Using liquid time to set this directly after the meeting

As the meeting officially came to close, Haydée waits around for anyone who might wish to pull her aside so that they can speak with her privately. Emerald eyes dart over to where Dorian waits, her brother’s worry practically radiating off his form as he waits to descend on her to begin treating the wounds on her neck. The herbs Lucy had provided to keep her awake and going are rapidly leaving her system and, with them, the last of her limited energy reserves. A headache has rooted itself behind her right eye, making the overcast day too bright and the fact that she hasn’t had a full sleep for close to forty-eight hours has it slowly creeps toward a migraine.

Truthfully, Hay wants nothing more than to retreat to her room, shut herself in, and sleep for a whole month. However, she knows that the throbbing, still sluggishly oozing wounds demand to be tended to. Dark granules of sand from the beach where the fight had taken place are still embedded in them and the dried blood crusts the fur around the open areas, plastering it into the open injuries as well. Idlily, she thinks of how painful it will be to have them cleaned. Once it is obvious that there is nothing left for her to do, the young woman finally looks to her brother, tense shoulders sinking down as the exhaustion she feels pulls at her.

With a small dip of her head, she climbs down to approach Dorian and softly says, “Let’s go to my den.” Haydée doesn’t wish for anyone to see her cry while her brother tends to the deep wounds so she slowly leads them down from the top of the falls. Thoughts jumble together as they walk, her tired brain continuously running over all that still needs to be done. The world fades away as she gets lost in her own mind and Hay barely registers the fact that they enter the cave system behind the curtain of water.

It is only when she is pushing aside the fur that covers the doorway to her space that she comes back to the present and she steps aside, holding aside the fur so that her brother can join her in the relative safety of her room. Lanterns are spaced around the room, illuminating the darkness but their guttering lights are now ringed in halos and Haydée winces as their low level of brightness still send shards of pain stabbing into her right eye. Sluggishly, she moves to where her bed is and settles herself on top of the furs.

There is so much she wants to tell to Dorian, so much she has to apologize for but all she can do is lay her head on her paws and allow him to tend her painful wounds. As Dorian approaches, her green gaze flicks to his injured cheek and shame once again fills her chest.

This is all her fault, after all.


"Haydée Kedieo"

Sitting through the meeting knowing that his sister was injured and in pain right in front of him had been difficult, but he waited mostly patiently for her to say what needed to be said and for anyone that wanted to say anything additional to her to do so. He couldn't help the slight, stern frown that lingered on his face while the meeting went on, very clearly bothered by the fact that his sister had decided to hold a meeting rather than get treatment for her wound first no matter the reason. The how and why she ended up with the wound was a whole thing in its own regard, but he had to prioritize what he was going to worry about to keep himself from losing sense of all of it and her immediate health was more important.

As soon as everything was done and Haydée rose to leave he was immediately at her side. As good as she was at putting on a brave face for everyone else, Dorian could see through it to see the way her shoulders sagged, the exhaustion heavy on her features, and the way she recoiled away from and squinted at the light. Even before she mentioned going to her den he had already decided that they were going to at least retreat to the caves so he had no qualms with that. He kept close to her side just in case and slightly guided her toward the caves and eventually to her den, glancing toward her face occasionally and noticing the distant look in her eyes. Her mind was clearly far away, but he couldn't blame her with everything that had happened in the last day or two. Hells, even with the last couple of days aside there had been more stress and trauma than any of them should reasonably be able to deal with, but here they were–doing their best to hold the line.

As soon as Hay was settled on her bed he was sliding his pack of supplies off of himself and going to fetch a bowl and waterskin so he could start cleaning up the wound, allowing himself to retreat into the familiar tasks and motions. Before he did anything else though, he pulled out a vial of concentrated meadowsweet extract and held it up to her muzzle, saying, "Stick out your tongue." When she complied he dripped half a dozen drops of the medicine on her tongue and let her swallow the slightly bitter, herbal tincture. Cleaning this wound would probably still sting regardless, but it'd at least help take the edge off of the pain. While he waited for that to take effect he poured a bowl of water and mixed in some trillium, placing a couple of rags into the mixture to soak while he prepared some other bandages, sutures, and poultices.

He was quiet while he worked, unsure of what to say or if he should say anything at all–partially because it was obvious her head was hurting her and partially because he couldn't think of anything to say that wouldn't risk coming across the wrong way. She didn't need him to scold her or berate her, she was probably doing that enough to herself for the both of them. He wasn't there, he couldn't say what she should or shouldn't have done. Eventually he just sighed softly as he stirred one of his poultices to reincorporate some herbs that had begun to separate from one another. "It's just one thing after another, isn't it?" he said quietly, a frown tugging at his lips. It felt like their father's death had been the tipping point that had sent everything else downhill and it just didn't seem to have any sign of stopping.

"Dorian"

The weariness that Haydée feels is not just from lack of sleep; it is deep, burrowing all the way down into her very soul as insecurities, both old and new have risen to plague her already tortured mind. They travel in silence as Dorian guides her into the cave, the dazed, distant Leader moving sluggishly wherever he directed her to go. Her bed calls and Hay answers, quickly flopping down to the soft furs as Dorian moves about setting things up. For a moment, she tries to relax and her brother steps up to her to stick a vial near her muzzle.

Tired emerald eyes lazily blink at the container as he instructs her to stick out her tongue and, while it takes a few moments for the words to be processed, Haydée finally does as ordered. The drops that hit her tongue are slightly bitter and her face screws up slightly at the taste but she does not pull her tongue back until he is done with her. Swallowing down the herbal mixture, she silently watches as her sweet, caring brother prepares to stitch up her neck. A pregnant pause falls between the siblings as neither one is quite certain what to say.

Quiet words meet her ears and Haydée pulls her eyes from where they had been watching him mix the poultices, hypnotized by the calm, rhythmic moments that come so easily to the healer. Sorrowful green eyes meet her brother’s lighter gaze and the young woman’s brows knit together as she blurts out, “He… he scolded me Dorian. After he gave me these wounds, he ridiculed me for the way I lead.” The pain of that moment will live on for months and perhaps even years and it has had Hay questioning everything since she left the beach.

A sigh fills the air as she diverts her eyes, too guilt-ridden to be able to meet her brother’s gaze for long. As Dorian begins to work, Haydée softly says, “I am so sorry Dorian. Maybe if I wasn’t such a weak alpha, the Raiders would never have come knocking at our door.” The unspoken responsibility of his wound unvoiced but heavily implied by her words. If only she wasn’t Leader, then maybe, Ethne would have been out of harm’s way.


"Haydée Kedieo"

The steady motion of the mixing stopped at Haydée's blurted confession of how she had been scolded by the man that had maimed her, that she had been ridiculed for the way she led the pack. He didn't lift his gaze from the pot of herbal medicine in his paws right away, but he sat still for a moment as he processed the statement. Not only had this man that claimed to be a leader himself intrude on their lands with his wolves and steal their belongings, but then went on to wound his sister so deeply there was no way it wouldn't scar and perhaps wound her mentally even more deeply than that. His jaw tensed and he closed his eyes for just a moment while he took a breath to steady himself before he continued his work, trying to focus on that instead of everything else that seemed to constantly be stacking against them and crumbling around them.

He had only just picked up one of the rags from the bowl of treated water, ringing it out some before bringing it to the back of her neck, and had begun gently cleaning away the dried blood and dirt from her wound when Haydée spoke again. She apologized, making him glance toward her face with confusion. What did she have to apologize to him for? As she went on to blame this on her being a "weak" alpha he only grew more angry–not at her, but at their situation and this Raider brute that had caused it. "You are not weak," he insisted quietly and firmly while his paws continued to work, his emerald gaze focused on her wound as he cleaned it and get a better sense of how much damage had been done. Somehow having this situation to distract him made his paws move even more easily and steadily, moving on practiced instinct instead of letting himself overthink what he was doing. "Showing care and concern for others and not leading with some diluted sense power at the expense of strangers doesn't make you weak. There is a difference between being weak and being gentle. You are not spineless, you are not weak, you are not dumb. You are smart, caring, steady, and thoughtful. Just because some pigheaded, violent thief says you're weak doesn't–"

He realized as he was speaking that he was starting to grip the rag he was holding far too tight, the curl of his toes making his paw start to ache, and his paw had started to tremble lightly as he got more and more worked up about the situation. He stopped himself and pulled his paw back to take a breath, putting the now bloodied, dirty rag off to the side and instead picking up the medicine he had been preparing. "Just because he says so doesn't mean you are. There is no one right way to lead," he finally finished as he was beginning to spread a light layer of the medicine that would chase away any possible infections and encourage the wound to close once it was stitched together. Once that medicine was applied he sat back a bit with a heavy sigh, putting the pot aside before rubbing his paws over his face. "We're only two years old..." he lamented. "You took this on before we were even really adults. We've seen our father murdered, our mother lose her mind, and we're supposed to just... know how to handle this? To know how to lead or... even just... live our lives? Who is he to criticize you? He's practically an old man scolding a child who was given a job that they weren't trained for."

He couldn't sit still any more so he got up, busying himself with discarding the soiled rag and putting away the pot of medicine now that he was done with it, pacing back and forth across the space a bit to calm himself down. He had been teetering on a razors edge for a long time, sometimes swaying one way or another ever since their father was killed, but the events of the last couple of days were pushing him and threatening to topple him over. He started preparing the bone needle and thread to seal up her wound while the herbs he applied did their job to soothe the inflammation and form a protective barrier across the exposed flesh. "I... I don't know if I can take another hit like this, Hay," he admitted quietly as he looked down at his own paws and struggled with the thread he was trying to feed into the needle, his voice wavering as he spoke. "It's been non-stop since dad died and I don't think I've even really accepted that... that he's gone." His voice broke and he realized with a start that his vision had clouded with tears and he quickly wiped them away.

"Dorian"