Drooping Willows This town ain't mine

For Skoll, set directly after this and this. PP of Craw, let me know if you would like anything changed Siki :)

She had walked back to the Willows with Craw, walking comfortably shoulder to shoulder and realising just how much she would enjoy this new found partnership. When she finally crossed her brothers trail she accepted the way he tucked her head under his jaw before she managed to break free and sneak a cheeky swipe of her tongue across his temple (even if she did almost have to jump to reach it). He couldn't have expected to retreat without some small retaliation.

She watched as he headed back towards the den, the ghost of a grin fading as she set her tired mind to the task at hand, easy in her movements and contemplating just where they would go from here. It was such a small thing it wouldn't be discernible to anyone else, but she felt a shift in the way she wore the silver wolfs scent on a deeper level than she had before their talk. It helped to strengthen her resolve, she knew she was doing what was right - for her and her children, and that was all that mattered. She surprised herself with her change of heart, so sudden and yet not. She had been thinking of leaving since before she was even handed leadership. Even back then she had known this wasn't hers, never would be, and it was still quite clear some of their longest serving members, ones who should have seen just how hard she had worked to earn her position still thought her unworthy.

Fuck them all. They could make all the excuses they wanted. She was going to make progress. "@Skoll?" she called to the darkness, concerned tone well and truly concealing just how few fucks she had to spare for the message she was about to deliver. In her own mind, these were no longer her monkeys, and this was not her circus.

opposite ends of the universe

"When you separate an entwined particle and you move both parts away from the other, even at opposite ends of the universe, if you alter or affect one, the other will be identically altered or affected."
- Adam, from Only Lovers Left Alive

---

He almost did not rouse from his sleep earlier, his dreams much more comforting than the waking world around him. Today he had dreamt of simpler times, when Angier held superiority and Skoll had all the time in the world to think of ways to sneak around, carry his toy maowse around, and find dead things to leave in the most startling of places - or drop on the heads of the most easily spooked pack members. Week-old hunger pangs easily prompted his limbs to drag himself out from beneath two close-growing shrubs; he had been hiding here since he had given @Sven the little copse close to the pack den. The thicket in which he had hidden Piety away was now a place that he avoided, treating it as a grave site where his first love had practically died and left the little ghostling behind.

When Morganna's voice had called to him by name through the dark, the ebon prince had been hot on the trail of a dead raven being dragged through the dirt. Niles had obviously been this way and the older half-brother was very keen to see just what state the bird was in... if it was still edible or, perhaps, rotten enough to leave somewhere as a (distasteful) gift.

He stopped in his steps and turned around, his pointy ears pressing forward to locate just where his age-mate was coming from. "I'm here," he answered her, his voice weary and undoubtedly tired. There was a tinge of sadness in it that was so uncharacteristic of him that it could have possibly been comprehended as startling and unsettling.

Without waiting for her to appear, he took a few steps forward until he could hear the fresh-grown grass crinkling beneath her feet and the willows whispering in her wake. "I don't feel good," he anounced, just so that his sister was aware of the mood he was in, "I'd appreciate it if this were quick."

i'm a dreamer, i'm a man

i'm doing whatever i can to make the bad things go away

A lynx has left behind the remains of a deer. +5 Health

Quick? She could do quick. "Hecate's gone." Was that quick enough for him? "I noticed her trail crossin' the borders when we went out fer a hunt. I sent Craw and Wraith out ter see if they could find 'er but she'd gone too far." Just a few short hours ago she would have laughed it off and said So what? but so much had changed. She had almost done a full 180. Morganna's softening expression would have been missed in the dark but it didn't stop her stepping closer to try and run the bridge of her muzzle along the underside of his chin. "Did yer know she was goin' or did she just take off?"

Regardless of the reasoning behind Hecate's disappearance, something had to be done about it (or so she thought), if she was ever to be able to turn her back on this place without a care in the world. "She's carryin' yer kids @Skoll, yer can't just let 'er vanish inter the night like the last one." After all, she had been depending on him to challenge Nicolo by dangling Hecate over his head, if she seemed disinterested now he would loose all hope. "This is meant ter be yours. Yours an' hers." Even if Hecate would have to grow the balls to challenge a thoroughly pissed off Elettra, an Elettra that was even more pissed than Morganna that the white woman had slipped away before she got her pound of flesh. This place wasn't for her. Not anymore.

opposite ends of the universe

'I KNOW!!' he had wanted to yell, but he stifled it. At the back of his throat, the heated words made the whole of his tongue almost feel as if the roof of his mouth were scalding. "I'm sorry," he murmured, seemingly in response to her telling him that Hecate had gone too far rather than the fact that he had just screamed at her in his head. His silver eyes looked away, even as she closed in on him and touched her muzzle to his chin. A whimper fled from his throat.

"She took off. I told her to leave." A lengthy pause, a few sniffs and a shiver... "It was impulsive. It wasn't love. I thought it was, but-" He met her eyes and his ears folded back as he sank down to her height before planting his rump to the ground. He hunched his shoulders forward and he stared at her paws.

"She used me," the words just tumbled out in sob that he tried to rein in. "I thought it was the other way around." For sometime after, he merely trembled there before her, unable to even comprehend or stomach just what she had told him... about Willow Ridge being his and Hecate's. He shook his head, his nose wrinkled in an attempt to save face or, at least, keep hold of what self-control he had.

"Morganna," her name came in something like a plea. "I wasn't meant to have anything." He grimaced as he looked at her again. "I'm an Archer prince. Obviously, I inherit nothing. It's all yours." And, this is the very reason why I am the way I am... "I'm sorry. For everything. I will stay out of your way, I will do what you ask, but I will not, cannot, go looking for @Hecate. I've already died twice over; if you want me to leave, all you have to do is ask."

(This post was last modified: May 01, 2016, 07:15 AM by Skoll.)

i'm a dreamer, i'm a man

i'm doing whatever i can to make the bad things go away

As @Skoll shivered she froze. Not again. It felt as though she had just finished piecing him back together. Of course Hecate was using him, I TOLD YOU SO! trapped behind a tightening throat, tightening shoulders, rigid spine. This time she would take an ear, and everything attached to it, certain there was little that would stop her from doing so if Hecate Liar was ever unfortunate enough to cross her path, and knowing it would be done because she was a woman of her word. That alone was enough to release the breath that held her so taught, to bring herself in close to her brother and take a seat at his side as she had so many times before.

Morganna chuckled when he referred to himself as a Prince. "We're the bastard children of a man tha' didn' care if we lived or died. I've worked hard fer everythin' I have. I am no Princess an' I will never be a Queen. Nicolo might think 'imself royalty - do yer really wanna associate with that? Waitin fer shit ter fall in yer lap an then doin' nothin' with it?" She meant every word, this bastardised concept of royalty was another reason she felt she could not stay.

"I won't ask yer ter leave, I don't want yer ter leave. But I am." It felt good to finally say the words out loud. "I'm takin' my mate an I'm takin' my kids an' leavin' him ter realise just what he's done ter our mothers name. Before the moon reaches this point again, I'll be gone." She and whoever proved themselves worthy enough to follow her. "I wanted yer ter hear it from me." I wanted to give you time to plan your next move. But looking at him now she wasn't sure he was capable of making one.

Perhaps she really was lighting a match on her way out that door.

opposite ends of the universe

She sat beside him and listened - really listened... If there was one individual Skoll could trust to not make assumptions and just hear him out, it was his sister. She laughed at him though, relaying soon after just why his words had tickled her so. Skoll merely stared at her, wincing. He waited until she was done to say his piece.

"But, what about Mother?" he asked. "Angier? Sven? Ravenna? Niles?" For him to utter their names should have told her that he really did care, no matter what terrible things he had done to them or what neglect he ultimately put them through from the means of self-preservation over the years. The next thing he wanted to say was meant to wound her, just so that she could see how low her older brother had seemingly fallen, "You're... You're going to leave... me?"

At this point, he wondered now if it was really worth it to stay in the only place he had ever called home. His eyes lifted to the bits of sky above the willows, staring at the moon for some time as he configured his answer. Apart from worrying about what might happen to his own hide once his sister (as a Leader) could not protect him, he wondered what might happen to Angier. The now ancient man, though still something like a fountain of wisdom, could barely move and it seemed now that all his other senses were failing. In Morganna's stead, Elettra would retake her title (which seemed 'just fine'), but he could not be sure what to expect of his uncle - and Aunt Adele who seemingly never left Nicolo's side. Just like Hecate, Morganna was going to make him choose.

"I won't survive without you. I can't. What will I do tomorrow when I wake up and you're gone? No one trusts me; I've given them no reason to question my loyalty or my motives but they do anyway..."

i'm a dreamer, i'm a man

i'm doing whatever i can to make the bad things go away

He listed off the names of those she knew wouldn't understand, each a stab in her heart but not enough to change the course. "Mother is still perfectly capable o' leadin'. They respect her. I'm assumed ter be up ter no good, too young not Archer enough." She had finally stopped giving a fuck. If Nicolo wanted it that badly, he could keep whatever charred remains were left in her wake. "They don't trust me either." Sure, the younger, newer members of the pack seemingly had every faith in her but the ones that had been there from the start, who had seen all her hard work refused to acknowledge it, and that was what stung the most - that they might side with a reclusive 'historian' rather than the strong leader she had become.

She drew a deep breath, knowing @Craw was just as unfond of her brother as anyone else, but a deal had been struck and she planned to keep her word. "If it were upter me, just me, I'd take yer away in a heartbeat. But that isn't my call ter make." Perhaps she could try and swing things in her favour but she would not try to cow Craw into giving her her way. Not yet. "You'll need ter speak ter Craw. You've got time, almost a month, but he will lead beside me," as any mate should. She leaned against her brother, both offering and taking what support they both needed. "Yer'll have ter change if its gonna work," it was a warning delivered with love and good intentions. They were going to be better than all this.

opposite ends of the universe

Skoll could not remember for the life of him now if he ever heard anyone speak ill of his sister; for the most part, he still held her in the highest regard. If Angier had thought the sun of Elettra and the star of Morganna then, to Skoll, Morganna was his sun. Without Asriel to anchor himself to, Skoll had no choice but to figuratively cling to his age-mate sister. If he could have battled his newfound morals concerning the spilling of blood, he would have. As it stood, he was too cowardly in the end to face the old Archer historian. If he had followed through with his word, @Nicolò would have been dead... then what would the pack think of him? The King Killer, finally out for all to see just what he was capable of. He had done away with Xetor a long time ago, sure, but he was oh-so-lucky to not be reprimanded for such a misdeed. A part of him had figured out by now that if he murdered another wolf, his own Leader no less, Willow Ridge would scatter to the wind. As a willow-legged man whose interests were selfish and centered around only those he held dearest to him, no one would have thought to stay.

They had it all wrong, he believed; it was not Morganna they ought to have been wary of. It was him; and, they should have accepted Morganna as she was at the top of the hierarchy.

"If it were upter me, just me, I'd take yer away in a heartbeat," she told him, "But that isn't my call ter make." He stared at her, his eyes wide in question, half-wanting her to confirm his assumptions as correct. He wouldn't voice that he had indeed noticed that @Craw's musk commonly traced his sister's paths - old and new. He wanted to hear it from her and he did without even asking. "You'll need ter speak ter Craw."

She could have just stuck his snout in a hive of bees and he audibly whimpered - no, he cried. "I don't... I don't know if I can," he admitted to her, searching her eyes for any last bit of assurance he could collect from her. "And, if I cannot change, Craw would probably not let me close to you again." Inside his chest he felt his heart start to wither. "Not after I could not deliver what I had promised... about Nicolo."

When his gaze fell to his paw beside hers, he sighed. Maybe this was it... "I won't say goodbye," he said, jaw quivering. "I'll... I'll see you again, right?"

i'm a dreamer, i'm a man

i'm doing whatever i can to make the bad things go away

He didn't know if he could. Jaws clenched as she let him finish saying his piece, it was true that Craw was a lawful beast and she very much doubted he would have much patience for Skoll's brand on mischief but perhaps that was just what he needed. Someone not afraid to call him on his bullshit and put him in his place. His final question was answered with a silent shrug of her shoulder and a minuscule shake of her head. Probably not. "If I'm close enough ter kill him, I will." but she couldn't do so in her current state, nor holding her current position within this pack. There was nothing lawful about that course which was why she had handed the task to Skoll. He didn't even have to kill him... just make sure he was far, far away.

Morganna knew he was hurting, hell she was hurting for him but there was no way to sugar coat what she wanted to say. "If yer don't have the balls ter own yer fuckups we've got no place for yer." But where did that leave him? Redemption, or damnation? "So stay here, take the pack back fer mother, and keep it fer @Ravenna an' step aside when her chosen mate steps up. Do it fer her since yer wouldn't do it fer me," she paused to take a steadying breath, the second option so simple to say but still a stab in her own heart. "Or disappear," just like their father, and brother, and half siblings. Like so many others that had 'just stopped by'. Just like Skana, and Guiness. Just like Isolde.