Kass lay quietly among the stones where he'd been born and grown to adulthood. His breathing was slow but ragged, hitching occasionally. He hadn't been able to muster the energy to move from this spot in the three days since he'd arrived staggering from Abaven's borders. He had brought water with him on his trek, but that would only keep him comfortable as he faded. It was no surprise to him - he had come this far knowing it was where he would die. Still, he couldn't help but cling to life... frightened, perhaps, of what would lie beyond. He was afraid... of nothingness. Of nonexistence. Of unending loneliness, never reunited with the family who had already gone before him. He had known he would die here, but... he hadn't known it would hurt so much.

Cassiel had come across the male the better part of a day before, but had chosen to watch from a distance until he was sure. Until he had put together the memories of stories of memories his mother had used to tell Senka and he so fondly of the male that had been her lover for so short a time. The male who had begat them, and then had disappeared when she had gone back to tell him the news. Abandoned her, abandoned them. Yes. Yes, this was the male who'd sired him, Kassander Xanilov of the distinctive markings and the bicolored eyes. Now that he saw him, Cassiel could see for himself that he'd inherited his looks from the old man though his coloring was much more present on Cassiel's sister Senka than it was on the monochromatic Cassiel himself. The burly build that had come to Cassiel was on this auburn male wasted and wizened with age and infirmity, but it was still clear. This was without a doubt the man who had sired him.

And he, like Cassiel's mother before him, was dying.

Cassiel knew enough of healing, had been through enough, to recognize the signs when he saw them. This male was too far gone to be saved, even if Cassiel had wanted to save him.

Which he didn't.

No, the tight, hot fury that had struck him on seeing the male had only faded to a callous, disapproving coal searing his chest into a frozen nothingness. Yes, the metaphors were most definitely mixed, but that was what it felt like. A hate so hot that it had burned away into sharp-edged ice.

But he'd fed and nursed that anger and disgust for so long now that watching the male there, that Xanilov he'd spent so much of his life hating, that he found that he could feel hardly anything at all anymore when he looked at him. Just the cold, faint stirrings of that old anger, and strangely, a distant pity. He was nothing - just an old man dying alone.

Cassiel's jaw clenched, and his eyes hardened.

Kassander was lost and delirious with the pain and fear. He thought he trembled, but he wasn't sure if it was from cold or fright. He found himself wishing for the first time in years that his mother was still there. When a shadow fell over him, for one confused moment he wasn't sure if it was Raisa, or Sigmarr, or... He raised his heavy head with some difficulty, but had to let it fall again and tilt to the side to see. Even that small effort had him panting, breath hitching. It wasn't Sigmarr, nor their mother. It was... Kassander blinked painfully, with some confusion. He actually had no idea who this was. This young, gray stranger who dropped a bundle between Kassander's paws.

Cassiel was careful when he carried his precious cargo winding around boulders to where the male had lain these last days. It was a leaf-wrapped bundle, but even so he was careful not to put his mouth on the leaves protecting it, but only on the single broad leaf that he'd wrapped around the whole thing to provide a makeshift basket.

Cool-eyed, he stalked up to the male and dropped the bundle between his sire's forelegs. The leaves fell open to reveal the contents, but Cassiel had eyes only for Kassander Xanilov. He puffed out a sigh, and lowered himself, carefully arranged his body to curl around the wasted auburn form. "You've been having a right rough time of it," he said, his voice surprisingly gentle, "but I'll help you now."

A warm body curled around him, and Kassander huddled instinctively into the comforting presence though he had no idea who the young man was. No idea, until the youth spoke, and the accent dredged up a faint echo in his memories. Where had he heard such an accent befo- the cold that doused him then had nothing to do with dying. He could remember her. Remember her accent, and her pretty face, and the way she'd seduced him and encouraged his shy, anxious attempts to reciprocate. But he could not remember her name, and she had left in the middle of the night some time before he had chosen to make his way to Abaven. Could... this be... He drew a sharp, pained breath, gasped it out again with faint, barely heard words. "Y-you... you are..."

The old wolf didn't even glance at the bundle he'd dropped, instead staring at him. Cassiel stared back, gaze hard. "Don't say it, mate," he told the old man, his voice low and warning. They were both quiet for a moment, then Cassiel continued in that same low tone. "You left my mum in a bad way. Pregnant, alone. Sick. Two of us survived." His expression turned harder. "My mum wasn't one of them." He was quiet again, then continued in a more conversational tone. "It hurts, don't it? Dying. I had to watch her die, alone, and there was nothing I could do about it. But you could have, couldn't you, old man? If you hadn't disappeared on her."

Listening to the young man speak, a dull ache in his chest joined the pain he'd already been feeling. He'd done so much wrong in his life, he should have known that the one time he'd ever sire a litter he'd screw it up. Just like he'd screwed up the rest of his life. Failed as a king, gotten his brother killed, failed to keep his family together. A failure as a son and a failure as a father. "I didn't know..." he began breathily, but trailed off. It didn't matter that he hadn't known. He'd still not been there when she, when they, had needed him. "I'm sorry." That was true, whether the boy believed him or not. He was sorry - sorry to have not been there, sorry not to have given them the chance to have a family. Sorry for everything. "I wish I... had time. I... I..." He broke off with a shudder of pain. "Would... would you a-at least tell me your name?"

The old man was barely clinging to life. They both knew it. Maybe he didn't want to die with this on his conscience. Cassiel couldn't bring himself to be sympathetic. If the old man wanted absolution, he was looking in the wrong damn place for it. Xanilov's body shuddered against his with obvious pain, but Cassiel just lay stiffly next to him. He gave some thought to not answering the question, but hell, he was going to die anyway. "Cassiel." The word came out curt, and he didn't even give a passing thought to giving the bastard Senka's name. He wouldn't drag his sister into this - she'd been through enough and he didn't deserve to even know that much about her.

Kassander closed his eyes. His throat tightened in shame and grief. Cassiel. She'd named the boy after him, and he couldn't even remember her name. His eyes drank in the sight of the young man, the mask that proudly proclaimed a heritage he likely knew nothing about, the mismatched eyes shades darker than his own. He looked so much like Raisa, in a way, more so than he did the black and white form of the mother who'd birthed him. He didn't wear the auburn of her coat that Kassander had inherited but the resemblance to the Xanilov line was still unmistakable. "Cassiel Xanilov," he whispered, savoring the feel.

Cassiel Xanilov.

Maybe when he'd been a young pup raised on stories of his father, before he'd learned the truth, he might have been proud to have him give him that title. Now, now it was just an insult.

Cassiel stiffened, anger raising his hackles and curling his lip. "No," he snarled, one short, angry syllable. The old man cringed away from him. He took a deep breath, slamming the lid back down on his rage. "You can keep your name, mate," he continued in a more moderate tone, though the harsh edge still wavered there. "I'm not interested." He took another calming breath, then more gently, "Eat the medicine. It'll stop the pain."

Kassander cringed away from the young man's anger, in hurt bewilderment. You would think that Kass would have understood the anger, and maybe if he'd stopped to think back to his own youth, and his own misguided anger at his own mother's abandonment of him, he would have. But in his pain and confusion he couldn't hold on to those old memories, couldn't understand, and so he cringed away with a shaky whimper. But at the boy's last words his gaze would finally drop to the leaves that had opened between his forelegs, proudly displaying the wealth of natural medicines contained in them. Confused and in pain he might be, but his medical knowledge had always been so thoroughly entwined in his life that he could never lose the part of himself that had always been able to latch onto it despite all his anxieties and griefs. Now as he focused on it his mind automatically recognized and categorized the leaves and the mushrooms that tumbled across the carrying case. Some were everyday sorts of relaxants and pain relievers that he'd been medicating himself with for years now. Others... his gaze jerked to Cassiel's in alarm and more than a hint of fear. "These are..."

His mother hadn't exaggerated when she had spoken so proudly of Xanilov's healing knowledge. It didn't take more than a moment of study before the old man recognized the purpose of several of the plants. Cassiel's jawline firmed, but his voice came out in a surprisingly gentle tone. "Yes." He breathed their medicinal scents, and closed his eyes. "Yes, they are." His mismatched eyes opened again, and met Xanilov's own, locking their gazes together in understanding. One healer to another. He had watched his mother die slowly, and agonizingly, and he hadn't been able to save her. He had known there was nothing he could do. And even then, he could not bring himself to take away her pain in the last way he'd known how. He had no love for this man, but Cassiel was not evil. This man had sired him, and his mother had loved him, as much as she'd loved anyone. He couldn't watch him die slowly and alone and do nothing. "They'll stop the pain," he repeated, ever so gently.

Kassander met his son's gaze, and studied it.

He wasn't the best judge of character. He never had been. He had always been too willing to go along with stronger wills, more forceful personalities. He'd always found himself gravitating towards those sorts, never quite having the courage to actually put himself forward but always orbiting them like a little, anxious satellite. Katja, Valentine, Dagmaer, Chaos. It hadn't ever really taken much for him to fall in line, or fall in love. He was lucky that no one had ever really taken advantage of him. Luck favors the fool, they say.

But he truly, truly only saw sincerity in the boy's eyes. Pain, yes, and anger, and a great deal of bitterness. But beneath it all, the same earnest sincerity and desire to help others that had always allowed Kassander himself to push past his own faults to heal others. He looked down at the jumble of herbs. He was right. There was nothing that would magically make old age go away, stop Kass' body from shutting down. He was going to die slowly and messily and in immense pain. No healer could save him from death.

But.

He would never have been able to make that that decision as a healer. He'd always lacked the confidence in himself. What if he'd made the wrong call? What if there was something he could have done after all? But Cassiel...

He was right. He couldn't stop Kassander from dying.

But he could stop the pain. He could make it fast.

Understanding and love tightened Kass' throat and shone from his faded eyes when he looked back up to the young healer. He swallowed hard, then nodded. Without a word, he gulped down the herbs and mushrooms that he'd been given, then laid his head upon his forelegs to wait.

Wait as the pain faded, and the herbs sent him into a deep sleep.

Cassiel watched silently as Xanilov, trusting as a babe, swallowed the herbs and the mushrooms and laid his head back down quietly. He lent his comforting warmth to the elder male's side as his eyes slid closed. He watched. He watched as Xanilov's body relaxed, as his breathing slowed. As deep sleep took him. Cassiel watched. Xanilov's breathing slowed, and stopped. He was gone.

Cassiel let out a shaky breath of his own, and pressed his eyes shut. Swallowed hard.

It was a mercy, and Xanilov had known what he was doing and allowed it anyway, but even so... Cassiel had never killed anyone before.

He opened his eyes again. Several minutes had passed as he had struggled with his own soul and decided it was untarnished. Well. Not any more tarnished than previously, anyway. He had done what he had to do.

He studied the limp form beside him. "Well, chum," he said, half to himself and half to the departed. "Let's get you sorted then."

Digging a grave in the rocky soil was slow going, but he managed a decent enough hole, and the rocks he'd been prying out of that godawful ground made a cairn over the grave grander than the old man deserved. Cassiel studied the items left behind, a few small bits and bobs the old man had wrapped in a hide. After a moment he realized that the leather strap attached to the odd rock was to hold it against a paw, and the scent of herbs that came from both the rock and the bowl-shaped rock with it told him that they had been used together. Grinding herbs? Well now wasn't this a treat? The old bastard had left him something after all.

The hide slung across his back by the rawhide strap that had kept it tied up, Cassiel stood beside the cairn-marked grave. No words needed to be said. He hadn't even known the old bastard. But he sucked in a breath between his teeth and muttered "good luck" at whatever soul might be lingering nearby anyway, before he turned to trot off. Maybe he'd go track down Senka and get quietly drunk with her. Or rowdily, as the case may be. But one thing he knew for sure. He wasn't going to tell her what had happened here. She'd been through enough.