Sacred Grove blues for sister someone

Wanna start off by saying the ONLY reason that this thing is so long is because its Rome's entrance into RL post! But yeah would definately LOVE some company for Romanis and her dead friend :)

It was completely usual for Romanis Riordae to awake in the midst of a paranoid depression. Intense –but again, less than riveting- the episodes would rile her from bed and onto some imaged course for hours on end. Running until she was too tired to even consider her fears, it was only then that she would return haggard and bitter –but better.

Forced to perform this mechanism of coping on the first night of her arrival, Romanis had unfurled an immense trail before her mental ills began to wane. Moreover, the first lights of dawn had already tinged the sky by the time that she managed to retrace her way back to start.

Well worn by then and eager to achieve the deep sleep she had previously been denied, it was without ceremony that Romanis returned to her place alongside Desra Tantamount. Unbothered by such demons and furthermore accustomed to Rome’s, the elder female had remained at their camp and resting in the hours that the yearling had departed.

Recognizing her spot alongside her companion, Romanis was quick to lower, fold and press herself against the darker wolf’s warmth –mingling the colors of their sides as she settled. However, sleep could not come immediately with the twinkling and twittering of noon so loud and lively. So instead Romanis was forced to wait in a state of almost meditative wondering. The sort of blank but all encompassing thought that usually led to a seamless entrance into similarly designed dreams.

Lingering in this way for quite some time, Rome had almost completely drifted off when she was bothered by the sound of a chattering animal. Raising her head first in alarm and then her lips in sad annoyance, it was with forgotten regard for Desra that she quickly raised the sound upon spotting the raucous troublemaker.

Yet as swiftly as she had began an argument with the prey animal Romanis managed to remember her manners. Thus she immediately quieted herself and even looked upon Desra with more than an ounce of concern. Bending back her ears as golden eyes searched for signs of increasing consciousness, it was with relief that she found none. However, just as the young Riordae planned to rest her head again, she felt the slightest of pricks.

Not upon her coat or even anywhere on her exterior, but rather in the farthest part of her mind. It was a sharp and needling sensation which overpowered any sense of fatigue and thus Romanis remained alert with rounded eyes. Turning her cream head from side to side and then finally, back to Desra –it was in this instant that the feeling became a hot and irritable swarm.

Something was wrong.

Tilting her head upon her neck as her nose came close to her companion again, it was this time with more of her senses that Romanis gave regard. And indeed she did find the wrongness in all of it’s would be horror –for Desra Tantamount was dead.

Immediately reeling back and into her own personal space, it was with a spur of instinct that Romanis’ first verbalization came forth as a petulant growl. A fowl sound directed not at the black colored husk, but rather the unknown which had stolen her away.

Freezing in this moment as her emotions frosted over, Rome’s subsequent move was one of slow and deliberate quality. Rising from her spot but not completely moving, she shoved the Tantamount once before silently accepting the obvious truth. She was alone –again.

The right to mourn was quickly established thereafter and yet Romanis Riordae refrained. Instead, she allowed herself to slip into a familiar auto pilot as she gazed at death’s most recent victim and wandered a catholic amount of bizarre things. What next? Should she be buried? Should be she eaten? Would there be punishment for either option?

Dizzied by these queries and many more, Rome attempted to gather herself before surrendering both in spirit and form. Lowering herself back to earth and back to the comfort of Desra’s side, she quickly closed her eyes and slowed her breaths in a desperate attempt to escape into a reverie. After all she was much too tired to run.

(This post was last modified: Nov 29, 2012, 08:02 PM by Romanis.)

It's okay for me to assume that, though they're close to his borders (since this was posted in the Grove) they never actually trespassed? Because otherwise this would be an even more unhappy thread c:

I also hope my assumptions in the last part are okay - let me know if you want me to change anything!

<blockquote>It was not unusual to come across the tracks of strange, lone wolves out in the neutral territories, going one way or the other but usually in no direction of concern to Marsh. The only time that he truly paid attention - save for if the scent was familiar, implying a lingerer - was if it toyed with his territory's edge a little too finely. When he crossed the trail of a female early in the dark morning, therefore, he paid it little heed. This time of year, he had even less to worry about from loners than normal. They may be more desperate for food, but they were weaker for the cold and the hunger, and with the pups practically fully grown, there was nothing terribly vulnerable in his home to get too paranoid about.

It was a few hours later, prowling about in the light of dawn in the forest that surrounded his grove, that a female's scent caught his attention, and rather than be inclined to dismiss it, he noticed a peculiarity. Immediately he realised that he recognised it. Such an event called for investigation, to be on the safe side, and so it was without hesitation that he padded along the scent trail, inspecting it on the way. Two females, one aging and one no older than Fenru or Kisla. He feared the idea of neither. Stealing ahead with brazen confidence, it was only when the subtle air of death touched his nose did he pause. Ears high on his head, he moved forward slowly, a more inquisitive curiosity growing alongside the businesslike one, and when he finally reached the pair, the two females he had smelt, and realised what had happened.

It was not in his nature to pity, but seeing the young wolf laid next to the freshly deceased did not exactly inspire anger. She was close to his land, it was true, but it was plain to see that she was no threat - even less than the average wanderer, he assessed. There was no need for wrath here.

There was no doubt as to the state of the old, darker female, but he stepped forward anyway to lower his nose at her, to see if anything was awry. . They were close enough to his territory for his authority to count, by all rights. As far as he could tell, though, she just stank of too many years, and the cold could not have helped. He practically treated the younger wolf's presence as if she were dead too, for how little attention he paid her - at least for now.</blockquote>

Oh no that is perfectly fine. Thank you so much for joining!

The process of mourning had steps –phases which if left unvisited would reportedly leave a wolf in worse ruins than the deceased. Considering this, it was an unfortunate thing that Romanis had never experienced the process of loss. For she was unaware that it was best to submit to her feelings rather than spiriting them away to some deep and dark place as hastily as she may. However, Romanis was a creature of habit so knowing no better means of emotional survival she was quick to rely on the denial which had time and again saved her.

Keeping her eyes fastened shut as she tried to ignore the cold stiffness which now described her friend; it was with justifiable difficulty that she repeatedly failed. With every nudge and shutter she felt her loneliness reiterated in a loud and teasing tone. After all, that was the worst of what Romanis Riordae was suffering from –a general sense of loneliness.

In the arrangement between Desra and Romanis there was an understanding of their equal difficulty as individuals. Romanis was young, strange and antisocial while Desra was bitter and old. Thus they traveled together for the most basic pleasure of doing so –barely speaking and hardly ever sharing a meal.

So why did the revelation of her death spurn the yearling so badly? Why, I already told you, it was because Romanis’ greatest ill of all was her inability to be alone –followed closely by her feral nature. Overwhelmed with herself in this moment of personal truth, the youth bit her lip with heavy teeth. It was a poor choice of action. For instead of helping her to cope and hold on, it made her want to cry out against the pain and so much more. But instead Romanis refused and thus gaped her eyes wide open when she thought they might fill with tears.

Blinking stupidly as her mind continued to flutter somewhere far above her, it was with a listless sigh on the tip of her tongue that the young Riordae finally noticed her company. Rounding her eyes in expected surprise, it was in the very next instant the Romanis threw her ears back and tucked her tail in close. Obviously in her moment of grief she had forgotten her all too important senses and likewise left herself vulnerable to what was surely an impending attack from the male. Accepting this thought as quickly as she had formed it, it was with a wane whine that the yearling adverted her eyes.

What use was running or even speaking for that matter? Romanis knew fate to be cruel. So instead of doing anything...well 'normal' she decided to simply remain as she was -indivisible from the dead Desra Tantamount save for her large batting eyes.

Fenrir: you accidentally opened a second div tag instead of closing it, I closed it for you :)

(This post was last modified: Nov 30, 2012, 10:06 PM by Ice.)

My pleasure! Btw, do you have an unclosed tag in your table? It's not breaking anything except in the preview screen <3

<blockquote>It was a curious matter. On the one hand, he was not prepared to just leave a stranger so close to his home without some message that she was not welcome, but with her companion deceased, he did not know if she would linger anyway. With how sorry and pathetic she looked, tucked up beside a corpse as if denying the death, he half wondered if she wouldn't survive the winter anyway. Perhaps putting her out of her misery would be the best thing to do for everyone involved.

There was the matter of the older female, too. He disliked the idea of a fresh corpse on his borders as much as he disliked the presence of the living wolf, for he had no need of such a beacon to scavengers and rivals that would attract. It was a judgement of whether she was close enough to warrant concern, though; any potentially dangerous creature to come across the free meal may yet be far enough from his borders, yet close enough to smell them and comprehend they were not welcome. Plus it would give him one less beast which might want to try their luck on his land, with a corpse so easily at hand. Let the scavengers fight over her and kill each other, that suited him best.

So he had been preparing to wander on again, with the intention of passing by this way later to see whether the younger female had moved on, lingered, or died herself, when the low whine cut through the cool silence. So there was life in her yet. Sharply his head turned towards her, steel eyes cutting into her wide open ones as he regarded her anew, unfazed by her inclination to remain frozen to her dead companion. With barely a moment of hesitation he stepped about the corpse in order to thrust his nose towards the living girl, partly to learn of her as well, but partly to see if she would react. From what he could tell, she was an ordinary passer by, of no particular interest in her own right save for the nature of her company and her proximity to her home. </blockquote>

Thanks Fenrir!

Rome couldn’t say for sure whether she preferred life over death. Whether she actually reveled in the constant struggle to maintain a pulse or wished to slip away and into the eternal coma of her demise. It was a real toss up given her current circumstance –not to mention all of the other recent issues of her life. Perhaps if the male had known this it would have swayed him one way or another, but he couldn’t have given the girl’s continued silence.

Having quieted even her contemptible whine, Rome was less than blank as she shifted her eyes to the paws of the stranger. For therein lied everything that she needed to know about his prowess and potential. He was a larger creature and moreover experienced in ways that the yearling could never hope to challenge. So when reverting back to thought over her possible end, Rome was once again assured that she had next to no liability in it. Hell, if the male chose to snuff out her breath and blood now, pleading cries would be her only slim chance of salvation.

Swallowing hard at the severity of this thought, it was in that instant that Rome subconsciously answered her own dubious question. For in some secreted part of her –some still sane part of her- she still cherished her scrappy little life.

Still unaware of this though the wolf would remain prone as the wolf suddenly turned towards her –suppressing every urge to spring and flee. Why? Well she wasn’t entirely sure but it just didn’t seem like the right thing to do. Instead, Rome allowed her gaze to float upwards and into the realm of his handsome face. Of course her mind was far flung from such trivial thoughts and motives but it was a fact she admitted deep within herself all the same. The stranger had simply fared better than her in life thus far.

Yet with her eyes so concentrated on the soul of the larger creature, Romanis couldn’t help but to feel a different sort of stirring within herself. It was a feeling which had occasionally come over her whilst in Desra’s presence but time and again she had suppressed it back into hiding. For it was of all things the desire to talk.

Speak. Converse. Express. Or so she was advised by the tingling feeling inside. It was that remote part of her which longed for normalcy and all of the sparkling knickknacks that would come along with it –namely the gem of renewed socialization. Yet, as nagging at her inner thoughts were they were also overpowered by Romanis’ prevailing sense of feral lunacy. Surely she couldn’t just open up her mouth and expect something sagacious to come flowing forth. Could she…?

It was with ease that Rome inched her head from the dirt floor, but conflicting difficulty that she attempted to unhinge her mouth. Creeping through the process with a steadily shaking jaw, by the time that it was done her ears had dove backwards and her aura reeked heavily of sincere fear. Not of what the male would think of her words –she hadn’t even gotten that far yet- but simply of what they might be. Holding this awkward pose for at least a minute, it was at long last that she croaked a single thought, “m-my f-f-friend is d-dead.”

(This post was last modified: Dec 04, 2012, 03:19 PM by Romanis.)