Another day! Oh boy, the Spring was the best time ever! The sun was out, grass was green, and all the snow was gone. And what happened when snow left? MUD! Oh yes, mud! Letting out a big bark and he ran from the den and right into the open. Golden eyes cast around to try and pick out the best, biggest puddle, but it seemed that there was none around the den. Oh poo... that meant that he had to go looking for them. Trotting around, he jumped and leaped and let out joyful calls. And then the urge to run took over, and Lebrah took off. A war cry of pure joy left his lips and he weaved his way through the trees. Thinking that he heard Anias behind him, he turned his head to see if she was there. Nope! And then he whipped his head around, only to see at the last moment that there was a tree right in front of him. Oh shi-

Crack!

The wolf's head connected with the trunk of the tree, darkness over taking everything else. The pale beast fell to the earth with a solid thud, body limp as it laid to utterly still. It was as if breath was no longer leaving the creature, but slowly his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm. The rest of him was quite limp, as if nothing had happened moments before. All the joy, everything was gone. Just darkness, silence, and almost lifeless.

Golden eyes opened slowly, confusion dancing upon them. Where in the world was he? He couldn't recall this place at all? Groaning, he slowly pulled himself to his blue paw pads as his nostrils flared. He could pick up his own scent, so slowly the man followed it. His movements were still slow, pain throbbing in his skull. And then he froze, everything coming back to him in a rush. His sisters death, his jaws closing around her throat until the life left her eyes. His brothers, killed before his very eyes. Their screams filled his head, memories of them being torn into tiny parts. Blood everywhere, staining the earth. Cries, tears, blood. Snapping back, Lebrah felt tears fall down his face. No. He remembered everything, every little bit of it. Faye, his dear, dear sister. He had taken the very life from her, he was the reason why she was no longer around. Israel and Colt, his brothers. Oh gods no... The feathered marked man fell to the earth as the sadness took over, filling him with wave after wave of it surrounding his very soul. He let out a terrible cry, the harsh sound breaking even his own heart.

Shakily, Lebrah raised once more to his paws. Sniffling, he ran a paw over his eyes to clear the path of tears away. He had to set a mission, to try and figure how just where he was. Shaking his head, he followed his own smell. It brought him to a small den, and poking his head in he could tell that this is where he had been living. But why had he forgotten everything? The very last thing he remembered was -- oh shit. The meditation, he had reverted himself back to a pup-like state. Oh gods, what had happened? Could he do it again? The pain was too much, too hard to handle. Backing up, Lebrah's head spun and he fell back onto his rump. His family, his poor family... Those cries would never leave his mind. He squeezed his eyes closed, muscles clenched as he rested his head on the side of the den. Could he live like this any longer? If he couldn't revert his mind back once again, he was afraid that he couldn't go on living.

Walk | Talk | Think  She had been out trying to be responsible again. Lebrah was no issue - aside from being a little clingy and in need of her attention, he was rather easy to care for - but Espirit was a different matter. Taking after her brothers, he seemed ready to go off and tackle the world head on without the proper training and know-how first. Anais admired his tenacity but at the same time wished he was a little more patient, and was glad her brothers and sister were still willing to lend their support. She had left Espirit in the care of her brothers, planting the idea of them setting out to show the youngster in an early lesson a little bit about hunting, and she was sure it was going to be an educational experience for the lot of them. She almost wished she was gong to be there to see it.  But she had wanted a moment away, a moment to devote a little more attention to Lebrah that she felt she had neglected to give him as of late. He was but a child himself, just as prone to jealousy as the next wolf and more so for his youthful nature, and she did not want him to grow to resent her little brother for it. She heard his gleeful calls over the distance as she trotted through the woods on her way back, smiling to herself at the sound. Her son was in a good mood then, which was a good sign. it meant she had not neglected him too long as she had feared.  With no worries, she continued about her leisurely pace, sure he would still be in his good mood once she found him, but to her surprise and horror someone cried out in pain before she could get there. The voice was his, she recognized it instantly, and a natural worry and need to protect urged her into action. "Lebrah?" she called with concern, her trotting gait picking up into a run and hurrying her to the open space just outside of their den. She slowed upon seeing him upright, sitting just beside their den and looking uncharacteristically disheartened. "There you are," she remarked softly, walking forward to creep up along his side gently as he seemed more or less calm now, or at least compared to the usual near-hysterics she would have guessed to find. That, in itself, was strangely odd. "Is something wrong?" Her voice was gentle, concerned, sensing something amiss that she could not place or name as she tried to draw closer to him but not wanting to upset him further by making whatever had happened out to be something greater than it might have been. Maybe he had gotten over his scare already on his own.

A voice.

Faye?

No... This was a whole different soul, but one who knew his namesake. The man turned away slowly, appraising the woman before him. A voice screamed at him, telling him that he knew this being. But no. A name did not come to mind, and nor did her features really ring a bell. But her words spoke of someone that knew him, perhaps when he was in his revered state of mind. Golden eyes were indifferent as they looked at her, there was clearly a change within him. He sat up straighter, and he wasn't wiggling to and fro. No, his spine was stiff and his tail laying straight behind him. His coloured flanks only moved with his breaths, head tilting slightly to the side. "I am sorry my love, but I do not know you," he said finally, after quite a few moments of silence. He didn't want to offend the poor dear, it would seem that she had been around here a lot. Her scent and his own were mingled, claiming the land with their stench. "I do think that I should thank you, for caring for me. Tell me, did I remember anything at all?" his voice was level and calm, trying to hide the utter sadness within him. He was a very, very broken man.

Lebrah cleared his throat, his paws shuffling slightly. He could feel another onslaught of emotions, but tried to force them back behind steel walls. He would not break in front of this woman. No. There was an inner part of him that told him that he cared for this woman, but fear of losing her too suddenly clouded his mind. He grew even more stiff, teeth gritting together as he eyed her more. "Did I tell you how I got myself like that? Or how to get back?" he asked, voice cracking slightly. Oh no, it was breaking down. "Please, h-help me," he said with a slight whimper. He couldn't live like this. His breath wheezed in his throat, as if even breathing pained him. He couldn't remain in this state for long, it would surely kill him. If this woman didn't hold the answers, then he might just have to end it himself.

Walk | Talk | Think  All he needed to do was look at her to freeze Anais in her tracks before she could fully reach his side, the slow, confounded way in which he brought his yellow eyes to her the very opposite of what she expected from him. It was Lebrah, undoubtedly, there was no other who shared his beautiful white coat marked with his two-toned feathers, nor the yellow eyes that seemed to bleed out into the fur surrounding them. This was him, it had to be, and yet... This was not her Lebrah. He moved differently, held himself differently, behaved nothing like the excitable, clingy, fully grown child that she had taken to caring for, had adopted as her own. He was, for lack of a better description, a stranger wearing her son's face.  Confused, suddenly anxious, Anais drew back a hesitant step, her ears folding back against her head as worry and uncertainly suddenly manifested itself upon her face and caused her body to shrink, to shy, from the wolf that she had shared her den with. Even his voice was different, when at last he spoke, carrying the same timbre that Lebrah would have but speaking from the mouth of an aged wolf, a man and not the child she associated with his sound. She drew back yet again, her heart beginning to race, her breath beginning to come in more quickly. Who was this that spoke with Lebrah's voice? That wore his face and yet was so unlike her adopted son? She was so confused, so startled by the change, that she could barely make sense of his inquiry, only managing to respond with a quiet, shaken, "What?"  Whatever strained composure the male who wore Lebrah's face had been donning appeared to quickly deteriorate, the whole of his physical being seeming to tense as he remained seated, shifting slightly in place. Noting it, practically able to feel the tension there just within his frame, the grey and gold girl's nervousness only grew and made her more wary. He was her son, she should have been just as comfortable with him as she had been the day before, as she had been earlier that day. But recognizing that he was a stranger, that there was someone new staring back at her from his eyes, made the nervous, frightened, fearful side of her emerge once again. She had been able to trust Lebrah, whole-heartedly and without question, but this Lebrah? He spoke to her again, his voice that was familiar and yet foreign so unsettling to her ears, though what he said was even more so. What did he mean "get back?" How he had gotten himself like--? But it clicked. He meant as she knew him, the Lebrah that was her son. Was he still there somewhere, sharing space with this stranger, watching her behind his other Lebrah's mask? His strained voice had broken, and again when he whimpered a plea for help. Anais shifted her weight between her forelegs, feeling in those broken whines a connection to the Lebrah she was familiar with. Maybe she was right to think him still in there somewhere.  Scared but unwilling to sit by and watch her son - no matter what guise he took on - stay wrapped in pain, she drew closer. "I'm sorry," she muttered apologetically, unable to answer anything that he had asked and not at all sure what had happened to bring about the change in him. She wished she knew. She wished she knew exactly what had happened and why he was like this now, why this side of him was so different. Unable to do anything else, she reached forward to wrap her neck around his, to draw him to her as she stepped forward to try and hold him as he often wanted her to. It had always worked before; maybe it could even work now. "I won't leave you," she whispered, desperately hoping that her presence alone would work like magic as it had on the Lebrah that was hers.

He watched her shrink away, basically melting away from his form. His ears fell back against his skull as some part of his mind screamed at him to comfort her. Part of him knew that he cared for this woman deeply, that she meant the world to him. 'Comfort Momma, hold her!' a voice cried, pushing him to go and hold the stranger. But she wasn't a stranger, she was known to his heart. But he didn't move from his position, his rump firmly planted on the earth. He studied her with his yellow gaze as slowly, slowly his walls came tumbling down. Emotions broke through the surface as the woman moved closer to him, her fur pressing against his own. Breath hitched in his throat as his body grew ridged, tightening more as she told him that she wasn't leaving him. Swallowing hard, his eyes squeezed shut as a few tears slipped passed his slowly faltering guard. The last wolves that had cared for him had all been killed, right before his very eyes.

'You were always the strongest of us Lebrah, you were the only one who could have made it out of here.'

Faye's voice was soft in his mind, but it was followed by her dying screams. Gasping, Lebrah pulled back from Anais, his back slamming against the outside walls of the den. Fear made his eyes wide, fur standing on end. "No, I can't. I can't," he whispered, breath hissing out of his parted jaws. "I can still hear them, I can always hear their dying screams. It never leaves me, it haunts my every moment. That is why -- I have to get back!" he was panicking now, feeling as if he was going to pass out from his lack of proper breathing. He scrambled even further away from the woman, head shaking back and forth in quick motions. "Please don't get too close, some part of my soul yearns to be close for you. But everyone who got close to me got... taken away. Before my eyes... I watched them... I watched them lose their lives before my very eyes. My sister..." the man sobbed, his heart shattering all over again. "Oh Faye, I'm so sorry. I didn't want to take your life..." falling to the earth, he looked up at the woman with desperation in his eyes. "You have to help me, please. I can't -- I can't live like this."

Lebrah felt as if the weight of the world was coming down on him, crashing down on his already frail shoulders. The little voice in his head was silent, only its cries filling his mind. Or was it Faye's, or his brothers? Trembling the man looked around for something, anything. He was clawing at the surface of the darkness, trying to climb his way back up. He wanted to hold the woman again, but the fear of her getting hurt turned his limbs into cement. "There was blood everywhere... by my jaws. Her blood, all over," he whispered, his form not staying still as it quivered and shook. He needed to get his mind back, revert it back to the Lebrah she knew, the one that was safe from all this blackness.

Walk | Talk | Think  She hoped, prayed even, that she might be able to help this poor, broken wolf. He was different somehow, not the Lebrah she had adopted, and yet he was here, she could feel it. Was it a mother's sense? Was it the bond she had begun to develop with him? Or just her promise that rang so strongly within her ears, demanding that she keep her word and protect this man who looked like her adopted son from the demons who haunted him? Anais wanted to cling to him, hang on tightly as if she could soak in his pain and leave him whole and happy, but her touch was soft, hesitant, and just a little frightened. There was a danger here that she could not shake, and her need to help, to act, was the only thing stopping her from retreating in fear.  He jumped first. The sudden backward motion nearly undid Anais's resolve, and just as he leaped back and away from her she did the same, her anxious paws springing her backward a step as she sank somewhat into a crouch, eyes wide and ears tucked tight. His panic-stricken expression coupled with the statements he made about his siblings dying, witnessing it all, shocked her, confused her. Was that what happened? Was that why he was the way he was with her, the innocent, childish Lebrah? How?  It made sense. Somehow he had managed to hide away from the pain, the devastation, that was his past in the clueless, naive guise of a younger self, but just how he had managed it was a mystery to the girl who wanted to help him. He turned away from her, distancing himself more, and all she dared to do at first was turn to keep watching him, torn between wanting to step forward and help though she had no idea how and running herself away from the terror that was this hysterical wolf and his tragic past. He collapsed again, turning his desperate gaze on her, and on a whine Anais answered him, her own golden eyes filling with tears, "I don't know how!" She wished more than anything that she did.  She tried again, creeping closer as she nosed against his muzzle, his cheeks, his neck, offering gentle, consoling kisses and nuzzles while crouching and lying down beside him. Her neck curved around his, anchoring him in place and trying to hold his broken pieces together. She hated seeing Lebrah like this, no matter which Lebrah this was. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she mumbled through her own tears, "How do I help you?"

Where her sister was at the moment Lior didn't know. She just new Anais was caring for their new brother, and for the male she had seen in passing at Espirit's birthing. The female had decided, finally, it was time that she was to meet this young man. Get close to her sister again like she used to be. Lior wasn't angry, nor was she sad about Anais spending time with the other. No, they were all adjusting to their new lives and how to live them. Perhaps it was by the grace of the gods, or perhaps lead there by a certain pair of angels, that would bring Lior upon the distraught pair.

Concern washed over her features when she saw the man, saw her sister. He seemed... lost. Something was wrong. Very wrong. Lior would flick her ears back, gaze shifting from the man to Anais. "What happened? Is... he hurting?" It seemed to be so... but she had to make sure. Already the girl was trying to think of what plants she knew, limited as they might be to commonplace ones, to what she might be able to get to help him. Gaze would shift to Lebrah, giving a soft whine. "Hey... Things are going to be okay, alright? Ani and I will help you." There was no questions other than that. Her sister wanted to help this man, the same who had lived with her, and that was enough for the younger sister.

"Hear Me Talk,"
'Read My Thoughts.'

Table by:: Evelyn

The woman cried out, telling him that she didn't know how to help. She then came to his side again, falling on the earth and nuzzling him where ever she could touch. With every soft nuzzle he felt himself crack further and further until the man was sobbing. He pushed back against her, needing to feel all the love that she was offering him. He no longer cared that it might mean that she got hurt, he just needed to feel. Something, anything. He had been empty for so long and hiding himself away for so long, that his true mind had been denied this emotion for so long. He was oh so broken and torn apart, that he just needed this more than he realized. So he wiggled even closer to her frame as his tears spilled on her golden coat as he wrapped his head around her neck, trying to pull her even closer as he wept. She appologized again and again, asking how to help. But that was it, he didn't know how this could be helped. He didn't remember the process that he had gone through last time, but he needed out. Now. Gently his lips would tug gently at her fur, sloppily just looking for more attention. "I just need out of this. I cannot handle this thoughts, they are driving me mad," he whispered, his whole body shuttering.

It wasn't long before another came into the scene, and he stiffened somewhat until she referred to the wolf before him by name. He loosened his grip around the woman as he looked up at the newcomer, his golden eyes pleading. She promised that they would take care of him, and asked if he was hurting. Lebrah touched his paw to his chest, signaling to what was inside. "It hurts here," he whined, tears still pouring down his face. "I need to get back, I have to get my mind back," he knew that this woman probably had no idea what he was talking about, but it was so hard to explain. "It hurts so much!" he cried, wrapping his head back around Anais as his body shook. He felt like rocking his body back and forth until this was all over, his thoughts slowly pushing him to the edge of madness.

Walk | Talk | Think  He surprised her by not immediately jump back for a second time but actually pushing back into her touch, accepting it and seeking more. She whined and offered him all the consolation she could, wishing it was enough though she could feel by the shaking of his sobs that it was not. Neither of them knew what would be enough to stop it, to make him feel okay and whole again, and she had not the slightest clue how he had possibly changed into the side of himself that she had taken in. It baffled her, and made her immeasurably curious about how he had possibly ended up like that to begin with. If she had known, she likely would have been more help to him now. The sound of her sister's voice shook her and drew her gaze, her attention, and suddenly she was conscious of the picture she posed with her adopted son. They were a mess, and rightly so, and possibly worse since Anais could feel even more helpless tears welling up seeing and hearing the concern from Lior. "I...I don't know what happened," she mumbled, "he's not...the same." How else did she explain it when she was still struggling to understand herself? He tried, in his own way, to explain the issue, the problem his thoughts - no, memories - were causing in his mind, and Anais thought she knew then, a small spark of hopeful understanding lighting within her bright eyes. "He needs to forget again," she spoke up, her voice a little clearer than before as she finally felt like she was getting to the heart of the matter. Maybe all he needed to do was forget again.

The older man, normally in the persona of a child, would motion to his chest, saying that it hurt. She wasn't quite sure what was going on, but she understood he was having some sort of internal pain. Some sort of internal trouble. Gaze would flick to Anais in hopes that she might be able to shed a bit more light on the situation. Unfortunately this wasn't really the case. She didn't know what happened either... But there was some memory apparently plaguing him. Something he needed to forget. The girl would close her eyes, trying to think. There had to be something... Something...

“I think I have a plant in mind but... I’ve only found it once. It was around here, up near the walls where the trees grow thick.” Lior would say softly. She would focus on Anais again, giving a small nod. “Stay with him. I’ll go look and be back as fast as I can.” The female would look around, racking her brain. She had tried the plant herself when she had found it. The scent was relaxing... And it had been. She wasn’t sure if it would help Lebrah forget... But... It was worth the shot. Going off in a run the girl went to search for the plant. If only she could remember the exact location!

Ooc:: So Lior is temporarily exit on this thread, unless you guys just want to wrap it up here since the thread is so outdated. If ya’ll wanna continue I’ll bring her back in after another post each or two from Lebrah and Anais.

"Hear Me Talk,"
'Read My Thoughts.'

Table by:: Evelyn