But Wendy was none of those things. So what Wendy is - is outside Lukas's door shortly after lunch. Sharp knuckles rapping meekly against the wood frame.*
[Wyrmbreaker] Lukas has lived here long enough, or perhaps merely been a wolf long enough, that he's beginning to recognize footsteps. Knocks on the door. The one is relatively unfamiliar; a very quiet shuffle up to his door. A hesitation before that meek little tap-tap-tap.
He finishes the last line of his email, hits Send, and then looks up. "It's open." When Wendy enters, she's almost insubstantial: so thin and tall she looks more beanpole than girl. In contrast, lounging on his twin-sized bed, Wyrmbreaker looks about four times as large. He closes the lid of his laptop, though not all the way, and looks at her over it.
"Hey Wendy." His voice betrays a hint of surprise. "What can I do for you?"
[Wendy Berber] Um.
*Thats all she gets out before the whisper of a female has to wet her lips and start again. Its purely animal, whether she knows it or not. A submissive gesture as old as wolves themselves. She's thinner - as if that were possible - than the last time he saw her for any length of time. In a billiards room, where the spindly kin fled his mate, as her own nearly had an altercation with the Shadowlord over territory. Shuffling forward, Wendy starts again.*
I.. w-well.. I d-don't.. well. I thought, maybe you m-might know rh-rhya.. wh-who I'd r-rep-repo-report to?
[Wyrmbreaker] If she came hoping for an easy answer, a quick solution to her problem, she'll be disappointed. It's not even puzzlement that has Lukas quiet for a moment; the look on his face is closer to a wince.
He and Boy never really got along. Strange; he can't even remember why now, though at the time he disliked that pack with all the fire of righteous indignation. He had some reason, he's sure, some reason having to do with their honor. He thought it was a good reason at the time. Now, with the clarity of nearly two years' retrospective and the colder wisdom of something like maturity, he wonders if it had more to do with Marrick and that very first Ahroun Eldership challenge than anything else.
Well. Too late now to change the past, or even to wonder about it. The best he can do is attempt something like gentleness with Boy's very-likely widow.
"Are you," he asks quietly, "still with Boy?"
[Wendy Berber] *The ahroun's come quietly. Still, no amount of soft speech could salve certain wounds, nor could they brush away the prickling danger of his every action. Everything about him spoke to war, whether he cared for it to or not, and it was more than enough to unnerve a creature as skittish as Wendy Berber. Her lips press thin, and she shakes her head, coke bottle specs on hand to catch the moisture threatening to leak from inkblue eyes. Kin's voice a faded croak.*
N-no. He. Um. He l-left me.
*Why? A single glance at the trembling kinswoman gave a person plenty of possible reasons. Shoulders hunched, taking up as little space as possible, six feet trying to bend into five, as though if she became small enough she might disappear entirely.*
[Wyrmbreaker] Okay. So maybe he was right about that honor thing. A frown flashes over Wyrmbreaker's face. Then he slides his nightstand open, closing his laptop all the way and placing it inside. He's wearing an old, comfortable pair of jeans. When he crosses his legs indian-style, the denims crease into long-set patterns at the knees, the hips.
"I'm sorry," he says. "To be honest, I don't know whose kin that makes you. But you might be better off looking to the Uktena. The last I heard, an Ahroun named Leon was the Glass Walker Alpha, and he had a recent history of beating kin. He may also have left town; I haven't seen him in weeks.
"The Uktena Alpha is a young Ragabash named Kieran Twisting-Winds. He seems a gentle sort. I think he actually lives down the hall. Do you want to see if he's there?"
[Wendy Berber] It's n-not-
*Like that? His fault? That bad? Whatever she was about to blurt is quickly swallowed, kin stepping back and bumping the door shut with her stooped back. The contact startles a choked huff out of her as she wrapped her arms around her long and woefully thin midriff, crushing a moth-eaten sweater to her skinny frame.*
Oh. um.. Ok. Th-thank you.
* Shoulders swivel, head following a beat behind, then stopping. Wendy turning back to face the ahroun in slow degrees. Careful, as though a sudden movement might incite him to violence.*
Um. Si-sir?.. Is.. Is a .. er.. is D-d-do-doodle.. the b-bone, um, the b-bonegnawer still in the city?
[Wyrmbreaker] No matter how well Lukas disguises it, or controls it, he's a savage and a predator. A Shadow Lord at that. No matter how well he means, how humane and perhaps even human he tries to keep his thoughts when he's around the kin, some part of him must look at this waif of a girl and think
weak. sickly. easy prey.
Primitive and feral, the thoughts nudge at the corners of his mind. He pushes them back, distantly unsettled by himself, twisting his head quickly on his shoulders as though to dislodge the notions. Then Lukas is getting up, slow to get out of bed, motions easy so as not to startle, giving her plenty of time to skitter out of the way as he reaches for the doorhandle.
"He left a long time ago," he replies. "I'm not sure anyone knows where." The halls are quiet, though it's daytime, and there's distant noise from the kitchen below. Someone's radio playing in someone's room. A shower running in the bathroom. "I think this is the room," he says, indicating one of the doors before rapping with the backs of his knuckles.
[Wendy Berber] Ok.
*Two syllables. Clear as they are disappointed. The shadowlord moves, and skitter she does. Well out of the way of the ahroun, like an animal away from a lava flow, close enough to feel the burn of rage. Perhaps she knew what she was to him on some level. Perhaps she knew, in more than the recesses of ancestral memory, but through logic, and experience - just how feeble and disposable she was in the scheme of things. tripping over her own feet, Boy's ex-mate follows Lukas down the hall. Waits quietly. Bites at her skeletal index as though its the only thing she's eaten in days. And looking at her sunken cheeks and general pallor - it may well be.*
Th-thank you Rh-rhya.
[Wyrmbreaker] "Don't mention it."
They stand in silence for a while. Lukas tries a second knock, a little louder. Waiting, he looks at Wendy, studying the scrawny kin.
"Can I ask what happened?" he speaks again after a while. "With Boy, or you coming back, or where you've been, or ... just whatever you want to tell me."
[Wendy Berber] *Time seems to yawn eternal between knocks. Wendy waiting to see this new warder. New tribe, without the relative safety of Boy to guide her through it. No one answers, and Lukas turns his focus to her once more. Wendy sniffs, hunching her shoulders and adjusting glasses that are more tape and glue than they are spectacles anymore. Her gaze drops to the floor, voice thin and stuttering.*
I.. w- um. M-marrick.. Died. So we, um. W-Boy.. He wanted to go b-b-back to, um.. to o-oklahoma?
Uh. So we d-d-did. And then. um, Then.. I ... well..
*A pause, Wendy slouching further and drawing her spindly form away from the ahroun protectively.*
I um. L-Lost.. Lost a b-b-baby. My b-body.. ab-abso- I um. I l-lost it. Then b-boy .. thought I'd be b-better. Better wi-without him.
*A sharp sniff, louder than the whisper of her voice.*
So.. th-thats.. thats why, I'm back. I m-mean.. I -.. he knows wh-where to, um. to fi-find me here, M-maybe? I mean i-i-if..
*Two small squeaks cut off whatever she was about to say, choked noises dying in her mouth, fading to a meek clearing of her throat, nose rubbed with needle fingers.*
Ok?
[Wyrmbreaker] Lukas can't comprehend that behavior. The incomprehension is in his eyes, so baffled that he hardly has room for anger. He can be flawed; he can be relentless and unyielding and so proud sometimes, but he's a defender at heart. A protector. He would lay down his life for pack, for mate, for his blood-kin. He cannot comprehend how or why anyone could abandon what their very spirit has claimed, especially when she needs strength and protection most.
And --
he can't comprehend her nature either. Even the fucked up, twisted, beaten, cowering Shadow Lord kin he knew weren't like this. They were bitter, at least. Vicious, like cats backed into corners, scratching at those they could best even as they fled from those they couldn't. Not like this, flinching at shadows, blaming only herself. Afraid to look anyone, much less an Ahroun on a full moon, in the eye.
Harder to be Wendy right now, though. To see the look in Lukas's eyes, which passes from bafflement to anger to perplexity, finally settles in something like pity.
"Okay," he says quietly. And he knocks on the door a third time, loud enough to wake even a sound sleeper. A few seconds go by.
"I guess he's not in," he says. "Are you living in the Brotherhood now? Are you eating?"
[Wendy Berber] *The
I am s-sir.
*Staying at the Brotherhood? Eating? Both? Admittedly one more than the other.*
[Wyrmbreaker] Lukas thinks a moment. Then he leans back against the wall, walking his feet forward until his back slides down, his eyes level with the gangly kin's.
"Listen to me, Wendy," he says -- unsure of what this might accomplish, unsure of what a single conversation might do; sure that he should try, nonetheless. "There's strength in you, strength apart from what you drew from Boy or being Boy's or carrying Boy's child. If there wasn't strength, you'd have given up and died already. You are not to blame for losing the baby. You are not to blame for Boy leaving. You are more than a mate and an incubator; you must want to be, or you wouldn't have come back here.
"So when you meet Kieran, you'll hold your head high and introduce yourself as a kin claimed honorably by the Uktena, here to aid the tribe you mated into. And between now and whenever you meet Kieran, try to think of something you could do for your tribe, or this Sept. Something that makes you more than just a walking womb, more than shyness and timidity and self-beratement.
"There must be something you can do. Something you know, or can teach? You were always reading, before."
[Wyrmbreaker] [charisma + leadership (rousing): chin up, girl!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 5, 6, 6, 8, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6) Re-rolls: 1
[Wendy Berber] *Its hard meeting the eyes of an ahroun on a night like tonight. The gaze Lukas holds with the Uktena kin is a fragile thing indeed. Its a strain for her, not to dart her eyes away, all the more obvious - magnified as they are behind her ridiculously thick glasses. She wants to shrink away, but something about the Shadowlord commands her to stay put. To listen. Not just to listen, but to take what he's saying and absorb it. Believe it, because if this adren believed it, then who was she to argue with him? Lips are wet, and the bookworm nods her head. She.. could do something. She had done something before... maybe her silly little hobbies were something worthwhile afterall. She could try and make her new tribe proud, at the very least. Another meek nod, kin squaring her pointy shoulders a little more.*
I'm.. I kn-know alot... about ... the occult? ... And things?
[Wyrmbreaker] In so far as rousing speeches go, that was hardly his best. He's not used to this sort of thing. Counseling fragile, half-broken kin. Pumping their spirits while the bestial side of him, the creature in him that roars at the full moon, roars with the full moon, saw nothing but easy prey, fresh meat.
When she meets his eyes it's a little easier. A little easier to put that savage monster down; remember that she too is half-wolf. She offers something - occult and things? - and Lukas's lips quirk in a quick laugh.
"Are you kidding? You're dealing with Uktena. They love mysteries and the occult. Tell Twisting-Winds what you know, what you can find out for him. If you really want to make a good first impression..." Lukas thinks for a second, "Kieran just joined a brand-new pack. They follow Dragonfly. If you can look up the mythology and symbolism of the Dragonfly, particularly in connection with the Changing Races -- if you can figure out some way they might be able to appease and strengthen their new totem through spiritual correspondences, I think they'll appreciate it. It might not be much, but it shows you want to be -- and are -- an asset and a resource."
[Wendy Berber] Oh. um.. Ok.
*Its not much of a speech, and Wendy's reaction is not much of a brightening, but its something. The kin nods, one foot rubbing the other, before she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, shoulders raising as she meeps.*
Um. th-thank you, S-sir.
[Wyrmbreaker] "No problem." Through some unspoken agreement, it seems their little tete-a-tete was at an end. Lukas straightens up, regaining those four rare inches over the spindly-tall kin. "You know where my room is. Come find me if you need anything."
[Wendy Berber] Ok. Um. Th-thanks.
*Three full steps down the hall follow goodbye. Then -*
Um... Rhya?
....*A beat, eyebrows up, solicitous.*
... Does your m-mate still... play world of warcraft?
[Wyrmbreaker] This time it's not just a blurt of a laugh but a real one, surprised and happy. "Yes," he says. "What are you, Alliance or Horde?"
[Wendy Berber] ..Horde. I'm. um. An undead h-holy P-preist?
*The blurt of laughter had startled her, she bounced off a doorframe, but recovers quickly.*
B-but.. Uh. I have um.. Alts?
*This.. was terrifying, and surreal.*
[Wyrmbreaker] "You suck," Lukas replies promptly, "but Dani&+269;ka would love you. Her main's an undead 'lock. Vyvratku - " he spells it out, " - on Warsong. My main's a Draenei pally, but I'm not telling you the name so you don't come corpse-camp me. I've got a Worgen alt on Hellscream." Of course. "His name's ColdVictory. I'm uh. Not very creative.
"I've also got a Tauren in Dani&+269;ka's guild, 'Triumph'." A pause, and then he grins. "You should look me up sometime. We'll play or something."
[Wendy Berber] Oh. Um. Ok. that'd..
*Be bizarre? Awesome? Potentially dangerous? What if she ended up getting them TPK'd in the dead mines or something equally stupid? skeletal fingers scratch at the back of her neck, and she nods once, curtly.*
Um. Y-yeah. Ok!
