Quaking Vale dream lantern

Sahalie continued to surprise him. Once again he had been prepared for punishment and was instead met with stunned silence and when he risked a look upwards he saw her look of dismay. Did she really not know? Oh god. What had he just done? This time he listened closely as she rambled on and stammered through her response, his green eyes focused intently on her face. Did she really have no feelings for his brother or was she just scared? Well he had already made such a mess of things, he might as well continue to poke the bear.

Once all of her stammers had subsided Draven almost sighed, "Do you not want that or are you just scared that he will find someone else?" Maybe he was projecting, thinking of how long he had held Neha at an arms distance because he was afraid that she would leave. In the end it had been him who had left, even if he promised to return it had been his paws that had carried him away from the mountain. Neha had stayed behind because of family obligations, kind of like how he had left the stone giant for his family. Little did he know he had a family of his own growing within her womb.

This time his words were softer, a kind of deep empathy behind his mossy eyes, "Why limit yourself to certain ways of happiness if you could have them all?"

Her eyes—only a sliver of sunshine left to peek through dark storm clouds of her brows— narrowed on him and his haughty sigh. Draven though he had it all figured it out, the whole tired story expelled with the rest of the recycled air in his lungs. It was all just that easy for him. She could just lift Alastor's curse and she could just admit that she was scared. Sahalie was scared of a lot of things but she had come to term so many times with that. Where was he even pulling these things from. Was this what Alastor was hypothesizing with him, or something Draven was pulling out of his own experience? The thought of two wolves discussing her in such a manner made her skin prickle. It was not an idea that brought joy to her heart.

"I'm selfish but I'm not greedy," Sahalie could harden her tone when the moment called for it, but here she hardly muster the energy, she felt adrift in her own confusion. "If he finds someone else I'm not going to stop him. I don't think you realize that I do want Al to be happy. He is my best friend in the entire world. But there are some things I'm not prepared to sacrifice. Not for anyone. There's a piece of me that's mine."

"I realize I'm young. So maybe I'll change my mind. But that's up for me to decide and not for anyone else. And right now I'm not 'limiting' myself. I don't feel limited. A lot of stuff scares me, but losing Al completely scares me more. I'm doing what I can. Is it working? Is it enough? Is it right? I don't pretend to have the answers, Draven"—since he was being so bold—"L...love has just lead to a lot of bad things in my life, in others lives. And I'm just not ready for it. If Al...is.." Oh God "Then. Ya know what, he's ahead of me. Maybe he's more selfless than anyone seems to think I am."

"I think you should go now." Before she said anything else. Before she started to cry.

She had to wonder what she was doing with her life any more.

This time when she narrowed her eyes Draven knew that he had crossed the line that he had been teetering on. He dipped his muzzle back down towards the earth and flattened his ears though he heard every word that she had to say. Any anger that he had felt deflated out of him and he accepted what she had to say despite disagreeing with almost every word of it. If she was selfish than she was most likely to be greedy, after all, hadn't she claimed this pack as her own? Alastor wasn't just ready to find love, he was already there even if Sahalie refused to see it behind those sunshine eyes.

He nodded at her demand and turned without another word. His paw steps were deliberate as they led him straight to the border and then past the markers. He would return, and he would talk to Alastor about what had occurred but for now it was clear that his place within this pack was questionable. He would stay for his brother because that's what family was supposed to do, but he knew as long as the Tainn woman led he would be walking on eggshells and with a held tongue. He had seen great women lead in the past, and in Draven's eyes Sahalie just didn't cut it.

He missed the Cove more than ever.

Fade