Slowly, oh so slowly, her body was beginning to recuperate. It took a while for her to even have enough strength to walk around the castle for any length of time, but it came. It took a while for the wounds to begin scabbing over enough that Gwynevere didn't feel the need to layer on the herbal medicines so heavily, but it happened. Physically, she was on the mend. It allowed her to get away from the wing of the castle where her family lived and she began to float around the castle like a ghost, barely acknowledging anyone she happened to pass and ignoring the glances and stares that followed her. She didn't have it in her mentally to address any of it just yet. Not yet. Perhaps not for a long time.

She kept drifting toward the door that she knew would lead her down into the dungeons, but always forced herself away. Even when no one else was around, even if she thought she might be able to get down there without anyone catching her, she didn't. She kept trying to justify it to herself as not wanting to go against Resin's wishes and not wanting to break the decree that Ulric had given to the pack about not going into the dungeon, but she knew there was more than that. The more she stared at that door, the more she realized it. She was afraid. It was hard to determine what exactly she was afraid of out of the many, many possibilities, but she was. She hated that fear - she had spent a majority of her life running from it, and now it had returned.

Turning away from the door again, she walked out of the castle and into the courtyard, the cold air hitting her as she stood out in front of the main castle entrance. She tried to think back to how she had managed to pull herself up out of that hole the first time around, and the more she thought about it the more daunting it became. Recovering from what her family had done had taken months - maybe years. It had taken ages of travel on her own, learning how to fight form Sirius and Resin, climbing the ranks of the Armada, birthing her children... All of those things had helped her burry all of her pain down deep into her soul and seal it over so she never had to think about it again.

She grit her teeth and trudged off to find Sirius, clinging to any shred of determination she might be able to muster as she went to seek him out. Walking up to him, she lifted her head to fix him with a firm look - a look that just said that she needed this and to not question it. "Fight me," she told him simply. That had been her gateway before, perhaps it could be again.

"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

It was cold in the dungeons, and he felt stiff as he woke in the morning. He didn’t speak, he was silent and careful as he crept back up the stairs and into the light of day. Yawning softly as he went. He couldn’t stop thinking about the bear. When it had maimed Magnus, and he had lost his cool. He had just about rampaged himself, and Resin had gotten in the way. She had deflected his blows and worn him down. She had put herself between Sirius and others, and calmed the raging beast in his heart. Now the tables were turned, and he didn’t know how to bring Resin back to them. All he knew was that it was his turn to get in the way. If nothing else, he could promise Resin he would not let her hurt anyone else. He would be her wall. What else could he do? He was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t register Tam until she was upon him. He blinked unsteady eyes upon her. He could see the determination in his eyes, and he thought of the roiling unhappiness in his gut. “I don’t know Tam, it might not be a good idea.” He admitted softly. If he let himself loose, he wasn’t sure he could roll it back in so easily. He was too angry. "Speech"

Tamsyn's jaw tightened when he denied her request, telling her it wasn't a good idea, making that doubt creep in to the back of her mind again. It had been a long time since she had fought anyone and even longer since she fought Sirius. With Resin at the helm, she had easily fallen into the role of caregiver, the emotional one of the two of them for their children while Resin was the fighter and the protecter. Now... Now she worried that she would never be able to again. She had put in so much time and so much effort to work past her demons enough to be able to fight without flinching away and now...

Her ears folded back against her head as she started up at him, swallowing past the lump in her throat. "Sirius... Please, I need this," she whispered, doing her best to keep the pain out of her voice and ultimately failing. She knew she would lose. It was Sirius - of course she would. She had never won a fight against Sirius and certainly didn't expect to now while she was still healing and hardly in any real shape to fight. But that wasn't the point. The point was that she needed something that was in her control. A task or an activity that she could dictate, that was all her own. Everything else felt so out of control and she didn't feel like she had a say in any of it. She remembered when she used to fight and train and how powerful that had felt... She needed that. She needed to feel something other than pain and heartache and loss and confusion.

"Fight me," she repeated, though the determination in her expression had faded, desperation taking its place. It wasn't the fighting that she needed, it was just the chance to take herself back to a time when the hardest thing she had to do was learn how to set her defenses while Sirius was nudging her feet. She wanted to go back to a time when all she had to worry about was how the den she had built by the river ended up being on the whole opposite side of the pack lands from the training grounds. She swallowed again and bit back her emotions as she reached out and nudged his shoulder with her paw. "Fight me.

"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

Her ears folded back, and he could see the emotion in her eyes. It was like a slap to the face, he could see her doubt. It wasn’t her he worried about. Tam could do anything. It was himself, he didn’t want to loosen his fault on his emotions, he didn’t want to start a fight when he knew the anger and frustration boiling up inside of him. In the end, her need overruled his good judgment. He lightly knocked her paw away. “Set your paws, Tamsyn” he ordered, taking control, though his heart was in his eyes as he set his own defences. He looked at Tamsyn, and saw world beyond what she was saying in her eyes. Saw the helplessness. He rolled his shoulders forward, narrowing his eyes. don’t lose control he thought to himself. “Take me down, Tammy.” It was an order. "Speech"

It was just a simple command, but Tamsyn felt his order to set her paws all the way down to her soul. She could see the emotion in his eyes and knew he was struggling and torn as much as she was and perhaps at any other time she would have backed down and made herself believe that Sirius knew best, but not today. Not right now. Right now she needed this structure and reminder of what she could do - she needed it more than air in her lungs. Dutifully, she fell into the stance that Sirius had taught her ages ago with her paws evenly spaced and stance strong and ready for a fight. It didn't reflect how she felt and she couldn't keep herself from showing that in her eyes. She felt as weak and uncertain as she had the day that she began her training. Her body knew the motions and could execute them like a well oiled machine, but her heart and mind were not following suit.

At his order to take him down, Tamsyn didn't hesitate. She lunged forward, darting to his left side and keeping a bit of space between them before she pivoted and leapt in toward his left, hind leg. Already she was rewiring her brain and her actions to favor doing things on her left side to avoid anything reaching the right side of her face. Besides, even though she could see from her right eye, it still wasn't easy to fully open it and the last thing she wanted was to miss one of his movements just because she didn't have her full range of vision. She aimed her bite for the upper part of his thigh near where his leg connected with his body and kept herself nearly perpendicular to him so that it wouldn't be as easy to reach her right away. Even as she did all of these things she felt like she was just going through the motions, acting out the things that she had practiced time and time again, and easily fell back into the predictability of it all. It was soothing in a strange way to be able to just shut off her mind for a moment and run through this as if it were any other training drill they had done time and time again.


"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

She came at him, heading down his left side. He held steady as she rushed past him, watching from the corner of his eye as she pivoted and struck for his left hind leg. They hadn’t fought since his fur thickened and increased across his body. Even the hair about his legs had built an almost padding before his flesh. That surprise would distract her for a second as he pushed his weight into his back legs and swung himself around. Aiming to smack his heavy shoulder against her side as his larger body came up beside her. It also placed her rump close to him, and he reached for her tail. If he succeeded, he would give it a few teasing tugs with his superior reach. "Speech"

Tamsyn's teeth were met with a mouth full of thick fur - far thicker than she remembered. It made her wonder if she just never got this close to him in a fight to notice or this was a newer development. She couldn't even get her teeth close enough to his skin to do much more than graze it before he pulled away and twisted around. It kept her distracted long enough that by the time his shoulder connected with her side it was too late for her to dodge it or brace against it. He knocked the air out of her with a soft "oof", making her stumble a bit to the side before she was able to catch herself and recenter her balance.

Just as she was about to turn and face him again, she was stopped by the feeling of his teeth gripping and tugging on her tail. She shot him a glare as she twisted and curved her body with a growl, curling herself around until she could reach a bite toward his left foreleg, making a circle between the two of them as she went to connect the loop Sirius had started. She knew that if this was a real fight and Sirius had actually wanted to hurt her or bring her down she wouldn't have stood a chance and she was making practically every rookie mistake in the book. Already she could feel her strength beginning to fade and that just layered frustration on top of frustration as she shoved her shoulder against the leg she was looking to bite, lashing out and letting out all of this pent up frustration and anger.

















"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

He managed to grab at her little black tail, and give it a few tugs as he felt and heard her moving, bringing herself closer to his side again. Her shoulder hit his leg hard. He wasn’t expecting force, he had anticipated more biting - perhaps closer to his ankle, where the fur would be thinnest. Surprised at her change in tactics, his leg caved in towards him, knocking him off balance. He could feel her growing anger, the need to vent. He lightly nipped her rump, still not willing to fully let loose himself. He didn’t want to let out the beast and risk hurting her. He leaned against her as he sought to regain the balance in his back legs. He didn’t pull away, but let her take out the aggression she clearly needed to on him. "Speech"

Somehow the teasing tugs he gave her tail, the light nips he gave her rump, all just added to the steadily building frustration and anger that was building in her gut and threatening to burn her from the inside out. All of the anguish she had been through over the last few days, all of the terror she had felt and continued to feel, and the fear and worry she had over the future fed into that fire and she just kept pulling those emotions out from the recesses of her mind and throwing them on that blaze like firewood. Tears of frustration welled up in her eyes and she funneled that into her attacks, hitting his leg harder than she probably would have otherwise and she felt the limb cave under the pressure.

She was unrelenting and immediately took advantage of getting him even slightly off balance and went to bite down on the ankle of the leg she had knocked free from under him. She tried to pull up on the limb and keep it from being able to catch his weight as she threw her body weight into her shoulder and tried to ram it into his ribs with a grunt. She used that momentum to shove him away from her, whether she was able to knock him over or not, and used that momentary space to turn to face him again, immediately falling into her usual defensive stance as she stared him down though tear-filled eyes, breathing hard and not noticing how her form had begun to tremble under the weight of her own emotions. "Fight me!" she yelled at him and demanded with a hard stomp of her foot, snarling as she launched herself at him again.













"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

As he tried to balance himself, she pressed her attack. Grabbing at the leg she had unbalanced. Her teeth gripped hard about his ankle. Finding the places less protected by his thicker fur. He felt her fangs puncture his flesh, and the feeling of blood welling from the cuts. Relentless, she yanked at the paw, tugging it, digging her teeth in harder. Then her body was hitting his ribs, knocking out his breath. She was learning, working around his strengths. She wasn’t trying to cut into his thicker fur. She was going for impact over cutting. He still wasn’t defending himself, not truly. But the pain rippled through him. It had been a while since anyone had cut him. She shoved him away from her, giving him a view of her tear-filled eyes. He felt the breath of her yell on his face. He opened his jaws, and roared at her. Snarling, as he dove in. aiming to smash his shoulder into her throat and his teeth would aim to dig into her unblemished cheek. "Speech"

Finally. He met her anger with some of his own and as she dove back into the fight, his roar reverberating through her bones as he lunged toward her in return. It ripped away any of her logical, conscious thoughts and she completely lost herself to it. She felt his shoulder slam into her chest and throat, knocking her back and pushing the air from her lungs. She was fast though - faster than him. It was the one advantage she had always had, though it wasn't usually enough to tip the scale in her favor. She used that momentum he gave her from shoving into her throat to let him push her back onto her back legs and she threw her forelegs around his neck, holding onto him with a vice grip. His teeth reached for her cheek and she jerked her head away, feeling those fangs scraping against her neck instead and drawing blood.

All the fur along her scruff bristled and a snarl of her own echoed in her chest as she turned her jaws back toward his neck, reaching her teeth for the spot just behind his jaw since she hoped the fur wouldn't be as thick there as it would be on other parts of his neck. She found herself practically dangling from the much larger man's neck and still she didn't loosen her grip on him, only gripping tighter so she couldn't be shaken off easily. She also brought her hind legs up from the floor since they weren't giving her much support anyway and went to kick them hard into his chest and front legs, digging her claws into his skin.

















"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

He could feel the adrenaline pumping through his body, his senses hyper aware, and the bleeding slices in his ankle throbbed. When had he last let himself loose? Now wasn’t the time, he was on edge. Dangerous. But now was the only time he had, because Tamsyn needed this. She was lunging her smaller legs about his neck, exposing her face to his teeth as she came at him. He didn’t hit her cheek as he had aimed for, her neck got in the way. He tasted her blood on his tongue as he cut flesh with his elongated fangs. Hot and salty on his muzzle as her snarl vibrated through their connected body parts. Her teeth grazed his own neck in retaliation as she held onto him with her paws. As she put all her weight in her paws and lifted her hind legs off the ground, he would feel them connected with his belly. He wrapped a paw about her shoulder, bringing her close like a lover's embrace. Snarling softly in her ear as she kicked at his softer belly, he folded her towards him, and drove his weight forward, bringing her entire body and his upper half to the ground with a heavy slam. "Speech"

Tamsyn grappled around Sirius' neck, digging her teeth into his skin till she tasted blood, though it was nearly impossible to get a firm hold on him around his insufferable fur. She felt blinded by it all, lost in her own pursuits to escape her own emotions, and barely noticed when his foreleg wrapped around her tightly and held her smaller frame against his own. All at once the world shifted around her as he drove them both into the ground. Her back hit squarely against the hard stone floor of the castle and all of the air went rushing out of her lungs. Her head fell back away from his neck with a grimace, laying flat on her back under him while she struggled to work air back into her lungs. She was breathing hard and staring past him up at the ceiling for a long moment, the drive and the anger slowly simmering and seething just under the surface.

Eventually she sighed and let her eyes close, a few remaining, frustrated tears running down the sides of her face as she hit his shoulder with her paw. "Why?" she asked softly, her voice breaking and hoarse as she continued to try and catch her breath. "Why me? Why us? Haven't we been through enough already?" She didn't expect an answer, she just had to demand it of the universe even if it couldn't speak back. The fight was over, she had lost, much like she had expected to. She didn't need to win. She just needed to know that she could fight. Needed to remind herself. She didn't want to give up, which was really all she had thought of doing since Resin attacked her. She had slid right back into that place she had been when Zee had found her skirting along the edge of a cliff, but she couldn't stay in that place. She had to think about her children. They needed her, even if she didn't want it for herself.

She blinked her eyes open and looked up at Sirius' face for a moment before leaning forward to press her forehead to his. Her neck was bleeding, some parts of the wounds around her eye had torn open, and she was utterly exhausted. Gwynevere would certainly chew her out for such a stunt and the thought made a little smirk pull at her lips. She didn't know if she necessarily felt any better, but she felt alive and that had to count for something. "Thank you," she told him quietly.

"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

He drove them into the ground, and Tamsyn took the brunt of the force. He paused above her, giving her a chance to catch her breath. She drew it in in deep shuddering breaths, trying to full her lungs. He looked at the soft white markings that trailed from her eyes. Marred on one side by the cuts that Resin had gouged in her flesh. Far worse than the single dot puncture marks Sirius had left on her throat. In fact, Sirius was the one that would be walking away from this bleeding in more places then she was. Proof that he had only really been trying right at the end. He felt a sudden urge to kiss her closed eyelids, and wipe away the pain there. He wasn’t entirely sure the emotion was platonic, and he pulled away abruptly. Not fully, and not far enough to avoid the blow to the shoulder as she punched him out of frustration. He didn’t have an answer for her. The world wasn’t fair, and if there truly was a god, Sirius would have found him and ended him by now. For all the pain the world had caused those he loved most. She pulled closer to him, resting her forehead against his. He looked down at the spots his blood had lightly marred her fur from his position above her, before closing his eyes. Pushing his own forehead against hers and baring his teeth. “ Mine.” He snarled angrily. “Mine.” but even he couldn’t keep her from getting hurt. "Speech"

Mine. It was a simple, firm statement and it wasn't the first time she had heard it from him - and she was sure it wouldn't be the last. She had always been his since the day that he accepted her into the Armada and took her under his wing. Even when she fell for Resin, was pulled away to help her build up The Hallows from nothing, started her family, and moved further away from him. She was still his. At least in her eyes, even though he had granted her permission to leave and be with the woman she loved, he had never really given up his possession of her. "I know," she told him quietly her paw resting on his cheek for a moment.

Eventually she let her paw fall away and her head leaned back to rest against the ground once more, fixing him with a serious look. "I can't leave. This is my children's home. Plus, I can't abandon Ulric now that this has all just been thrown on him." She knew exactly what he would want to do and if she didn't have her children to consider she might have let him steal her back to the Armada, but she couldn't do that. Her children were her pride and joy and that at least she knew he could understand. She wanted to be very clear with him before his possessive nature took him any further because she knew without a doubt that it would. This was the same wolf that had scoured every inch of Boreas and Auster for one missing wolf. She knew how far his particular form of love could go.
















"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

She understood, she had always understood. When Sirius allowed people in, surrendered his heart to them, he did it with a condition. A right. that he would protect them, equal to his love was his possessiveness. He was a selfish bastard, and what pieces of his heart he gave away, he still guarded. He loved Tamsyn, and she would always be his.

He leaned his head into her paw, closing his eyes. Not opening them again until she lifted her paw free. “I know Tamsyn, I just needed you to know, too” he said, as through taking them all away had never occurred to him. As though he hadn’t already considered tossing the kids over his back, and dragging Tamsyn and - somehow - Resin, all back to his pack. Where he could growl at their door forever with that single word on his lips.

Mine.

“But I’m staying here, for as long as I need to. The Armada can truck along without me, Asla has become a fine, wonderful leader. The Armada can do without me for a time. I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. Because your mine Dammit.” He had started off quiet and gentle, but his determination and aggravation had grown until he was biting off the last word. It was absolutely killing him that he couldn’t kill something to free Resin. His strength meant nothing here.

"Speech"

She didn't know what it was about Sirius, but every time this protective, possessive side of him reared its head, even as he aggressively asserted that she was his, she still only felt the love and care behind those words. She was sure most others that didn't know him the way she did would see this angry, possessive bastard and would probably be afraid of him, but in her eyes he was just her Sirius. A soft smile pulled at her face as she looked up at him from where she remained on the floor. She was eternally grateful that his man helped her put herself back together again and again. It frightened her to think about what her life might have been like if he and Zee hadn't found her - how short it might have been.

Tamsyn nudged his shoulder with her paw, "Alright, alright, let me up." His or not, she wasn't going to let him pin her to the floor all day. She knew that ever present darkness would return, it was inevitable, but he allowed her a release and that was enough for now. Once she was free, she went to roll onto her paws and grimaced, her back aching from where she had been slammed into the ground and her legs protesting from the strain she had put on them. She laid there on her stomach for a moment with a short laugh, giving a little shake of her head. "Gwynevere is going to be so upset with me," she admitted as she tried to stand again and ultimately failed. She knew she was pushing herself too far too fast, but once she got her mind set on something she couldn't let it go.

"Help me up?" she asked, knowing he would have even without her asking.













"Tamsyn" | "Blue"

He wiggled his brows as he looked down at her, a smile pulling at his muzzle. “Make me” he said in response to her gentle order. She rose to the challenge and kicked at him, paws mercilessly beating his belly as he laughed and raised his paws. “Alright, alright” he said, giving her space.

She rolled onto her stomach, but that was about as far as she got. He leaned back on his hunches and watched her as she felt her aches and pains. She seemed in better sprites then he had found her, so the fight must have done her well.

He didn’t know Gwynevere well, but he didn’t hesitate to smile again. “She can bite me.” he said. He wasn’t a doctor, but he could still see if had been what she had needed. He leaned forward and hooked a paw about her shoulder and dug his teeth into the excess skin on the back of her neck. Careful not to hurt her as he hauled backwards and pulled the much smaller wolf to her paws. “Perhaps we should do some warm ups each day.” he suggested. They could fight if they felt like it, but a little bit of time and training together a day might do them both well. There was going to be enough darkness in the days to come as they both watched a wolf they loved fall to darkness.


"Speech"

Tamsyn barked a laugh when Sirius disregarded the possibility of her daughter being angry with them for the fight they just had. It felt good to smile, even if it was just for a little while. She let him lift her off the floor and she settled onto her haunches for a moment while she while she shook some of the ache out of her forelegs. She nodded to his suggestion of them doing some warm ups each day and she smiled up at him. "Just like old times," she commented with a chuckle before pulling herself fully to her paws again. "I've definitely fallen out of practice... And this has been so draining," she said with a wave of a paw toward her wounds that had really only just begun to heal. She felt like if it wasn't for this she would have held up a little better, but as it was she had only just begun to regain some of her energy and strength. She didn't know how much of that was mental or physical or perhaps a combination of the two, but it was difficult none of the less.

"Will you come with me up to our wing? I'd love for you to meet Gwyn. Well, meet her again, perhaps. She was just a pup last time you saw her." She glanced down at his ankle, remembering the bite she had dug into his leg. "She could treat that for you if you'd like." She knew that if Gwynevere caught wind of a wound of any kind she would most certainly want to treat it so it secretly amused her that she gave Sirius an option that he likely wouldn't have.



















"Tamsyn" | "Blue"