Joss | Lessons learned [Imogen/Henry/Evan]

She’s had rest, meditation, work, rest, meditation, patrols, rest meditation… and at some point in that rotation, she remembers food. The loud complaints of her belly likely has a lot to do with reminding her that quick sandwiches along the way isn’t always enough to fuel a growing girl. Well, not GROWING growing, but…

Whatever. She’s hungry, is the point, and as such she is currently exiting a diner with a to-go container in hand. She doesn’t go far, hitting up a outside table in the mostly empty patio, empty as the rain pelts down on the awning, and tends to blow up under and chill those brave enough – or dumb enough – to sit outside. Where she is currently sitting, kicking off her shoes, and pulling her feet up under her to sit criss-cross-applesauce (Indian style, for those still rockin’ it old school). She smooths her skirt – a light flowy flowery wispy thing – over her thighs, and pushes back her dreads over her shoulders, to fall heavily down her back, individual strands clinging to her damp sweater.

She seems un-bothered by it, and much more interested in getting her container of food open, and digging into the steaming pile of fries and greasy burger held within. The girl has NEEDS, after all.

So the logical thing to do, it appears, is to climb into running clothes and shoes and hit the pavement despite the fact that it has been raining on and off all goddamn day and the man hasn’t got the world’s greatest track record insofar as attempting to avoid accidents and injury is concerned.

At any rate: Henry Allard is jogging, and it’s hard to tell if that’s the earlier rain that’s soaking his t-shirt or his sweat. His hair is absolutely drenched.

IN KAHSEENO WE TRUST!)

Exiting the car is a tall, lean man of latin descent with thick lips, a light brown completion, broad shoulders, and well defined cheek bones. He is dressed in a baby blue short sleeve collared polo shirt untucked, and wrinkle free. Crisp, dark navy blue jeans cover his legs. They are a little baggy, enough for comfort but not so much as to look ridiculous. On his feet are white Fila sneakers, vintage, looking spotless, and the water seems to bead on the toes of the his shoes, apparently they been treated to be water resistant. On his head is a white Fila flat cap, cocked to the side just a bit.

He puts his keys in his front pocket after auto-locking the car. He strolls up toward the restaurant and even as he checks his watch it’s cool and casual, not even appearing flustered by the rain coming down around him. His watch hangs a little loose on his left wrist. It looks to be platinum and has bit of sparkle to it from the few diamonds encrusted in it.*

a bentley.
in the ‘Green.

A brow lifts and she whistles low as she watches the man exit the car under the umbrella. She continues to watch as he strolls up toward the little diner, and then just shakes her head and dives into her fries, watching the jogger get closer with every slapstep on the cement.

No, this guy looks down to earth, like he would be just as happy sitting at home drinking a beer as he is torturing himself with exercise. He also looks like he could use a sandwich, but he doesn’t stop in at the diner where the dreadlocked young woman is perched. Her Rage is not powerful enough to draw his attention, but he gives her a nod of acknowledgment as he plods past anyway, steam pushing out past his jaws as he moves.

It is an unpleasant part of town, an unpleasant area.

The diner’s coffee, however is not so bad and the day has been long. Consider a detour.

She’s a block away and she sees the Bentley before she sees anything else – then the driver. Her gaze rests upon it as her steps remain the same rhythm. She carries an umbrella to protect her from the rain and tonight, she has made no effort to blend with her surroundings. Her slacks and blouse likely cost more than some of the denizens of this neighbourhood make in a month. Her shoes might swallow another entire paycheque. She steps carefully around a puddle, one hand lifting to her face, pale fingers tendering back bright red hair.

The one upside – she stands out less than the brand-new Bentley and its high-rolling driver.

IN KAHSEENO’S NAME!)

The great American dinning out diet.

However it was probably one of the best choices for a meeting when business had to be discussed. Imogen suggested the spot and he went with it. Better to check everything over and possibly get something to satisfy his hunger. But then again it was kind odd to find the young theurge out and about, digging into some greasy foods.

He for the night was out in one of his older sets of clothes. One of the few sets that had survived his departure from home. A ratty old pair of jeans that had seen better days, an old and somewhat faded sports jacket and a simple black t-shirt underneath. The rain ignored because it didn’t really matter, it was technically spring after all.

And it’s a smile that Hector sees as he winks at her, before it flows into actual laughter after he goes inside. Which is about the time she sees Imogen walking this way – and she lifts a hand to wave at her. A nice normal wave, not giving away any thought inside her head which sounds something like: omgitsheragaintheresheisIstillcan’tbelieveI’mHERE.

Calm, cool and collected. That’s Joss.
(… in a giddy teenager kinda way…)

Maybe he’s banking on the fact that no intelligent individual would try to mug a man his size, or that he can outrun someone with a knife. You’d think after he and Tristan were attacked by that Gorehound that he wouldn’t exactly be raring to head back out into the great urban open where people have guns and cars to take down unarmed civilians. He’s not at work, and he doesn’t have a radio and near-instantaneous backup on hand in case someone becomes belligerent or out of control.

Hell, the last time someone at work became belligerent and out of control his arm was in a cast for six weeks. There are no damn guarantees anymore.

Out of the distance comes a petite redhead sporting a corduroy coat and an umbrella. He can’t remember the last time he saw this particular petite redhead, with or without a corduroy coat, but when he gets within ten yards of her he starts to slow down, panting for breath.

The wave is not entirely returned, but Imogen does nod, slightly, her gaze flicking toward Hector as he disappears.

Evan is approaching from the opposite direction and … Henry. The coincidence is enough to even make the stoic doctor smirk, a twist of her mouth. “Apparently this place is a bit more popular than I thought,” she observes mildly, to Evan as the distance closes.

“Long time,” she says to the sweating, panting Henry. A pause – then a decision made as she tilts her head toward Joss. “Have you met?”

And there’s Evan.

Imogen tilts her head towards the dreadlocked, skirt-wearing young woman sitting down to tuck into her food, asks if they’ve met, and Henry shakes his head, sweat coursing down his temples, the ragged sounds of his respirations taking the place of speech while he wrangles in a breath.

“No,” he huffs, reaching up his ring-bearing dominant left hand to pull a curtain of sweat off of his face. In the time since Imogen has last seen him, Allard’s accent seems to have only gotten worse. Or perhaps she’s just deacclimated to hearing the atrocious working class Chicagoan talk. “I’ve kind of been under a rock this year. Wanna introduce us?”

He pulls out a blackberry and hits the scroll button on the side a few times.

She comes back with a single cup of coffee, and Hector looks up, nodding and this time it’s easy to make out the words ~thank you~. He goes back to looking at his blackberry as she sets down the coffee and turns to leave.*

And as he moved down the block, his eyes fall on the gathering. He was expected only the liked haired kin woman. But it seemed that this was a gather of Eagle’s chosen, prospective and protected as it was.

“Good evening. Seems that this has become an official sponsor of the Eagles.”

Henry stops to talk to Imogen, and Joss tips her head, slightly and watches. Evan joins and Joss as a little wave for him too. Friendly like a puppy, she is. Like a puppy who could and would rip your face off when circumstances demanded, but a puppy none the less.

Then, she turns back – Henry tells her to introduce them, his tone light. Her gaze rests upon the Kinfolk for a moment before she says, “Henry, Joss.” Her introductions are sparse.

“Henry’s half-blood associated t’the Eagles from time t’time,” but she does at least add a little more. “Joss is o’ the same family as Rohl and is lookin’ t’join up.”

IN KAHSEENO’S NAME!)

KAHSEENO KNOWS MY CAUSE IS JUST!)

He looks at Imogen for a few moments… maybe something’s there? Bone structure, skin, even hair… Eh maybe not. Could just be a pretty woman.

At any rate he goes back to looking at his blackberry, and sips some more coffee.*

He’s always just tagged along for the ride and tried to keep himself on the periphery.

Imogen goes on to introduce Joss as from Rohl’s family, and Henry’s eyebrows lift in interest. Evan and Imogen haven’t ever known Henry to be able to lie about his age, let alone anything else, so it’s safe to say that that genuinely strikes him as something worth noting.

“Cool,” he says, the last of his wind returning to him. “Joss, nice to meet you. I’d offer to shake hands but, uh…” A brief laugh sneaks in. “I’m kind of sweaty.”

The kinwoman meets his gaze, steadily, evenly. She looks at him without a flinch, a sort of challenge in her regard.

Perhaps he looks away first, back to his blackberry. Otherwise, the pull of her conversation draws her back and she looks at whoever speaks next.

“You guys want to join me? It’s quiet out here, at least.” Everyone’s afraid to melt in the rain, though she seems largely unbothered by it, and mostly protected by the awning.

At the question of whether they want to join her, Henry sniffs to clear the cold-stimulated moisture out of his sinuses and considers.

“I’m gonna go get some water,” he says. “Evan, Imogen, you want anything?”

Regardless of yeas or nays, Henry coughs into the back of his scarred left forearm and meanders into the diner proper, his eyes lifting for a moment to lock on the face of the individual who Imogen had been staring down earlier before he disappears around the side of the building and lets himself into the restaurant.

“Coffee, please,” she says. “Sugar and cream.”

She swipes her fries through the ketchup and munches contentedly, as she waits for them to join and sit as they like.

(brb – dishing up dinner)

He didn’t feel much to eating any of the greasy foods that had marked Joss. He could smell the grease from the fries in the air and the evidence was still around, a little.

Then back to Imogen and his potential pack mate. He had been just silent for the moment while Joss and Henry had gotten known to each other. When the spirit-talker offers them to join her, he does indeed sit down. Looking at the young, exuberant Get seated down before them.

“So what exactly did you do at the house already?”

While he waits he lets his attention mosey around the interior of the place. It’s like just about any other greasy spoon in the city–brightly lit, cramped, too busy for the staff to keep adequately cleaned during the evening rush. All of the booths and nearly all of the tables are filled, and one person in particular draws Henry’s attention.

It isn’t because he’s attracted to him, exactly, or because he’s interested in sitting down and having a conversation with him; Henry hasn’t ever seen him before, which isn’t saying much, but he saw the way he was staring at Imogen and though he isn’t the most paranoid man to ever walk the face of the earth, he found himself observing him for a moment anyway until the line ahead of him moved.

Hopefully he turns around fast enough to avoid Hector enjoying the sensation of eyes boring into the back of his skull.

So far she remains standing. The rain patters down on her umbrella, some of it splattering on the shoulders of her coat, beading and darkening the fabric.

She lifts her brief case, setting it down on the table, then half turns away, collapsing her umbrella, shaking it gently to free it from water droplets.

“Yeh want to see what I’ve got?” she enquires as she sits down.

He finished up his coffee and then put his blackberry away. He pulled out his wallet and put a few crisp singles on the table to pay the cup, and give the waitress a good tip.

He got up and took his umbrella with him. He was in a good mood over all, and happy to have not been 180 pounds of ground chuck yesterday. He comes over by Henry and stops holding out his umbrella.*

“Here ya go champ. Next time check Local on the 8’s before you go jogging.” *He pats Henry on the back, and gives him the umbrella before moving to head out the door.*

“Scene photographs?”

Curiosity gets the best of her as she watches them. If the question was meant for her, he’ll clarify, she’s sure.

“Well, there’s a warning system set in the windows now – anyone peeks and they’ll get shards tossed at them, and then alert one of us. Also, you’ll notice the new christmas lights around the front window – anyone tries to get entry into the house will set those off – half will break, and then the little remote control police car inside will go nuts and find whoever’s in the house at the time. Been negotiating with some wind to get some more things set up, then Decker asked that I get some hot water at the dock house. That’s set up – no more cold showers! and I’m still exploring to see what was set up before, and how to reinstate them.”

She’s been busy.

“Yeah, hi…”

His walk is smooth, casual, like he doesn’t have a care in the world.*

“Does this work for the flip side also, I mean from the other side of the gauntlet as well? Or are you working on that side also?”

Yes she had prepared for fomori and physical assaults, but what about those banes and fallen ones that come through the umbra.

Her attention is abstract as the Godi goes through what she’s done. She is not quite interested – these are things beyond her reach.

A pause, and tip of her head. “Anything in particular you’d like me to see too first?”

Imogen’s coffee is quickly dressed using two sugar packets and two creamer cartons, stirred and capped, and he is back outside less than five minutes after he went in. He doesn’t say anything to interrupt the Eagles’ and Eagle-to-be’s discussion of security for the packhouse–he just hands Evan his water and Imogen her coffee before pulling his own cup of water out of the carrier and tossing it into the garbage.

He swallows the water as though he were running through the Sahara and not the Near North Side of Chicago, forcing himself to slow down so he won’t make himself sick, and takes a seat next to Joss. At this point he doesn’t care if he gets any more wet; he’s already soaked with his own sweat and the rain that had hit him during the first mile.

She glances at her watch, the silver delicate on her wrist, “I need to go,” she says to the group, “Ha’ a good night.”

A flick of her gaze toward Henry. “Thank-you for the coffee,” a lift of the cup in demonstration before she steps away, heading down the street, the rain pattering on her umbrella, dusting her shoulders with dampness.

“Understood Imogen. We can get to the evidence you spoke of another night.”

He had turned to the theurge when she asked if he wanted or needed anything else. He couldn’t think of anything at the moment. Well not until after he had seen the evidence that he had spoken with Imogen about. Then over to Henry when he returns as well.

“I will not begin to imagine what a theurge must do. Just know that the spirits in the area have not been well tended to much. I am a half-moon, but I do not know too much, nor know how to speak with them lest Eagle himself aids me.”

Henry doesn’t pipe up to ask what they’re talking about or try to get caught up. He just lets the water settle in his stomach before locking up his muscles to stop from shivering. It’s incredibly cold outside now that he’s warmed up and he’s not dressed for the weather.

(Thanks for the scene. Have a good one.)

There’s a not at Evan’s words. “They were eager to come, though not so eager to serve in some cases due to the neglect. I’ll see to it that they are appeased, though I may have to ask for some donations of Gnosis to aid me at some point. I am only one Godi – it depends on what they demand of me. So far, I have been alright, though it takes longer to recover here.” It’s not a complaint, just honest assessment of her talents and her strength. “I would like to see the wolves you spoke of though, and see if they can be strengthened and used to watch the borders on that side.”

Aware that she’s being sorta rude by not including Hnry, she turns to him with a grin. “So. Your sorta ours parttime, Imogen said??”

“NO.”

There was also what seemed to be a growl in that simple statement. As much as the human tongue can have. If there were in the wolf skin, she could easily see that those wolves were not to be used in any way, other than a reminder of the tolerance that Eagle has for the fallen and those that disturb their territory, in all forms.

“Those wolves are to be left as is. Rotting until there is nothing left of them.”

Henry doesn’t look scared so much as he is sudden hypervigilant, sitting up straight and all the muscles in his body primed to move, quickly, rather than stop himself from shivering.

Joss’s question, it’s fair to say, goes unanswered. Green eyes are locked on Evan until he can be sure that he isn’t going to snap.

She takes another bite, clearly calm even in the face of Evan’s growl. He is beta, but they share a rank. He is older, but they share a rank. She is – as ever – calm. “Henry, you were saying?”

Well aware that he wasn’t, at all. So says that mischievous twinkle in her eyes.

Those damn, fucking wolves.

And even if he doesn’t snap. He was damned close to it. Closest he is able to do under his own natural rage, under the gibbous moon. The beast flared within in, dying to break free. Control was just a blink away from destruction. He didn’t speak. knowing that his voice would betray his internal struggle for the moment, just breathing and holding back the wolves at the gate.

For all the time Henry knew him, he could not feel the rage burn so hotly within him. Inches from frenzy, if only he could.

Joss, bless her, just turns towards Henry and asks what he was saying.

“Nothing,” he manages, not taking his eyes off of the Eagles’ Beta. “Um…” He forces himself to look at Joss, smiling tightly, and asks: “What was the question?”

She’s calm.
She’s steady.
She’s so… herself, and in that touch she offers her own strength in the only way she can. Soon enough she will ask him to take her there, to see, to know, to hear. Until then, it is simply them, here, and her fingers on his arm, steadying and warm, her presence one of ease, of understanding. Even of apology for inadvertently bringing up something that pains him so.

And to Henry, she repeats the question, her voice still soft and soothing as she lifts her hand from Evan’s arm, and digs back into her dinner. “So,” she repeats, with a grin. “You’re of the Eagles part time? how so?”

He took several more deep breaths before he even recognized that touch. The Godi’s hand over his arm. He blinked a couple of times, focusing on that slender hand for a moment before looking up. She was just a child. A teenager. He was not much older, college age really. In a different time, a different world, under completely different circumstances they would she would be finishing high school. He would be a college student.

But that meant nothing now, here. They were warriors fighting a war against the damned. And in that few moments that wave of rage washed over him. Disappeared from him.

A softness coming back to his face as he looked at Henry, looking to see if he would answer then back to Joss. A silent thank you in that look.

Henry recognizes what Joss is trying to do by diverting attention and changing the subject, and he is trying. He’s playing along. But his heart is slamming in his chest and though he has managed to take his eyes off of Evan he still finds himself watching him out of his peripheral vision.

“Heh… well, it’s kind of complicated… well, not really… you know, not complicated, but… I don’t know if you’ve met Tristan Stern, he’s a BeeGee who stops by to do… do Decker’s laundry every week? Um… I met him back in ’07, and, ah…”

Christ, he’s nervous. It abates somewhat as Evan looks at him with a quietude in his gaze, but his arms are visibly trembling as he supports his weight on the structure they’re sitting on.

“… I was already with another pack at the time. And… I don’t know, they haven’t claimed me and I haven’t asked them to.”

This was an issue over a year ago, when that creepy Silent Strider followed Henry to the apartment complex and started a ruckus over a kinswoman who would later injure Henry. It was never resolved, at least not in a manner that saw Henry fully part of a pack. He isn’t complaining.

He doesn’t end up explaining so much as skirting some issues and generally saying he wasn’t claimed exactly and… she laughs, finally, lightly, and nods.

“I see.” and she doesn’t, but she tries… “Tristan is Eagle Kin, and you are his friend?”

“Tristan is claimed by us. Henry and Tristan are married, therefore he is under our watch.”

He thought about it for a second, trying to remember if Imogen mentioned it or not.

“Henry is of my tribe.”

Henry winces, as though he wasn’t exactly prepared for his sexual orientation to be aired to a woman he has known for all of ten minutes, but doesn’t protest or sarcastically thank Evan for outing him in front of a Fenrir. Imogen had introduced her as belonging to Rohl’s family.

Rohl and Allard don’t exactly get along.

With the residue of that wince still on his face, the Gaian kinsman reaches up to rub the back of his neck and waits for Joss’s opinion of him to make a hard left.

She pauses with the last bite of her burger midway to her mouth, and looks from Evan to Henry, and back once more. Henry couldn’t possibly know that the litany was discussed in depth about just this subject only last week, though it was in regards to two Garou. He also couldn’t know that she had tested a Foresti on his ideals on the subject quite thoroughly afterwards, continuing the conversation just to see how he would handle the questions tossed at him by a Godi of rank. He couldn’t know – and she doesn’t tell him.

Nor does her opinion take a hard left. Instead, she smiles. “Then seems to me your claimed practically as much as your husband – by Tribe and by relations. Do you all live in the area?”

It really is hard to reconcile her with her Tribe Elder and hopeful Alpha sometimes, isn’t it?

After a couple of moments he thought about it. Wait did he just say what he thought he said? Yes. But then again even if he tried, Evan was a horrible liar anyway.

“I never really claimed Henry either. Our tribe does not so much claim anyone who isn’t our mate, as watch over them if something happens. But there are exceptions.”

Then again Henry and Tristan wished to have their privacy and they were given it, most of the time.

So the tall kinsman climbs to his feet, tossing his cup and giving them both a wan smile.

“I live about two miles west, over the river,” Henry says. “Um… the address was on the refrigerator of the packhouse a long time ago but, um… pretty much everyone knows where it… is… I gotta get going, it’s getting kind of dark and the bridge is kind of nasty at night. It was nice seeing you again, Ev, nice meeting you, Joss.”

And unless either of them intercepts him with words, Henry turns and starts walking back towards the sidewalk.

For her part, she doesn’t stop Henry, she nods as she leans back in her chair and rests her hands in her lap. “Goodnight Henry. Be safe.”

Then after a few moments as Henry takes off he looks at Joss for a moment. It was obvious she wanted to know what happened to him.

“Come, let me show you these wolves. You might have seen them along the patrols.”

She takes the last fry from her container and shoves it in her mouth, before unfolding her legs from under her and slipping on her shoes. She gathers her dreads into her hands and lifts them off the back of her neck for a moment, and then lets them fall again down her back. Standing, she takes her trash and tosses it in the nearest bin, before nodding to Evan.

“Alright.” a pause, a beat. “I didn’t mean to upset you. This is a story I have not heard. I’d be honored if you’d share the reason I pained you so, so that I do not make the mistake again.

(Expression roll. Let’s see you tell the story right)

He didn’t seem to pause for a second after they pushed through the gauntlet, feeling the webbing hold them slightly before they made it into the shadows of the web-covered city.

“He was of your tribe. A strong kin, brother to a proud Garou. In his own way it seemed he was resentful of not being chosen. In that resentment the Wyrm found a crack to infect, to taint and to bring down.”

He sighed slightly as they continued to move passed a few spiders spinning webs further, ignoring their passage.

“Alaric wanted so bad to be garou, to fight for gaia that he was willing to do almost anything. And in that lies the problem. The road to hell is paved with good intentions as they say.”

He had made it all the way to the first Wolf, the bones of the creature and some of its flesh and sinew still there, feeding spirits of flies that had come, buzzing away when Evan approaches.

“This fallen fimbul wolf was known as Blood, its lies colored Alaric’s thoughts. He started the spiral downward towards the fall. Giving Alaric the idea that he could be true born. Its lies seeped into Alaric’s body. Corrupting him. Right under our own noses.”

When they reach the wolf, he tells of it’s name, and what it had done to Alaric in thought and body, right on their watch. Even now the fimbul wolf is a fierce creature, rotted and falling apart, flesh and sinew hanging and feeding the spirits.

She studies it for a long, quiet moment, before looking up at Evan, waiting for him to continue.

“This I find my fault, a dear fault of mine. I let the wyrm bred and grow within the heart of a kin, a kin under our protection. I should have kept better vigilance, I should have felt it out, saw it. In the heart of a man we called our own. But I was ignorant then. Even though the Eagle’s take up one of the worst parts of the town, I couldn’t fathom the wyrm being so brazen to go right at the Eagle’s, directly for their kin. I should have seen the truth, but in that I failed and for that I will always hate these creatures.”

He had a better reign over his rage now, recounting the hunt, the fight, the failure.

“As we went out to fight the wyrm, it strengthened right beneath us. Alaric started to become corrupt, thinking he could become one of us. And in his mind that was a gift from Fernis himself, through these wolves. Over time he was able to perform some dark ritual that they had helped him learn, helped him enact. And we did not know. The wyrm had found a way into the Eagle’s house, if not directly.”

They had walked for quite some time, skirting the western edge of the territory now.

“But I had come to learn of this, that Alaric was no longer just… kin. They had corrupted him, and my gifts had come across a strange feeling when he suggested that he was more than just kin… these dark fimbul wolves had done something. And in that, they corrupted his mind and body. Somehow, someway they had found a method of making him… garou, or at least corrupted version of it. When we confronted him, when we asked him to relinquish this dark gift, he resisted. He was so consumed with being true-born that he could not. And in that he made his choice. The wyrm in its way had brought the war to us. To our own household.”

His eyes came across the second of the trio of wolves. The largest one, the form still somewhat there. Its lungs and intestines left out, rotting away.

“This was war. The wolf that brought war to us as we were ignorant. This wolf taught Alaric how to master his new form in short time, and for that he had to be put down.”

She simply listens.

And more than that, she understands now the way he reacted before. She had apologized once, and may again. She couldn’t have known – but everything is a learning experience… even this.

She gives War the same careful study, her brilliant blue eyes filled with the things she is hearing, the feelings this physical embodiment of the fight the Eagles fight bring up right here on the edges of their territory.

She only moves on when Evan does, when he continues his tale.

“We went to see how Alaric gained these powers, came to find these dark fimbul wolves that had tainted his soul, had corrupted his mind and twisted his body. They had called him to think this was what Fernis wanted, to work in a twisted way. In his mind he was doing what a good Fernir did, fought and fought well. He brought war against us, against his own brothers. He and these three fimbul wolves. They fought with such hatred in their eyes, with such corruption in their souls.”

He was even worse off than before.

“And at first it was only Decker and Annemarie fought. In the beginning I was frozen by a corrupted form of our own gifts of true fear. I could not take action against them as my pack mates fought. I was frozen until I was attacked. And then I joined in the fray. But it was no simple match, not even with the glory that Decker has about him, praised upon him. These were fimbul wolves once of Fernis own brood, fallen to the wyrm. They fought as if an army of Get were before them. And Alaric, in his new form he was a force to be reckoned with.”

He spied the outpost ahead of them. The one he had kept vigil over the most. Ahead was his training ground, before the alpha of the trio and teh one he worked hardest on Alaric.

“We barely survived with our lives, but in that battle there had some falls. Alaric was killed along with these wolves. Decker and Annemarie, alpha and beta at the time had a falling out and didn’t speak for a long time, Rugiher moving back to her home to do some soul-searching. And myself. I blame deeply for allowing this to come to pass, to not heal the rifts that formed so quickly, to not cleanse the taint that had touched the heart of our kin. In some way the wyrm had almost taken down the Might of Eagle’s Chosen.”

In a moment they stood before the last wolf, the post matched with another post, one that had blood and dents in the thick wooden plank.

“This was once called destruction. Alpha of the brood. This one was the cause of much pain and suffering. And almost the destruction of the Eagles and your glorious hero, Silence~rhya.”

He looked at her now, almost as if to finalize the point.

“That is why they are here. To remind the wrym we are still here, that we will not allow them to find their way into our homes and kin again. To show all what happens when you piss off Eagle’s Chosen. And…. to remind us of that we cannot blink, to be ever-vigilant. The wrym does not sleep and we must not either. A personal marking. And that is why they are not to be touched, to be strengthened, to ever awaken from their rotting steadfast posts. That is why I have made this area my own personal training ground as well. To remind me constantly as well.”

When she turns to meet Evan’s gaze, her own shines with the pain of the story, with the victory that could not be celebrated, of the agony that her (hopefully) new beta has felt in her simple question earlier, her misunderstanding of what it all involved.

“I’m sorry, Evan. For your loss, and the suffering I brought forth with my questions. I did not know.” She reaches for him then, her hand resting light on her arm as it had before, this time in the wake of the story shared, the resolve born. “Thank you, thank you for telling me. Perhaps someday you will tell the tale to others, so that they may learn the same lessons you have, that I have in hearing it.”

She does not once say that he should not blame himself – but neither does she say he could not have done better. They are not infalliable. They are Garou, they are Warriors but sometimes they miss, sometimes the simply cannot see the whole of it. They simply do the best they can. It is all that can be asked of them.

“Thank you. But now it seems it is time to patrol. Will you join me?”

“I’d be honored.”

And when he turns to start out, she falls into step with him once more, as easily as if they’ve done it dozens of times before.