Willow Ridge endless salt

He rolled it over his tongue again, the sounds so familiar now and yet they were not, and that was the whole problem. Whenever he had time to himself, whether hunting or scavenging or patrolling or simply sleeping, chances were that his mind would wander to that name, and from there they would travel north, far, far north, and what was left there. Who was left there. Who was still there? Having spent so long carefully and obsessively building that empire (for his father, at least until the end), it was a torment not to have any idea what was happening now. Not whether anyone was left, whether it had gone back to the status quo or his actions had left permanent scars. He would be so disappointed if nothing had changed at all. It had cost him everything, absolutely everything, but he had left that earth entirely scorched.

Pharika. No, he still didn't know it. But was that a fault of his memory, or because it meant nothing?

He sat near to the pack's dens, the air still and cold as the moon was high in the sky and several of the pack's wolves slept soundly in the dark, warmed hovels. Sentry duty wasn't exactly a necessity in these secure lands, but the name had been turning over in his head and preventing sleep. At least sat out here he was doing something vaguely productive, the act of keeping ears trained on the quiet forest enough to dull the incessant pounding in his skull. Being in that den surrounded by wolves he had come to know and yet were of an entirely different world to that which occupied his obsessive thoughts... it was too much dissonance to cope with. "Pharika," he muttered, not realising he had spoken aloud, the name as foreign and familiar as ever. He would have to let it go eventually. Maybe. Once he knew once and for all that she was irrelevant.

All this Archer business was a distraction, was bullshit, was a means to an end. He needed to try and maintain perspective.