((Liquid timing to shortly after the challenge, being vauge about outcomes of pack memberships until confirmed with dragon))

"Speech"
Recluse's mind was running a million miles an hour, there were so many things she needed to do. She had so many wolves she needed to speak to, the first thing she'd wanted to do was make sure to spend time with her husband and youngest children but she'd only let herself have that for a single night, had instructed them to bathe themselves thoroughly to remove the pack scent from all of them and keep moving, for the time being, she would not let them stay in one spot too long. Her adult children would have to survive long enough on their own for now, though that thought brought her great pain. She would ask for the rest of the empire to look out for them and to shelter them if they could once she'd visited them... So maybe it was unexpected that her first stop wasn't her family or Armada... But rather her first important visit was for her pirate king. It was partially a strategic choice, she expected that her more personal relationship with the king was largely unknown to the bitch, she certainly hadn't taken any interest in the goings on in the pack, to begin with, and well... It would have been a lie to say there wasn't a large emotional component.

Recluse was a woman at rock bottom, her daughter had only been buried some weeks ago and now she was forced to fear for the lives of the rest of her children. She'd learned twice over now that it was possible to lose everything, to have the ones you loved ripped away from you, and Recluse knew now more than ever that she had to do everything she could to hold onto what was hers. She had two questions for the pirate king, one practical and one deeply, deeply personal.

The woman had scrubbed the pack scent from herself, had scrubbed until her flesh was raw and she did something she hardly ever did. With Lilith draped around her neck, she moved during the day, it left her open in its own way but she also wasn't about to be predictable, not anymore. Recluse hadn't even had time to really rest, her wounds were still raw and aching but she did not let herself wait. She had to get the drop of the skull-faced bitch, she would not be caught sleeping, never again. So it was how she showed up at the pirate's borders, probably looking like total hell. She had no time to dither, she tossed her head back and called for her pirate, her voice full of longing, full of desperation.

Art by petitecanine

Sparrow had headed home right after the challenge. She didn't trust herself to not do something dumb with Azure right there and after Recluse lost, she wasn't sure she should act on any of those urges to go comfort her either. The family of my enemy is my girl crush? That was NOT how the saying went. She had barely settled back in when Recluse called at her borders. Sparrow hurried faster than she'd ever admit to get to the pale woman's side. She looked at her, messy and desperate and her heart ached. She didn't like that. Her heart wasn't supposed to beat for anyone but herself anymore. She wanted to make a joke, but her throat burned with a growl she held back- not at Recluse, but at the unseen threats that haunted her. The other woman had won the pack. Sparrow wasn't one to hold grudges based on that. She had fought for Ignis's old pack once, and now the two of them were grand. She wasn't fond of the shank bitch, but she didn't blame her for trying to fight for a pack.

In the end, her brain fizzled, all of her thoughts out of place and all she could muster was a quiet, "Oh, my sweet spirit woman..."