aeistrios saxe

the darkness holds monsters

---

This content might touch on topics that are sensitive or triggering for some readers. Trigger Warning for mentions of death, child sensitivity

It was hot, so freaking hot and Aeistrios had found his way to the watering hole with his son dangling gently from his jaws. A single day had passed since the birth of his cub, and the presumed death of his mate - and he still had no idea what he was doing. He feared overall that he would fail his child and allow death to take him too. He had no idea what to do for a cub - the mothers always handled all of that! He couldn't even feed the newborn, was he too young for meat? Should he try instead of letting him starve? He didn't have a way to get milk!

His mind was a mess but there was one thing Aeistrios could do. He could bathe Valtyr , get him clean from his birth and figure out his next steps then. Taking in a breath, he gently lowers him to the bank of the watering hole, his mewls slowly starting to get louder and louder. "Hey, work with me here." Aeistrios murmurs to him, before he dips his paw in the water and slowly brings it over his son's body, letting the water drip onto his back. "See? You're gross." His nose wrinkles up in a teasing way as he slowly helps to bathe all the blood and yuck off him from birth, and while his eyes are alight with fondness and love for his child- there is a sadness lingering, a dark cloud over his head at Reah not being at his side with this.

@Ingrid

She negotiates the flats of the waterhole in leisure and languid strides, the relentless heat drawing her to the water. The lands are firmly in the thrall of summer now, and so, she expects the coveted water source to occupied when she arrives.

What she doesn't expect is a hulking male, accoutered in a rather exotic color.

But it's not just that. She knows this man. Perhaps not intimately, but she was there when he tried to take control of her home. Firnen. She stops, her breath hitching in her throat. Devil—that's what her intrinsic reaction was when she first saw him, trying to uproot her esteemed home. Of course, she knows better than to make such quick judgments. Empires rise as quickly as they fall; but it doesn't make it any easier when they do fall.

Standing there indecisively, she considers turning around and leaving. Until she sees the little bundle of joy underneath him. The way he coos to the child awakens something within her, watching for a while as she observes this entirely different side of him. She sidles up to him, a small smile playing across her face. "Is he yours?"

@Aeistrios

ART COPYRIGHT JAZZYBLU / CODE COPYRIGHT ANALESE

aeistrios saxe

the darkness holds monsters

---

His child wasn't the happiest with the bath, and Aeistrios understood why. Who wanted to get clean when their stomach was rumbling with hunger? Who wanted to do anything when they were hungry? It was his biggest obstacle - feeding his son. Why was that the hardest thing for him to do? He'd of never expected that to be his hardship as a father.

There was a noise - an approach. Aeistrios' head snapped up to see the small woman, her scent strong of Firnen and for a brief moment does the new father tense. Would she bring harm? Try to hurt him, or his child, for having tried to take the Rainforest land? He bristles at this thought, gaze fixed on her until he heard the mewl of Valtyr. Snapping out of it, his gaze falls down to him as he hears the words of the other.

It was her smile that made him relax.

"Yes..." His words rolled off cautiously, an ear flicking before he tries to place his next words carefully. "He's hungry." This was stated with a deep frown, purple eyes looking back to her as he now sought help. Aid. She was a lioness - she had to know this stuff, right? "How do I feed him?" It was a vulnerability he reveled to her, an anchor of trust thrown her way in his weakest of times. He had no clue how to help his own son and he needed her help - and he hoped more than not she felt like being a friend than a foe.

@Ingrid

The mountainous man recognizes her as well. She can tell in the way tenses and bristles, and such a harsh reaction to her presence almost has her feeling guilty. He looks so vulnerable now, and she's reminded once again the world is not black and white, but a spectrum. She probably would have done the same—she still feels the need to protect Anya from all the perceived evils of the world, even if she was never hers and is already growing up to be a self-reliant young woman.

Then a mewl breaks the tension, and she shifts her attention to the cub the same time its father does. Ingrid has absolutely no desire to harm, certainly not a child and its father. "Sugar vawter." She muses, absently. "It is found in sugar beets. Should keep him happy for about two to three days." But she knows the answer isn't satisfactory. Two or three days isn't going to cut it, and she knows it. Unless he intends to raise the child on sugar beets alone.

"Beautiful child. He reminds me of a little larkspur." It's her healer instincts that automatically drive her to liken a baby to a flower. She comes a bit closer, close enough to see the boy. "How long has the boy gone vithout food?"

@Aeistrios

ART COPYRIGHT JAZZYBLU / CODE COPYRIGHT ANALESE

aeistrios saxe

the darkness holds monsters

---

He didn't like weakness, didn't enjoy any part of him even being able to be assumed as weak- but here in this moment? His lack of knowledge was his weakness. He always thought strength was power, but his son already was making him see that intelligence was just as important.

"Sugar water?" He repeated in a question, but stored the information away swiftly. She said they were found in sugar beets, and Aeistrios determinedly set that at the top of his to do list. "What do sugar beets look like?" He asked, eager to get the description of the plant so he could get some nourishment in his son.

She comes closer, her eyes on Valtyr and Aeistrios watches her closely. She didn't seem like a threat, not anymore at least, and with her helping him he doubted she'd try anything now. ""A day. He was born yesterday- his mother, she," He looks down to his child with a softer gleam, sighing. "died in labor." The grey cloud threatened to loom over him again, to sidetrack him from getting his son fed. Lifting his head, he shakes it and sucks in a breath. "Can he eat meat yet? Would the sugar water and meat be enough for him?" Meat was tasty and always made him feel full - could that be enough for his child too?

@Ingrid

Ingrid furrows her brow as she looks upon the huge man and his child with growing sympathy. It's a distressing sight, seeing such a helpless little boy without its mother. She can tell its father is doing everything he can to save him, but without a mother, he can only do so much.

"It is a vhite, fleshy root. Zey smell sveet. Like burnt sugar." As she describes it, she can't take her eyes off the small baby writhing underneath its father. She knows she can't leave them. Even if they find sugar beets for him, it will only delay the inevitable. Her conscience pricks her, the man's offense all but forgotten.

She looks at the man in arrant shock when he tells her the cub is only a day old. A day! The baby is more vulnerable than she could have ever imagined. Her blood turns icy when he continues to explain that its mother has died, words seemingly hitching in her throat. Seems like tragedy follows this child around. Her heart hurts for him. "Oh... zat poor baby." She despairs.

"He vill not be able to eat meat for two more months. Vithout a mother... ze child vill be dead vithin three days." She concludes, failing to disguise the horror creeping into her voice.

@Aeistrios

ART COPYRIGHT JAZZYBLU / CODE COPYRIGHT ANALESE

aeistrios saxe

the darkness holds monsters

---

She gave him the description of sugar beets and Aeistrios securely stored that information away in his head. He would be sure to find a huge amount of them for Valtyr, whatever he needed. However, when Aeistrios reveals the daunting trouble behind his situation- he sees the shock filter across the small woman's face.

Ears fold back at her words, a harsh reality spilled from her lips- and Aeistrios stiffly shakes his head. "No." He comments this sternly, as if him telling the world 'no' meant it wouldn't be allowed to take his child, couldn't take his child. A paw moves to bring his son closer, his mewls quieting down while Aeistrios resumes a protective hold on him, glaring at the earth beneath him. This was cruel! It was his first child, his first son, how dare fate play with him like this- sentence both mother and child to death?

The horror in her tone did little to soothe his worries and Aeistrios takes in a deep breath. "Sugar Beets. I'll find an abundance of them, then when he is two months he can have meat. That'll work. It has to.."" But something in his gut told him it wouldn't work, no matter how persistent he was, death was coming for his son and it might be the only enemy he couldn't fight away.

@Ingrid

No. The plum male sounds defeated, and Ingrid's eyes darken with sorrow. He pulls his son closer to him, the cub's persistent mewling almost instantly dying down as soon as he does so. The scene pulls at her hearstrings.

She's not sure what to say. No one wants to hear their child will die, but Ingrid isn't one to smooth over the details. Her ears flatten against her head as he goes on about sugar beets, and she directs her gaze upon the ground as his voice tapers off, anguish overtaking her. Sugar beets won't save him, and they both know it.

For an agonizing moment, there is a thunderous silence filling the empty spaces between them, and all seems lost. Then she lifts her gaze again to look upon the both of them, her voice steadier than before. "Come vith me." Firnen might or might not receive him with open arms, but there's no time to find out. "To Firnen. I know someone." She looks at the little helpless bundle between his paws. "Zere might still be hope for him."

@Aeistrios

ART COPYRIGHT JAZZYBLU / CODE COPYRIGHT ANALESE

aeistrios saxe

the darkness holds monsters

---

There was a lot weighing on his mind now- not only had he lost Reah, but he very well was on the path to losing Valtyr as well. What kind of luck was this? He fully started to believe it was because he hadn't acquired a land for Reah to flourish in. If she had a proper home, she'd of had a proper birth- she'd of been healthier. Brows furrow, lost in his thoughts as he comforted both him and his son in his hold, but it was the words of the lioness to pull him from his defeated trance.

"The Rainforest dislikes me, monkeys and lions alike." He stated, hesitating at the idea. What if one of the lions there sought to harm his child? Take his child as revenge? It was dangerous. "I only challenged to try and take the land. For my mate - for him ." A stiff sigh leaves his lips as he shifts Valtyr. The cub was dozing off but Aeistrios suspected it was more so from not having any energy in him versus being happily asleep like Aeist loved to do.

But he knows he truly has little choice. She could leave them here today, and tomorrow could be one of the last days he has with him left. Or the next, but death was coming regardless. "If they hurt him... I will not hesitate to do the same back." He mumbles this, but his gaze looks to her, hoping this is understood. It was a risk of him to go with her - it was a risk for her to bring him back - but he wanted her to understand he would not hesitate to harm anyone who hurt them.

@Ingrid

She hasn't forgotten how the monkeys of the rainforest turned on him, seemingly irate with the would-be ursurper. Of course, a more plausible explanation would be that they got tired of the commotion (what do monkeys care for the unending power struggle of lions?), but a spectacle like is quite hard to forget.

He speaks of revenge, and she answers quite sternly. "Refenge is a vaste of time. Let Maua decide betveen right ahnd wrong." It is not a lion's place to pass judgment, and she has plenty to be angry about. The lions of the Rainforest aren't so unreasonable as to leave a completely innocent cub to its fate. Even if its father did try to acquire their home. "Eferyone vill be judged ahccording to zeir deeds."

If she doubted Firnen even for a second, she would never risk bringing father and child to its border.

"It vill not come to zat." A big promise to make, but it's all she can do at the moment. "Your boy can still live. But you must trust me." She tips her head towards the treeline; it's where she intends to exit Andal and start journeying back to the rainforest. "Ingrid." She offers; now she's no longer a nameless face. Maybe it will boost his trust in her, even if only a little. "We better mofe fast."

-exit-

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