Hearthwood River Ain't Going Backwards

Goodbye thread; takes place very soon after the pack meeting. Sooo sad. :'( @Kyrios @Atropos @Bennet

Not so very long ago it had been common for Karina and all three pups to be in one place together: learning, playing, sleeping, growing as a family.  Now that the pups were older they had taken to their own pursuits, Bennet growing in faith with Kjors and Karina, Atropos learning botany from Lachesis, and Kyrios.. the Mother only knows where he went and what he did.  As it was, it felt almost unfamiliar to be all together now as one patchwork family, and it was certainly odd for the mood to be so somber.  Although he was most special to Bennet, Kjors had been an important person to all of the pups, and no doubt they were all feeling the heaviness of his freshly-announced banishment.  

 “I know you’re all confused about Uncle Kjors,” Karina began, breaking the silence, “And I want you to know that you’re welcome to share your feelings now.” She turned to the alabaster twins to add, “..You can of course talk to your father about your feelings too.”  She buried her nose into Bennet’s ruff to take a steadying breath, and her eyes filled suddenly with tears.  Although Kjors was gone, Bennet still smelled like her father.  Karina did not hide the evidence of her emotion from the children; she wanted them to know it was okay to feel sad, or however it was they felt. Karina fell quiet in order to let the children express themselves, licking and nudging them comfortingly.

 When the children had said their pieces, Karina continued, voice raw.  “Kjors is no longer part of the Hearthwood River family,” she began, “..And that was his choice; he made his decision when he rose against Lachesis.”  Despite how she felt toward Lachesis and her mother in this moment, Karina knew this explanation was best for the River children. She did not want to scare them by leaving them with the impression that Kjors was driven out of the pack against his druthers, because as pups they might worry that if they did something bad, they would be banished too. 

 “However, I still consider Kjors part of my family..” She reached her muzzle around her daughter’s body to pull her closer. “Mine and Bennet’s family, that is.  And I cannot leave him to suffer alone, no matter what he’s done.  Bennet and I will be leaving at once to find Kjors, to help and comfort him, and..” Karina swallowed. “..And we won’t be returning.  Attie and Kyrios, you will stay here to support your father and the River. It’s what your mother—your birth mother Naia— would have wanted."

 The twins had been told of Naia before, but from the way they still called Karina “mama,” she could tell that the idea that they were adopted hadn’t really sunk in for them. Not until now, at least. How could she blame them? All Naia was to them was a story, some wolf they had never met and never would. Karina knew it would also be shocking news for Bennet, who was about to be separated from those she considered her siblings. 
 
“This is for the best-- this way nobody ends up alone.”  Maybe the children could accept her decision, if they thought of it as the best way to help Kjors. The young mother’s tears were flowing freely now. “Know that I love all of you,” she finished, “Very, very much.”  She fell silent to let the news sink in for the children and to allow them to say their goodbyes.   

(This post was last modified: Oct 03, 2016, 06:39 PM by Karina.)

   

    
 

The news of Kjors had been Kyrios' first real exposure to pack law – sure he'd been told of it before, he knew that they were to treat the adults with respect, Kisla especially, and always do what they said – but this was the first real example of punishment. Still too young to understand the nuances, the boy mostly found himself confused at the whole affair, and worried; He'd sensed the effect the banishment had on Karina, and knew how the absence of Kjors so far had affected her and Bennet. And that also made him angry. In fact the more time passed, the more angry he felt. Whether it was directed more at Kjors or at his father, he didn't really know, all he was sure of was that this wasn't right! When Karina called them together, he felt the knot in his stomach grow tighter; More bad news? He couldn't really imagine that it was just a casual gathering like they used to have, playing and listening to their mom's quiet teachings. Though he could have never guessed the true purpose either. The silence was heavy and tense, Kyrios twisting his paw in the dirt as he waited, glancing up at his sisters intermittently. When the silver dam finally explained why they were there, he felt anger flash fresh and hot in his chest; Confused didn't even begin to cover it. He wasn't sure he should tell her though, it seemed like something she wouldn't approve of, though when she suggested they talk to their father instead, he could no longer hold his tongue. "I don't wanna talk to Pa!" He grumbled, glaring at the small hole his paw had dug. A pebble teetered at the edge and the boy swatted it angrily, sending it tumbling along the ground. "He's the one who did this." Karina tried to explain what had happened, but that only added to Kyrios' frustration; Then why did he do it?! He wondered. What was wrong with things the way they where? But he didn't speak, he really didn't want to talk about his feelings; It doesn't help anything..! So he sat silently as she continued to talk, shifting his eyes up to watch her face with furrowed brows. She was crying, hugging Bennet close and saying that Kjors was their family – of course! – but not his and Atty's; What? He shook his head lightly. Surely they were all family, his dad always said the whole pack was family; But Kjors isn't part of the pack anymore… So that meant he wasn't? But then he wouldn't be to any of them; Right? The furrow in his brow only deepened as she continued to explain, the meaning of her words slowly dawning on him. "No!" He exclaimed, springing to his feet. Karina had barely had time to finish. "No, you can't just leave us!" How could she possibly say this was best? Golden eyes turned to Bennet, filled with tears of desperate anger; "A' don't care what anyone else wanted, it ain't right! Please, don't go." His shouting died out into a hoarse whisper at the end, a light wheeze following as he breathed rapidly. He couldn't bear the thought of losing them. Word count: 537 ”Speech” Thoughts

Burtn @DA & Dawnthieves.de

Atropos was young, despite growing larger with every passing day. She still didn't understand many things, and pack law was something the young Stark was still coming to terms with understanding. She knew you had to respect your highers, and that Kisla and her father were the "top" of the pack. So when they said that Kjors had to go, because Kjors had broken the rules of the pack, it had to be ... and it left Atropos torn in two. Her father, or her uncle. Kjors had always been so patiently kind with the budding herbalist! How could he have done a bad thing? Her daddy had never done a bad thing, of this she was positive, so there was no way he could have lied about the one-eyed dragon doing something wrong. She couldn't believe for a second that Lachesis was telling fibs. It was impossible!

It was with Karina's summons that everything started to fall in place.

At first, she was simply hurt. Upset in a way that stirred her insides and left her feeling a rise in her throat. First, it was at the situation. Then it was at Kyrios, despite the guilt she felt at being irked by her brother's words. It wasn't dad's fault! It couldn't be. He had to keep the pack safe, and if Kjors was being mean and breaking said rules, then he was somehow bad. "Ih-it's not duh-duh-daddy's fault, Ky." Her voice was quiet, strained. She didn't like the atmosphere of the little group, didn't like the invisible clouds that hung over their heads. It felt like heavy rain all around. She nudged her brother lightly, as if to say snap out of it, bro. She definitely didn't like Kyrios' grumpy moods.

But woe suddenly turned to scorn and Atropos' calm surface shattered. Like a mirror being thrown, she felt little bits of her fall away. Karina was leaving her and her brother. That wasn't fair! It was after her brother's outburst that the younger stark made her own complaints known. "Wuh-wuh-why do yuh-you gotta?!" It was a child's fury, a lack of knowledge and understanding that spurred her sharp tongue on. "Yuh-yuh ... you're just sss-ssss-saying that you luh-luh-love us! It doesn't muh-muh-matter, 'cus you're luh-l-leaving! You don't luh ... llllove us. L-liar." She shook her head side to side, fast and frightened. Her mother was leaving her. She crept backwards, tucked into herself. Her voice was a stammering hiss of youthful pain. "You love Buh-Beh-Bennet! Not mmm-mm-me! Or Ky!"

Bennet was a rock.

Once the news had been processed, the change in her reality having thoroughly settled in, Bennet had quickly come to terms with it. Made peace with it. She was under no delusion that the decision would be reverted, that any impassioned plea from herself or Kyrios or Atropos or her mother would change their minds. In Hearthwood River, what Kisla Baranski and Lachesis Stark said was law. Bennet was nothing but a child in their domain, at the bottom of the heap, and she understood that. Accepted it. She would not waste time trying to bend their rules to bring everything back to normal.

But normal wasn't normal any more, and Bennet had absolutely no intention of adjusting to the new normal of Hearthwood. That normal was a world without Kjors Sorenson in it. That was not her world.

Bennet was a rock; she appeared calm and almost emotionless, yellow eyes steady as she gazed from her mother to her other more outwardly affected siblings, already knowing what she was going to do about it. What had to happen. And though her mother started out slow, spoke gentle things to try and soften the blow, to encourage them to open up, to explain what was to come, Bennet knew what the conclusion was going to be before Karina said it out loud.

They were going to leave Hearthwood River, because its normal was no longer compatible with their own.

Unsurprisingly, Kyrios and Atropos took it badly. Bennet watched her milk-siblings with something approaching pity, though their sorrow did not move her, did not spurn her to cry out in comfort and protest that they would be split up. This was the new normal. Why couldn't they see that? What was so hard to understand, to come to terms with?

Her brother pleaded, and her sister cried, and through it all Bennet just sat still, a frown creasing at her brow. In truth, their weakness and whining was painful to watch, but the girl had just enough compassion to hold her tongue from lashing out at them in impatient admonishment. Didn't they understand that they were getting the cushy deal? They would get to keep the pack and their dad and Kisla and each other, keep this place they all grew up in, keep the river and all the memories here. It was Bennet and Karina who were leaving it all behind, casting themselves away for the goodness of everyone involved.

Kjors was gone and could never come back; it didn't matter what they wanted, that they clung to the past and the status quo, but Bennet didn't belong here any more. It was a simple impossibility. Her status quo had been shattered, there was no returning to it.

But she held her tongue. Her mother would handle it better than she could. Honestly, honestly, she just wanted to get on with it so they could leave. This place already meant less than nothing.

There is a deer that was killed by a lynx nearby. +10 Health

The young mother had expected tears from the children, but the force of the twins’ anger and accusations was startling to say the least. She blinked repeatedly as Kyrios shouted at her, feeling like a deer in the headlights. Under normal circumstances, his insolence would have been swiftly quashed with a rumbling growl and shake to his ruff, but in this moment Karina knew it was desperation and not disobedience that fueled the boy’s outburst. His plea was heartbreaking.
 
“Kyrios,” she crooned, eyebrows knit in sympathy for him. “I know, I know it isn’t right..” she agreed, her voice hardly more than a whisper. She continued, voice a little stronger, “..But it’s also not right for Kjors to be all alone out there.  He has no father to teach him and look after him, and no sister to make him smile. There is no one to keep him warm at night.” Perhaps reminding the boy of everything he still had would soften the news. Kyrios was an emotional child, and Karina hoped that he could muster come of that passion to feel some sympathy for Kjors’s situation. 
 
She might have said more to Kyrios, but Atropos cut in at that point. Her anger was less desperate; her words chosen to intentionally hurt Karina. The Mother would have been very disappointed, but Atropos could not be blamed for her actions. Bennet was the only child who had been taught of the Mother, so only Karina could be blamed for the other pups’ ignorance. That knowledge alone was more painful that the words Atropos hurled, and it steeled Karina’s resolve. Once she was outside Hearthwood River, there would never again be another pup in her care allowed to be ignorant of the Mother’s truth.  
 
“Oh Attie,” the words came out with a sigh. “ I do love you. All of you,” she insisted, so earnest that tears formed at the corners of her eyes. “I would like nothing more than to take all of you with me. Truly.” If only! “But that would leave your father alone, and no one deserves that. No one deserves to be alone. Certainly not your father, and not Uncle Kjors either.”
 
Karina turned to her daughter, who had so far been silent. Her mother wondered if perhaps she had taken "be a rock” a little too much to heart… Bennet was the one who was really losing everything, after all. Her entire way of life had just been turned upside down, and she hadn’t made a peep about it. She was truly special; a dragon in a pup’s body. “Say goodbye, Bennet,” Karina instructed quietly, rising to her feet. Perhaps the twins were too angry with Karina to give an affectionate farewell, but she imagined the children would at least want to send Bennet off warmly.  

   

    
 

They didn't get it, none of them seemed to get it; Why? Why didn't they get it?! Atropos defended their father, her touch almost breaking through his wall of fire, but then Karina spoke about Kjors, how he was alone; I KNOW! Wasn't that what he'd been saying; No one should be alone..! But they weren't hearing him. Bennet was eerily quiet, staring straight ahead. Kyrios ached for a reaction from her, anything, even a dismissive one; Or just a look! Instead Atty lashed out, the words taking her brother aback. She didn't see, she didn't understand either. And the boy was left to look between her cowering form and his little sister's unmoving one, heart torn clear in two. Karina tried to appease them, but her soothing words offered little solution to their pain. And yet; "Then do it!" Kyrios sprang forwards, tears stinging in the corners of his eyes though he fought them back; "Take us with you!" She said Lachesis would be left alone, but that wasn't true. He had a whole pack with him! The pack was life, they'd all learned that from the moment they were born; Out there… Being on their own, that meant death. I couldn't let them go, not unprotected; "You can't stay, so let us come!" Chest heaving, hot with emotion, the boy stepped to his sister's side. Hovering over her slumped body protectively, one leg pressed against her flank in an attempt of comfort, he put on his most fierce expression as he met, first Karina's pallid eyes, then Bennet's golden. "I won't say goodbye," he barked, jaw set stubbornly; "I won't let you go alone!" This was what they didn't get. They thought theirs was the tough part, that they were being merciful in leaving him and Atty here. Kyrios huffed and shook his head. They didn't realize that they were tearing him apart. He wouldn't have anything if they left, what was a grandmother who they hardly ever spoke to, and stories of some mother who'd died when they were born; What am I without you? Tearing his gaze from his little sister's, the pale boy looked down, lowering his muzzle to Atropos. He pressed his nose to her ear, breathing slowly has he tried to control his churning feelings. His life was not Hearthwood, even his beloved river he could leave behind, but without his sisters… Nothing else matters. Voice a hoarse whisper into Atty's fur, he pleaded one last time, for his life not to be torn in two; " Come." Word count: 424 ”Speech” Thoughts

Burtn @DA & Dawnthieves.de