattered and notched, turned at the question. Blood was strong, but it was not strong enough to override the terrible things his brothers had done. Andrezej was dead. Vitium, by all rights, should have been killed as well.
Gabriel did not answer the first question, and looked over at the boy when he spoke again. “Yes,” he answered. “He was a part of Inferni until he was exiled and became alpha of a pack called Chimera.” Then he had take up with a whore and run off with no explanation. After a year, Gabriel no longer recognized him. “Your grandmother would know more about it then I do, though.”
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[html] http://i233.photobucket.com/albums/ee19 ... _table.png); background-position: bottom center; background-repeat: no-repeat;"> He noted the fact that Gabriel didn't answer his first question, but Jael hadn't honestly expected him to. It had been more of him thinking aloud, stating his own conclusion to the older hybrid. But his uncle did answer his second question, confirming the identity of at least part of their bloodline. "Kaena?" he asked, ensuring he had his facts straight about who was who on the family tree. Vitium had been a bizarre creature, and nothing said he couldn't have lied to his offspring about their relations as everything else, deluding their young minds as he had already attempted to.
"So.." he began, glancing toward the doggish creature, "Could you maybe tell me what you do know about who I'm related to?.. I'd prefer to get further information than simply what Vitium provided." His distaste for his sire was apparent in the way the name crossed his tongue with vague disgust. A liar and a traitor, he had turned those he should have been closest to against him, and Jael couldn't quite forgive that anymore than he could forgive the horrible things he'd done to his mother. [/html]
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“She’s here,” Gabriel stated, studying the boy still. “Arrived just a few days ago. I was pretty sure she was dead, but that woman is something else.” As he said this, a bemused smile broke across his face. Despite the horrors of the world, despite all the terrible things she had gone through, his mother had survived. That was one of the most remarkable things about her; the stubborn need to survive.
Vitium’s very name sounded like poison. Gabriel’s eyes glimmered darkly. He was glad the boy (and his siblings) had accepted the news as they had. If their blood-traitor of a father ever showed his face near Inferni, Gabriel would make sure his children torn him apart. That, at least, would be a fitting end. “Most of Inferni. My co-leader, Ryan, is my cousin’s daughter. Then you have my son, Ezekiel, who is your cousin, and Ryan's daughter, Valkyrie. There’s also Zana, who’s a cousin of sorts to you.” Shifting his weight, the smile on his face fell and his eyes turned cold.
“Do you know your mother’s name?”
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[html] Gabriel confirmed his mother's identity, proving at least Vitium hadn't lied about something. Kaena Lykoi was his grandmother, and apparently, still alive and living within meeting distance--that being, right here within Inferni's ranks. His uncle was obviously amazed at her will to live and ability to survive, stating even that he'd assumed she was dead, yet was mistaken. Perhaps he'd seek her out amongst all the other creatures he shared blood with for no other reason than simple curiosity. Blood didn't mean everything, but it did create some sort of link between him and certain other living beings, and he was intrigued by this. Blood meant shit to his littermates, yet Gabriel had allowed him, nearly a wolf, into his clan because of the simple ties of family. For now, he'd explore these bonds and everything they could possibly provide. Gabriel went on to list even more relations within the clan: a variety of cousins and the confirmation of the fact that nearly all of Inferni was family. So Vitium had sent them right back into the embrace of their blood, yet violently chased them away and ostracized them from their wolfen kin. Gabriel's demeanor suddenly changed, bringing the subject to Jael's mother. Cold crept into his chest, wondering what about this topic could cause such a darkness to rise within the older hybrid. "Yes," he replied, gaze falling downcast, unable to lift when he felt he'd encountered something almost shameful in the discussion of his lupine mother. "Colibri Soul." He swallowed, finally allowing his vision to lift, though it was like raising a ton of bricks. "Why?" he nearly croaked, thrown off by this dramatic change of mood. [/html]
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___ The muscles around Gabriel’s jaw tensed, and his teeth clicked together. Tension filled his muscles, and he had, for one instance, the impulse to demand all three children leave his home. It was not because they were so much wolf, or because they had come from his brother’s bastard seed, but because that name meant something entirely different to him. Suddenly, the names that he had listed were a fraction of those he knew of. That number, however, was also a fraction—Gabriel knew only what he had learned through the raven and the wolves.
___He felt his upper lip twitch, curling whiskers upwards, and forced his jaw to unhinge. “Because your family is much larger then I imagined. There’s a boy here who carries that name—he also looks more like a wolf then coyote.” Flicking one ear in a motion that was closest to irritation, he continued, voice dropping an octave as he found it impossible to hide the hatred in it. “One of the leaders of Dahlia de Mai holds the surname as well.”
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[html]  | More and more the boy felt he had somehow miscalculated. When gaze did shift across the Aquila's face he could see the tension in his muscles as thought he was utterly restraining some sort of emotion or impulse invoked by his mother's name. Jael fought the desire to back away, wary the male might suddenly turn on him or something equally bad. He was naturally distrustful and aware his links to Gabriel's family might not be enough to save him from everything. He knew nothing of his mother's bloodline--if she was honestly a good person or an evil soul that did deserve all the misery she received as his father had stated. And Gabriel's reaction to her title wasn't helping one bit.
He began to speak, and Jael felt himself lowering his body to the ground like a beaten, sedate puppy, not wishing to associate himself with any of the sins of his mother's family any more than his father's if it could be avoided. He simply wished to be judged for his own actions, not his mother or his father, whom fate had chosen unwillingly for him. "So Colibri's family, and your family do not get along?" he asked, suddenly wondering if Vitium's initial choosing of the she-wolf had not been of random choice, but careful, masterful selection. He'd never heard the name Dahlia de Mai before, and so it meant nothing to the child, but he could already assume tension existed between them and Inferni, or at least, their leader with the name Soul and Gabriel himself. |
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A cold intensity held sway over the muscles in Gabriel’s face, though they could not hold against the fire that he felt in his chest. He could not and would not deny that flame. It had served him since he was a boy, just as The Voice had done. God had been quiet for a long time; it was his father he had heard last, pushing him to slaughter the silver-gold woman whose daughter he had taken in. Of course, such things should come to pass. Zana had chosen to be a coyote. She had come to them willingly, and now she was excelling under the wings of Inferni—a vicious carrion bird whose wings spread fire across the lands.
It did not occur to Gabriel that perhaps Vitium had chosen Colibri out of some twisted need for revenge. He would not give his brother that much credit. “No,” he said shortly. “But don’t let that concern you. You chose to come here.” That made him a coyote. That made him a part of Gabriel’s family above the wolves. That was all that mattered.
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His suspicion was confirmed along with the realization that more than being part wolf and part coyote, ingrained with inner turmoil from breed alone, he was half in a family that was simply arrogant wolves, known for killing their lesser cousins, and half in the family of vicious coyotes that fought back and destroyed. And it hadn't been by choice on the part of his mother, like some foolish romance in a decaying novel, but the result of a filthy, selfish act meant to shatter her soul. He and his siblings weren't even meant to be and should never of been, but rather exterminated at birth or beforehand through deadly herbs. He could run away and forget them all, joining some pack far, far away from here where either family name had never been heard of. Jael looked like a wolf and no one would deny him such heritage if he boasted it as such, but he didn't really want to.
He didn't want to be alone in the world. He knew he could survive such a life and had when his siblings had abandon him, but he'd rather not if possible. Gabriel had allowed him into his clan simply because of heritage alone and that proved there at least should be some meaning in such ties, but not everything. He was forced to remember a father he'd rather forget because of blood alone and was reminded of his deeds every day living in the clan he spoke of so adoringly and had been exiled from. By his uncle's word he was a coyote, not a wolf, because of the choice he'd made and the path he'd chosen. He could look away from his appearance as long as he pretended to be a coyote. He nodded, eyes still lowered, not sure how to respond. He was disgusted at such torn ties between his blood and where he stood between them, having to pick one or the other, and never able to exist peacefully between. [/html]
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The boy did not look at him, nor did he speak. Gabriel wished sorely that his sister was present—of all of his siblings, she had battled the duality of being a wolf and a coyote the strongest. After all, Corona had grown up with their father. She had never been able to settle between either part of her heritage. Because she was gone, though, Gabriel would do what he could. “It’s not an easy thing,” he began. “, being a hybrid. You’re not a full part of either world. Outside of these lands coyotes and hybrids are considered lesser species. Wolves hunt and kill them.” Again, he thought of the russet cat with the burning eyes. Such things had been foretold.
“You are part of a very unique place,” the Aquila continued, amber eyes darkening. “It is uncommon for our kind to band together. Inferni is uncommon because we are not simply strangers living behind borders—we are family, and we are bound to one another by blood.” Even if they were not all related (and only a few of them were not), Inferni—and Gabriel, specifically—considered them valuable members of the clan and his family.
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After a time he did look up again at Gabriel, faint emotion overpowering the normal apathy within his fiery eyes. If he wasn’t mistaken it seemed as though his uncle where honestly trying to reassure and comfort him, going on in detail about just how fucked up it was to be a hybrid and the unique makeup of the clan. “And I look like a full-blood wolf,” Jael muttered dryly, remarking on how even here he was an outcast of sorts by appearance alone. His siblings had noticed that difference and remarked on it constantly, placing a brick wall between him and his brother perhaps forever. Enigma would never overlook Jael’s white coat that reminded them so much of their mother’s and finally accept that they were truly brothers.
He stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the sand and ash coats of the coyotes that blended in so well with the tawny grasses of their surroundings. Jael’s coat was meant for a land of perpetual snow and ice—frigid temperatures and high, arid mountains that touched the very sky itself. But Inferni was a place where he could live and thrive with his own blood and family—as long as he pretended to be coyote alone and disregarded his wolfen heritage. But Inferni already held his loyalty for now. The boy wasn’t much interested in abandoning the clan to search for a better, more promising life elsewhere. He had to pick and chose what he wanted to be, a wolf or a coyote, and right now he had chosen coyote.
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“And I look like a dog,” Gabriel said automatically. He knew this only because he had been called such before—and indeed mistaken for one by two dogs and humans alike. It felt peculiar to be speaking to his nephew in such a way. Again, desperately, he wished Corona was present. Because she was not, though, he was doing what he could in order to help the wayward son of his exiled, terrible brother. “You are not simply what you look like,” he added. After all, a long time ago, Gabriel would have been mistaken for a full blooded coyote.
That was before the war and the first fire. After that he had been covered in soot and ash and unable to wash it from his coat. Gabriel did not see the irony in this—he only saw it as God’s work and accepted it as his sign. “The fact you look like a wolf makes you valuable,” the Aquila continued. “My cousin, Anselm, looks as much of a wolf as you do—and that was why he excelled as a spy. Wolves will trust you over your siblings on sight. That is why I want you to serve as Praeses.”
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He may of laughed had he felt the situation far lighter. Gabriel did indeed look neither like a wolf nor a coyote, but rather a dog—a canine domesticated and modified by humans to suit their capricious whims and needs. A slave to the race long since deceased, it was a peculiar appearance since their blood had been filled with wolf and coyote for the last few generations. But no, it should be what one’s soul looks like where judgment arises, however too many are blind to true distinction and choose to simply see only what was right in front of them and nothing beyond. Before anyone’s eyes Jael was a wolf and Gabriel a dog, but that was not where their actions lead them. The Aquila continued and his words came as a surprise to the youth. He was.. useful because he looked like a wolf? It did make sense, but he hadn’t even thought of the possibilities before. The wolves, and everyone else, for that matter, would see him as one of their own. Other than the scent of Inferni on his coat he could easily pass for one of them and not arise suspicion with the larger canines.
“Really?” he said, the surprise remotely evident in his voice. He allowed a small smile to cross his features in response, quickly fading back into determined indifference. “Is there anything specifically I can do for you now then?” the boy asked, aiming to be useful to his pack leader. He didn’t know the area and surrounding packs very well yet, but for the sake of politics and the safety of Inferni he’d get to know it quickly and scout out the surrounding wolf packs.
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“Go to the packs,” he began, recalling what he had learned from Segodi during his brief period as a spy. “Stay out of their lands, but gather information. How many wolves are there, how constant are their border patrols, anything useful.” Flicking one ear back, Gabriel turned his head as a yipping call rose from the borders. Frowning slightly, he rose to his feet. “Report back when you can,” he added, and with a nod, turned and trotted off towards the sound of the call.
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