How long had he been awake for? He was losing track. The days had slipped together into a terrible blur. He had woken up in the Hallows. He had smiled as he had watched Tamsyn stretch, looking more comfortable in her skin then she had in days. He had thought wistfully of Zee, and had felt antsy with her absence. Had he truly sensed something wrong, or had he just ached to see her again? He hadn't gotten thr chance to tell her about Resin.

Thinking of Zee left him feeling sick and dizzy. His vision swam. Lack of sleep, or misery? He didn't know. It was late, the sun had long since gone for the day, and an owl hooted quietly in the distance. He didn't want to sleep, but he couldn't keep himself upright any longer. He found an empty den near thr burial site, and crawled inside the opening. He collapsed there, without thought of blankets or comforts. He longed for notting more then the emptiness of sleep. He closed his eyes, and tried not to picture Zee behind his closed lids.

Briar sat a good distance away from here her mother and brother were buried, but she couldn't stop looking at the graves in shock and disbelief. She didn't know how to feel. She was just... confused. It didn't feel real, it didn't seem like something that could have happened. Marigold sat beside her, leaning into her side, both of them unspeaking while Briar stared off into the distance quietly. For once in her life she was completely silent and had no interest in speaking. She thought about going to be with one of her siblings, but she didn't want to be forced into speaking with them, reminiscing and things of the sort that would just end up being painful. She thought about going back to the Hallows to commiserate with Artorias, but she thought about how mad her father had been the last time she snuck away to her friend's pack and she couldn't risk doing that to him right now.

She thought about her conversation with Art about her parents and how obsessed her father had been with her mother. His whole world seemed to revolve around her and now... now she was gone. She was surprised to find that she felt less loss and sorrow from the fact that she had lost her mother and instead was more just worried about her father. She reasoned with herself that maybe the truth of it just hadn't sunk in just yet, that the mourning would come, and that her mind was just trying to distract her from it with the worry she felt over her father. That made sense.

As if on queue, she spotted the massive shadow that was her father in the distance, crossing by the recently dug graves before disappearing into a random, empty den. She frowned at the sight her head tipping slightly. She didn't like that he hadn't come back to their usual dens to sleep and she didn't like that he would be sleeping alone. It seemed like tonight of all nights that would hurt him far more than she was willing to accept. Setting her resolve, she sent her fox away to go rest with Dandelion, assuring her antlered companion that she was okay, before she got up and went to the den that was currently housing her father. She quietly peeked inside and saw him laying there with his eyes closed, but she couldn't tell if he was sleeping yet or not. It hurt her heart so much to see her dear father laying here alone, not even having any bedding or the like. For a second she considered trying to wake him up and get him to come back to their usual den to sleep there, but instead she slipped inside, gently easing herself down against his side and leaning into him before resting her antlered head on her paws. He wouldn't sleep alone, not as long as she was around.

"Briar" | "Marigold"

He felt the touch of an antler against his coat, and it shocked any sleep right from his system. He turned and saw Zee moving moving snuggle up against him. His mouth gaped open in shock, his eyes widened and a slow smile began to spread across his numb face. "Ze-" he started, and then shut down the word as his face closed up once more. No. Not Zee. Her little twin, his Briar-rose. How could he forget how much she had started to loon like her mother?

"...Briar" he finished softly. But he knew the damage was done. Tears stung his eyes from the false hope and he blinked rapidly, not wishing her to see them. "My little one, my little one" he whispered, and pulled her in closer to him. Wrapping her against his chest like he had when they were tiny wee things. He buried in head in her coat, and tried to lessen the irratic rise and fall of his chest. "I love you, Briar" he whispered, holding her gently. "I'm never letting you go."

Just as she was getting settled in against her father's side, she felt him jump a little and she lifted her gaze to meet his. She saw the hope light up his face, the smile pulling at his lips, the disbelief painted across his expression as he looked at her. Her brows pulled together with a little bit of confusion and was about to ask him what was going on, but was cut off when she heard him begin to speak. She heard the very distinctive beginning of her mother's name and her heart felt like it shattered in her chest. Her ears folded back against her head and she whined softly with worry when she saw his expression suddenly change when he finally realized that it wasn't his wife, but his daughter instead. She knew she and her mother looked incredibly similar so in his sleep deprived state she could see why he would make the mistake, but it still killed her to see him hurting like this.

She heard him correct himself, saying her name instead, and spotted the slight glisten of tears in his vibrant blue eyes, making her whine quietly again. His leg wrapped around her and pulled her close and she was more than happy to lean into his embrace, tipping her head so that she could press her nose to his cheek as he buried his face into her fur, listening to his muffled words as her chest ached with sorrow. She didn't really know exactly what she was hurting over, but it hurt. Everything hurt for everyone. "I love you too," she replied softly, wiggling in his embrace to be able to wrap her forelegs around his neck and squeeze him in a hug.

"Briar" | "Marigold"

She even felt a little like Zee. Bony in similar places and he had to watch out for her sharp and pointy antlers. The longer he held her the more it felt familiar and safe instead of painful and sad. Somehow, eventually, it lulled him into sleep. When he awoke he was no longer in the den. He was in the field where he had fought for Deathbelles life after the first Empire had fallen. The places where he had almost died, and had been ready and willing to give his life for his Princess. The ambush played out before him in slow motion. He fought them all, despite the superior numbers. He fought for her and called out to her, but when he turned it was Zee. It was Zee, and she was burning. Her mouth was opening as she screamed for him. Those that fought him took advantage of his inattention and latched onto him. Holding him there as his Wife burnt in front of him. He screamed his rage and fear and lashed out at those around him. Fighting free, lunging like a snake to pierce them with his elongated fangs. He tasted blood and flesh in his mouth, the taste brought him back. He wasn’t in the field, that field was long gone, and far away. Instead, he held Briar in that cramped little den, with his fangs around her. He had pierced the skin, and tasted the blood of his child. His eyes widened in horror, but he could see he had missed anything important. His fangs had landed in the thick folds of her skin near her throat. He released her with a shocked cry “No! No, no, no.” The night terrors had stopped two years ago. "Speech"

Feeling him begin to relax against her made her feel better and as he began to drift off to sleep she curled up against his chest just like she would have when she was a pup. She was a lot bigger now, but the feeling of being safe against him hadn't changed. She laid awake for a while longer, thinking about her mother, thinking about how she wasn't going to be there any more. The thing that hit her the hardest was that she wasn't going to get to see how her father and mother looked at each other any more. She wasn't going to get to see her father messing with Zee and teasing her any more. She loved seeing them together and had always hoped that whenever she got to have a husband that he'd look at her the way her parents looked at each other. Eventually she drifted off to sleep as well, thinking of pleasant memories of her parents with her face buried in her father's fur.

She was sleeping heavily so any twitches or sounds her father might have made escaped her, but then there was pain. Sudden, sharp, biting, blinding pain. It yanked her roughly out of her sleep with a sharp gasp, her eyes flying wide open as she tried to jerk back away from wherever the pain was coming from, her heart pounding frantically while her brain struggled to comprehend what was going on. Her eyes found the side of her father's face, sucking shallow breaths into her lungs, seeing where his fangs should be, but they disappeared beyond her fur. She tried to pull away, but his forelegs kept her pinned against him and the hard hold he had near her neck refused to relent. She couldn't cry out or speak, she couldn't make him stop. She was frozen by the deepest fear she had ever experienced, gasping and panicking and struggling to get any kind of coherent thought through her head.

And then all at one he seemed to come to, his bite letting her go, allowing her to fall back into her floor of the den and as soon as she was free her instincts took over, making her scramble backward until she was pressed up against the wall of the den. She stared at her father with wide, terrified eyes, trembling lightly as a shaking paw came up to where his sharp teeth had sliced through her skin, feeling the wetness there, the blood. Artorias' words echoed in her head. Resin, biting Tamsyn in the middle of the night. A different fear hit her in the gut, a fear that far outweighed the pain and confusion of him biting her. "No... no..." she breathed, hyper ventilating from the panic that hit her. She hurried back over to him, pressing her face into his chest, hoping some how that might make him feel better again. "Y-You're not going to leave me, right? Not like Resin? Please don't go..."

"Briar" | "Marigold"

He stared at her in mute horror. His vision blurred, and he couldn’t tell if it was Zee or Briar before him. Zee, who had sneaked into his bed in the night to garner comfort from him. Only to wake with his fangs in her throat. It was the same, it was all the same. Life was a circle, leading him back to the same places. He couldn’t breath. He couldn’t draw air into his lungs, no matter how much he gasped. He bent over, panting, fighting back the rising panic. He had attacked his daughter. He had ripped into her throat, and hurt her. A few more inches to the side, and he would have woken with a corpse dangling from his muzzle. Another body, just like Zee. dead and gone. He gasped one more ragged breath and his lungs expanded. To his shock, Briar had rushed back to him. Instead of doing the smart thing and keeping distance between then, she came to him. She offered him comfort, and begged for him to stay. “Zee” he whispered in a soft moan, wishing his wife was there to smack him and take their daughter away to safety. Instead, it was just him. Fighting, and failing, to keep it all together. His eyes burned, he was falling apart without him. Why had she gone? She had promised to stay with him. She had broken that promise, and left him here alone. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t be an alpha, a father. He turned and tore out of that den, hitting the ground running. "Speech"

She felt him breathe, hoping in vain that her foolish plan had worked, but then she heard him speak her dead mother's name and then he was gone, tearing away from her grasp and disappearing out into the night. "Dad!" she cried after him, collapsing onto her haunches as she stared out into the darkness, her mouth agape as her body began to tremble, fear and confusion mixing together to overwhelm her system and shake her to her core. She just couldn't figure out the why? Why would he do that? Why did he run away? Why was any of this happening? Why was everything crashing down around them? She wanted to run after him, figure out what was going on, demand answers, but she didn't. She sat here staring in shock while her paw pressed to the bleeding bite on her neck.

At some point Marigold appeared at her side, fretting and fussing and questioning what happened, but Briar didn't hear any of it. Her father... He bit her. He bit her and ran away. Her mother was gone. Dead and buried. She thought about going to one of her siblings, maybe going to Asla. She was important now, maybe she would know what to do. She got up, ignoring Marigold's demanding questions, yelling at her to lay down so she could take a look at her wounds as she began to walk out the entrance, but then she stopped. What would everyone think? Would her father get in trouble for this? She supposed he should, but... She just wanted to get away. Get away from all of it. Go to the one wolf that she knew would understand. He hesitated for a long moment, but finally decided that she had to do both. She had to be responsible, but she also needed what she needed.

"I'm going to Artorias," she told Marigold quietly, her turquoise eyes pleading with her companion. "If I don't come back in a few days just... Pack up my herbs on Dandelion and come join me. I'll go tell Asla what happened first, but... I have to go." She didn't wait for Marigold to finish tending to her wounds or pay attention to her protests, she walked out of the den and made a beeline for Asla's. She was going to tell her sister and then she was going to go. She had to go. She had to get away.

"Briar" | "Marigold"

The cool air outside the den hit him like an avalanche. He breathed it in, filling his lungs, and letting that cool calm him. It burnt against his overly warm flesh, but it was good pain. Needful. He slowed to a trott, and then he was simply walking. He didn’t go far - he couldn’t. Briar was injured and confused, and he could not simply leave her like that. He just needed a minute to wrap his head around what had happened. His night terrors had returned. As he had once feared so terribly for Deathbelles life, that the visions had plagued his night time hours. Now his failure to keep Zee safe was taking a toll in a new, unexpected, way. Fun, life was just full of fun surprises. He walked for a time, keeping the den in his line of sight, until he saw Briar’s face pop out of the den. He started to walk towards her, close enough that she could see him, then stopped. He did not know if with a little bit of time to think, she might be afraid of him. But, there were some important things to discuss in light of what had happened. He couldn’t dig his head in the sand and ignore them, that was how Zee had gotten injured two years ago. “Briar” he said softly, giving her time to decide if she wanted to approach, or if the conversation would be yelled across the space between them. "Speech"

She was mid step, just about to take off toward her older sister's den, when her father appeared within her light of sight. She froze, hearing Marigold yell something at her from behind her before the antlered fox's head popped out of the den as well, spotting Sirius and falling silent. She stood there conflicted, torn in three different directions. Go to Asla, go to Art, go to her father. The panic, the fear, started to eat away at her gut, her eyes darting away from him for a moment, looking off in the direction of Asla's den. She had to do something, didn't she? Tell her what happened, get help? But she thought about holding Art, comforting him, and that's what she wanted right now. She wanted to escape, she wanted to hide. But her father...

He spoke her name and her gaze went back to him as her ears fell back against her skull. His voice was soft, he seemed calmer now. It was enough for her to pull the cool air into her lungs and let it out with a trembling sigh, steadying herself. Her neck still stung fiercely, the bite still seeping trickles of blood into her coat, but she ignored it. After a few hesitant moments she finally stated to move, taking slow, careful steps toward her father. She felt like she was on edge and felt like she needed to be ready to run at any moment. But she approached him all the same, stopping maybe a foot away. The bit of space felt good, kept her chest from constricting in on her.

"Dad..." she said softly, her voice breaking. "What... Why?" She had wanted answers and now this was her chance.

"Briar" | "Marigold"

She was cautious, but she came anyway. A lion in a little wolf's body. He smiled at the tawny girl, though it hurt his stiff face. He leaned back slowly on his hunches, and then let his paws slide to the earth until his head was nearly to the ground. Showing himself to be not a threat, before he started to speak. “Long before you were born, when I still resided in the Ashen Empire with Deathbelle and your mother” - she had heard stories before now about his time in the Empire, serving Deathbelle. “I used to get night terrors. Before your mother and I-” was it easier saying ‘mother’ then his dead wife's name? Maybe, maybe. “- were properly together. She did not know, and she snuck into the den one night to sleep at my side. Do you remember the small, thin scars beneath her neck? I was the one that put them there. I was terrified and furious when I realised she had snuck in with me, and what I had done to her. After that, I did not remain with her when I slept. Not for a long time. It was your Auntie, Io, who helped me through them. She helped me find the root of the problem - my memory of the day me and Deathbelle almost died fleeing the Empire we had come from. Tonight I had that dream again, instead of Deathbelle, it was… it was her.” he swallowed hard. It wasn’t easy to share all of this, but he had seen her fear. He knew she needed to know. “What’s happening to me isn’t the same as what's happening to your grandmother. I’m not losing my mind, it’s a form of grief. It’s not as dangerous for me as what's happening to her - but it is dangerous to others. You have to understand this Briar, so listen very, very closely. With the death of your mother, I am struggling to find calm. I am not a wolf that others can be around when I’m not calm. If… If I can not find my center, then you need to be prepared.” - for the possibility that I might still have to die. He wanted to, living hurt so much, but Tamsyn had been right. He couldn’t leave them, he couldn’t leave his little Briar, or all the rest of them. Godsdamn her for being right. "Speech"

Briar was still a little uneasy while she watched her father sit back onto his haunches and then eventually slide down onto his stomach in front of her. She eventually sat back onto her haunches as well, though less settled than he seemed to be. She drew in a breath and let it out slowly, trying to calm herself. He seemed calm, she could be too. At least that's how it felt in her mind. She still didn't reach out to him yet though. Reaching out to him had broken him last time so she restrained her urge, her shoulders tense as he began to speak and explain.

She listened closely to every word, letting him weave the story for her as he spoke of the Ashen Empire, Deathbelle, her mother, and night terrors. When he talked about the little scars that had been on her mother's cheek her paw automatically lifted to touch the still bloodied wounds on her neck with sudden understanding before he even confirmed that he had given them to her. Her brows pulled together with worry when he told her how this one particular dream about himself and Deathbelle suddenly had her mother in it instead, her ears flicking back against her skull.

But he explained that it wasn't the same as what was happening with Resin and she was able to breath a slightly easier sigh. She still wasn't completely at ease, but that at least took a slight edge off of her fear. He already had her full, undivided, enraptured attention before he told her to listen closely to what he was saying, but she fixed her gaze on his all the same and took in every word. He couldn't find his calm. He was dangerous when he wasn't calm. She wasn't entirely certain what she needed to be prepared for if he couldn't find his center, but she immediately disregarded the possibility, whatever it might mean. Of course he could. He could do anything.

She nodded and was quiet for a moment before she carefully got to her paws, feeling as if she couldn't move too quickly, too suddenly, or she'd disrupt something that would throw off this momentary calm. She dipped her head down to her father's leaning forward just enough to be able to press her nose to his for a second before she backed away again. "I love you, Dad," she said softly, quietly. Just enough above a whisper that it was still easy to hear. Don't disturb the calm. "I'm going to go talk to Asla," she informed him just as quietly. She had checked her father off of the list of wolves she needed to talk to and now Asla was next. She didn't know if she had it in her to go all the way to The Hallows tonight after all, but... She still needed to go somewhere else and find a way to unwind the tension in her shoulders and find some kind of plan. Something she could do to help their father.

"Briar" | "Marigold"