Their father had told them that their mother was sick, and she needed some cuddles and gentleness to feel better. Kyanite crept in at a moment she could get some alone time with her horned dame. She curled up on the bed beside her mother, shocked at how weak she looked. Their father had been right, she did need cuddles.

She wrapped a paw gently around her mother, her face mask pushed up by her ears. “If you need cuddles, why don’t you have Hissbiscus and blue cuddle you?” she asked, her voice going from concern, to puppy jealousy, and back to worry again. Vanta didn’t rub it in, but she and Vanta were the same in so many ways, and it was hard not to be jealous that their mothers concern for Vanta had bleed through in gifts that Kite had never gotten.


"Speech"

Slept came easily to Zee, a familiar escape from pain and suffering that she had relied on time and time again over her long life. At times she would be awoken by a resurgence of pain or a wave of unrelenting nausea, but the medication kept filled by her bedside was always present to chase those feelings away and return to her the sweet comfort of sleep. This time when she was woken it was not by pain alone, but by the sound of an opening door and tiny paws creeping up on her. Ever since becoming a mother Zee had become a very light sleeper, and while the medicines helped to deepen it where necessary it could not dampen the intuition of a parent noticing their sneaking child. Kite crept up next to her in the bed and Zee wrapped her slender limbs around the girl with a contented sigh. It had been the right call not to explain to the puppies what was to come - Zee could not handle the questions, of that much she was sure. She hated to think she was abandoning them, as she had her first and second litters so many years ago. "Where did this come from, little one? I did not take you for the jealous type." She asked gently, poking right to the fear in her daughter's heart as directly as she could. Subtlety was not for the healthy, not for the deteriorating. "Vanta is your sister, if you let these worries take root within you then you miss out on the relationship you might have had." The sick wolf sighed once more, weary this time. She let her voice drop, as if whispering a secret into her pup's small ear. "I bet she felt jealous too, when you found your kitten curled up against your side that night. I bet she wondered why no kitten chose her, and what made you better than her." Zee knew it might not be the conversation Kite wanted, but with time so short she knew she had to stop this seed of jealousy in her daughter's heart before it grew. After all, Azure's start had been with the same sort of toxic envy. "Speech"

Of course her mother saw right through the words and knew exactly what she was saying. She looked sullenly at the bed, knowing her father would cuff her for making this about her, when he had said their mother needed cuddles to feel better. Somewhat dutifully, she wrapped herself up more fully beside her mother on the bed, making sure her paws were curled about her mothers much larger (if more fragile) form.

“I just don’t understand why you gave her gifts, mumma. I love Vanta, you know that. I always want to look out for her, but I kept wondering when I’d get my gift” she tried to explain.. “Does that make me a bad person?”


"Speech"