made with gunmetal bones and wolf's teeth
a warrior, a soldier

A year came and went like nothing, and like everything all at once.

The days spent by Felice's side felt like a cruel finality. The woman was damned and determined, persevering through her sickness and her age in a brutal attempt to chain Kieran to her side, to grasp at the boy who given his entire life to her. And doggedly devoted was he, to abandon his mate and his children to care for her; he who would sooner be abandoned by his own children long after Felice had left the earth. And who would care for Kieran then? Who would lick his wounds, who would keep him from being abandoned to confinement and loneliness?

He could not find the strength to leave her until she was truly gone. Kieran had owed her that much. And long after he had finally pulled from her corpse and her homelands, Kieran spent long weeks and months making the journey back to her, back to them. Large and aching paws set forth on their journey, stopping only to eat and drink and sleep and nothing more. And by the time the brute had slipped into the borders of Amaryllis and weaved his way toward the Bluffs, there was a sense of relief and an almost boyish excitement when the scent of @Amara and his family were still there. Strong, fortified, resolute, unending.

He came in the night. He would not wait until morning to reunite with them, no matter how furious or repulsed they may be. Kieran had not left wordlessly, but he had left abruptly; and he had been gone far longer than any of them could have anticipated. But he would rather them be forever angry with him if it meant he got to see them again, even if his tired and steeled expression would not quite show it.

As the moon came to rest above the tree-tops of the Bluffs, illuminating the thinning treeline in a sieve of dappled silvery light, Kieran called, and waited.

@Beelzebub @Louve @Séverine @Elaine

A year had come and gone and she had grown -- they had grown. They had faced hardship and yet here they remained, strong and unbroken, untarnished; no thanks to him.

Louve hears the call and there is a swell of excitement that is quickly ruined by a rush of pure and blinding rage. It consums her strides as she stalks towards where her father stands, claws flexing against the stone ground of her home. There is an urge in the young adult to ruin him, to tear his flesh and drink his blood and bestow upon him one iota of the pain he had caused them.

A sliver of the ruin he had left behind.

"À présent? Maintenant tu reviens?" Now? Now you come back? A curl of her lip as the words come with a sneer, the mottled girl emerging from shadow to bore yellow eyes in to his solid form. A small part of her (the tiny cub that had ached for him in the beginning, hiding away the sorrow and grief if only to be strong) wanted to run in to his embrace and cling to him and sob. A much larger part of her did not, and it was that part that shot daggers at @Kieran.

"Vous êtes trop tard." You're too late. And he was, wasn't he? Because there she stood before him, nearly full grown, hardly the tiny child he had left behind.

Image by Rabs

Learning to exist in darkness had been the first thing Séverine that clung to — the first defining feature of her psyche. She'd had to, or the sun would have burned her pale skin and blinded sensitive eyes, and the call into the night is not what bothers her. No, the itch under her skin that she can't shake is the familiarity of that voice. She knows that she knows it, but she cannot immediately place why; @Kieran is such a distant memory now, barely even a blip on her radar. If someone asked her to describe him, she wouldn't be able to. He had only ever been a shadow, looming and fleeting.

She winds her way through the slopes of the Bluffs, racking her brain for this inexplicable familiarity, this certainty that she knows whoever is lingering at their doorstep. Rather than take a direct path, Séverine sticks to the higher slopes, keeping a somewhat cautious vantage point as she nears, first hearing @Louve's accusatory tone before her gaze drifts down from the peak to see him.

Père.

How can she not know him the moment her eyes land upon him? And Séverine freezes, her muscles quivering and the set of her jaw growing stern. She is not wholly of another mind as her sister, but her anger is not white-hot; it is an ember —a slow-growing flame. Her expression is a dark and unreadable storm, and she settles upon the slope above, leaning stiffly onto her haunches and looking imperiously down at the man who had left them. How was a child supposed to understand where he had gone? By the time she'd been old enough to possibly comprehend it, all she knew was that he wasn't there.

She may have needed him once, but in his absence, Séverine had grown without him — just as her sisters had, just as Xavier had. It's difficult to miss what you never really had. And now, seeing him here, after all this time? As if it is just that easy? She is of two minds, torn between her disconnect and her anger; she is quite certain that there is nothing he can say that will mend this rift. Louve is right — he's too late.

_{BG — ART — CODE}

A memory, deep within her mind. A dream she had a few times but could never really shake the feeling. The call came through the night sky and the yearling was aware of it but wasn't sure what to do. It wasn't until she saw her sisters moving toward him that she went. She didn't really know what she was going to do. Her time away from her family had made things muddy for her and she wasn't always aware of things. Time felt different but she knew that it had been a long time since she had seen her father. He wasn't part of their daily talks anymore either. Mother seemed to have stopped altogether. Maybe given up faith that he was coming back?

Elaine was a yearling now, her body littered with small scars from her fights with others. Would all those have happened if he had been here? Her blue gaze set on his body as she slowed in getting closer to him. Her sisters weren't standing together but Elaine went to join @Louve's side but didn't say anything as she looked him over. She wasn't really sure what to say to him. She wasn't really sure that she could remember the desire to have him back any more than she could remember his face before today. She didn't hate him. Didn't blame him. If she had learned anything in her short life, it was that loyalty was something that couldn't be given up on and he had shown his loyalty.

ART

How long had it been since she had shuttered up that part of her? She had some hope a few months after he left that he would be back but that time came and went and Amara figured she wouldn't see him again. Time was against them. Distance was against them. She raised her cubs into yearlings and managed to keep them alive, not out of fights but alive. Amara's wounded body made its way across her lands. Her wounds were fresh and she took care not to open them or likely face the wrath of Echo. The star-covered mother arrived with two of her daughters in sight but she was sure that her other daughter and son were nearby in some manner. Her ears folded back as she listened to @Louve's anger. She had told them all why he had left but that didn't mean they understood. She barely understood it if she was being honest. She didn't have a before, didn't have a family before the one she made here. She didn't have any ties or loyalty to anyone but those who were here with her and a few who had left. Still, she had let him go, unable to stop him even if she had tried. Her golden gaze was steady on him, blank of anything that may be going through her mind as she stood with her offspring. Her tone was smooth as she spoke. Elle est partie alors? If he was back then his mother must have died. Otherwise, he wouldn't have come back would he have? Ta soeur est partie auss. She updated him, letting him know that their children had been raised without anyone from his direct family being part of their lives. They had been raised with Cassine's group and a few others who had shown up. She didn't move toward him, her body having a strange reaction to seeing him. If she had been at her full strength, she likely would have attacked him to express whatever it was she was feeling but that wasn't an option. So she stood there, trying to understand the desire to attack him and greet him in a more wifey manner. *She is gone? *Your sister left also the lost art of murder

code // art // do not use without permission

made with gunmetal bones and wolf's teeth
a warrior, a soldier

He remembers them not as the strong yearling women who promenade through the Bluffs to stand before him now, bared-teethed and brooding and strong, but instead as the soft little cubs that rooted around Amara's belly, desperate for warmth and wanting for nothing. The gravity of his absence hit him all at once, then, fettering him to a sense of self-disappointment and regret. It had been easy to lose track of time in those distant, dreary swamps he'd been raised in. What felt like fleeting moments there must have dragged on like years here. And what did he have to show for it, other than reappearing on their borders once more, expecting to be welcomed back into their arms as if he'd never left? As if he'd been absent from his children's lives longer than he'd been apart of it? There is little that can crack the façade of Kieran Dieudonné, but the very first accusation that left @Louve's mouth caused his lips to turn to a frown, his eyes to cast downward.

You're too late.

Her words stung more than he expected. The first children born to Kieran undoubtedly despised him. And where once he would have felt a cold indifference, he surprisingly found himself regretting, grieving. She is not the only one; @Séverine lurks in the shadows, certainly keen to see his reaction, to see what he would say, if he could muster the strength to say anything at all. Kieran remained silent, perhaps much to their disappointment, teetering carefully between dismissing the idea of regaining their trust and falling to his knees and begging for forgiveness. Just like them, he, too, had never gotten the chance to be a father. He did not know what to do when faced with their wrath, near-strangers he loved so unconditionally. @Elaine wordlessly approaches toward Louve's side, and Kieran briefly wonders if the rest of the brood is lurking somewhere nearby.

Just as he opens his mouth to speak, the familiar form of @Amara appears from between the trees, bruised and beaten. Kieran blinks in surprise, suppressing the urge to tend to her wounds, to ask answers of her state. Instead, he remains still, knowing better than to approach the wife he'd left alone to raise their children for so long. Nobody had anticipated the length of his absence, but it did not mean Kieran couldn't have abandoned Felice and left to return to his family at any point.

“Elle ne pouvait pas lâcher prise,” She could not let go, he finally said, his voice dampened by the weight of their turmoiled reunion. Felice had fought with every last breath to survive, and Kieran was half-convinced she would come clawing from the grave. His gaze returned to his daughters, softening, raw. “J'avais choisi la famille plutôt que la famille,” I had picked family over family, he admitted honestly, his ears drooping against the sides of his head. Felice had worked so desperately to raise him. Kieran now needed to do the same for his, to realize that his loyalty belonged endlessly to his mate and his children. “It will not happen again.” But would they even believe him? Would they think his words merely an empty promise?

He would have deserved it.

In the early days she had not know what she was missing. Too small to comprehend she was only barely aware of her mother, let alone her absent father. As she grew it became more obvious, the missing piece from her life, and in the wake of grief grew resentment.

It was a constant rollercoaster, if she was being entirely honest. Nights where she wondered how he could have left them, what he had seen (or not seen) that had made him want to go. Sometimes beneath the stars she had embraced a bone deep ache in her chest, feeling every bit of the loss that haunted her steps.

Other times she was viciously angry. Resentful that he could care to chose one over many, to put the needs of an aging mother over those of his young children. Those were the times she wondered how differently things might have been if only he had stayed; and then she would tear gouges in to some hapless tree. An outlet for the anger — that was healthy, right?

He looks down and instinctively she lifts her head higher. Above him, fighting the pain that lances through her heart and instead schooling her expression in to one of indifference. Perhaps even with a hint of disgust. He shows shame and sorrow and she sees it as weak.

“Tu as fait ton choix.” you made your choice she agreed and her voice is anything but gentle. “ et vous ne revenez que lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à faire.” and you return only when there are no more to be made. Can he see? Can he see the sad little girl buried six feet deep? Not likely, Louve doubted there was anything left of her.

“ nous étions les derniers.” we were the last. Biting, accusatory, perhaps even mean. Weapons she wields against him even as she wants nothing more than to have that happy little family they had deserved.

Image by Rabs

An ear flick was all that was given as their mother arrived and spoke to him. She seemed to cover a few things but it wasn't at all what she thought would come from her. In everything, their mother was fire and now she seemed almost calm. It was a little offsetting but Elaine didn't have anything to base her knowledge on how the pair were together. She didn't have those memories to draw from. She knew that they had been through a lot since he left and maybe she was feeling the weight of all of it and the wounds that she had now could be a part of that. The stormy yearling listened to all of them, to his words, to his body and what it was saying. Her blue gaze didn't leave him as she waited to see how things played out. She found herself understanding his desire to help his mother, wouldn't she do the same? She sister was channeling the fire that their mother was lacking as she kept on with her attack with her words. She wants to lean into her sister but worries that she might lash out just out of a reaction so she flicked her tail across her sister's back legs as she tried to process everything that was happening. Would we not do the same for any of us or mom?* She asked her sister softly, unable to keep the words from being heard by the others but making it clear that it was for @Louve.

ART

The stubbornness of his mother wasn't surprising, she sees it doubled down in her children. They got it from his side and her own and she knew that wouldn't change and that it would be his downfall here. She had no intention of holding anything they wanted to say back from him. He would have to find his way back into their lives and she hoped that he would. She looked toward her daughters as each spoke, taking different routes. Elaine's comment was the reason why Amara hadn't put up a fight when he left. She hoped that at least one would do the same for her someday but she didn't think it would be this long. That their daughters would have been through all that they had. They had been in through two wars already and they weren't even adults yet. She was proud of them and herself, she had kept them alive and while they may not understand it she did love them in some manner. A way that she understood far more than her feelings toward their father. Pick them and none other.* She spoke to him in an even tone, letting him know that his attention should be on their children and building what he never got with them. If made to pick, she was telling him to pick them even over her. They needed it. Deserved it. She would always be ok, she had learned that long ago but their children needed to learn and connect with him more. the lost art of murder

code // art // do not use without permission

made with gunmetal bones and wolf's teeth
a warrior, a soldier

Had Kieran been given more time to be a father, perhaps he would have picked differently. The raw and aching feeling he felt at their birth had been almost unmatched. Almost. The years spent alone by Felice's side had been only just enough to draw him from the clutches of Amaryllis, and had he not been needed so soon, perhaps he would have found a way to stay. But Kieran could not take back the past, nor right the wrong decisions he'd made. His mother had been wrenched from her twin so terrifyingly soon, and had left her so aching and raw that he felt it cruel to abandon her in her final moments. But by doing that, he had abandoned those who had needed him the most: innocent, pawing at their mother's belly and unknowing of the terrors of the world he was supposed to protect them from. He could not blame @Louve for her fiery response; only inhale sharply at the pain it caused in his chest.

@Elaine, however, eased the pain, if only a little. Though he could not quite catch the soft words meant for her sister, there was not quite the edge in her expression that Louve had, and Kieran was perhaps somewhat hopeful that she at least did not feel nearly as much contempt. There was far more work he needed to do before they would allow him in again, he knew, and it was unlike Kieran to ever want something so badly, but he found himself wanting the family they all desired. Pick them and none other. @Amara's voice cut through his thoughts, drawing his gaze away from his yearling daughters and back to her. “Yes,” he agreed, trying hard to keep his tone from wavering, “Whatever is needed of me. Whenever. Wherever.” Kieran was rather good at being a guard dog, whenever he was around to be. Perhaps that would be the first, albeit small, step. Whatever their answer, he would not so soon let his daughters out of his sight anytime soon.