He couldn't help the soft delight that appeared on his maw, his tail subtly swishing behind him as she smiled brightly and authentically during their conversation, saying his name back to him. When her mirth filled the meadow and lakeside his piercing glacial blue eyes squinted into elated half-moons. He didn't mind that she laughed at his question. A tenseness in his shoulders from the question itself relaxed at her laughter.
Well, I'll be... He thought to himself as she went on. A pack with many differences, a pack without a sole religion? Something he had never even thought to exist! She hesitated before she continued and he watched her intently as she admitted to the circumstances of the raid and the unfortunate outcome of their retaliation. He could almost see the heavy burden of leadership creeping back onto her shoulders... A heavy weight of shame. She had all but admitted the mistake, and now regret seemed to chase her like shadows.
He tilts his head the other way slightly as she shrugs and admits that Ethne doesn't typically fight and has fairly simple rules to live by.
He lets the silence linger for a moment as he gathers his thoughts. He shifts his gaze away from her warm spring greens to the sky for a moment to remember. While his gaze wanders beyond the horizon he sighs and admits his own truth.
"Leadership is never easy. Even as I was molded and taught everything about it, it didn't prepare me for the reality of the cost. The way others hunger for it..."
He brings his attention back to the experienced leader before him, her scars are testaments to her strength and resolve, "I was taught nothing else but to be a spiritual leader of my people alongside my brother, but before I could even take up the mantle I failed to acknowledge my shortcomings and it cost me everything I had known and my mother's life."
He inched closer, if only to lower his voice sincerely, and maybe to see her radiant eyes a little closer, respectfully, "Practice and experience have given you more than study has ever given me. Own the mistakes you make and learn from them."
He was intrigued by this different way of life, freedom, no rituals, no gods to summon or appease. Love who you want, kindness and strength, acceptance.
He then continued in a lighter tone, to shift the tension away from consequences and leadership roles. "I'd like to see your merry pack, perhaps I'll make a gift of this fawn I hunted! How does one join?"
Professor
