it's my party, I'll cry if I want to

The cripplingly shy yearling took the first opportunity to drift away from the gathered crowd- they were here to celebrate him and his siblings, but he wished they could have just sent some gifts instead. There were so many of them, and he was so used to meandering unbothered through the broad territories of the Armada. Sometimes he would run into a friend or family member, or he would be friendly with a packmate. This was a whole new arena, and he wasn't the biggest fan. It didn't show, nor did he make a point of expressing his discomfort. It was telegraphed in the hunch of his massive shoulders, and the slight furrow of his brow, but he smiled and laughed whenever it was warranted. It was no one else's fault he was awkward and uncomfortable in a crowd.

Pale toes stretched into the dark sand as he settled at the edge of the surf, heedless of the waves that lapped against his flanks and soaked into his fur from wrist to belly. As he laid down in the surf, warm sand pressed against his very full tummy. That grouse had disappeared almost immediately between all of the siblings, and he had helped himself to more than enough of the snacks afterwards. As the tide started to roll in, and the moon climbed ever higher in the sky, he could feel the water creeping higher and higher against his outstretched forelimbs. Maybe some little minnows would start nibbling at his paws, if he sat still enough. Moonlight glinting off the sodden fur of his dun coloured flanks and ivory horns, the quiet Fatalis boy heaved a great sigh.

Once they all started leaving the beach, he would have to go track down his littermates. Give them gifts. Express his love in the best way he could, before everyone turned in for the night. Maybe he could pull his sire aside for a few moments, tell him that he loved him too. Mercury eyes flicked subconsciously down to the paired bands around his wrists, taken from the familiar cheetah pelt that his mother wore all the time. Thoughtful, meaningful. More than he could ever have asked from the man who had been hit so hard by her death. He lifted one foreleg to watch the gemstone glint and shine in the dim, cool light of the night. His tail thumped lightly against the wet sand a few times.

Content to listen to the murmur of voices behind him, festivities he would rejoin eventually, he rolled his hips to stretch his long hind legs out to one side. Between his forepaws, he started to absently pile up the ebon sands into a great heap. When was the last time he'd built a sand castle for himself?