Bad news isn't like wine

Odette was settled in the den, recovering from her grief, and his scouts had not yet returned in their search of Mortis. There had been nothing to recover of poor Hika, and he knew he would need to talk to Odette as his next of kin about a funeral. He was putting it off until Mortis came home.

A call at the border alerted him, though the caller itself was a surprise. He was expecting news of Mortis, so hearing from Deluge came out of the left field. Well, life didn’t stop in tragedy. He would go and see what she needed.

The smell caught him first. Older now, but still the scent of death. Death and Mortis. His eyes fell on the wings. His Uncle's wings. The wolf that had taught him how to fish. The once heir to the Armada. The wolf his grandfather had left behind to help him and offer him advice, because his own father hadn’t bothered to. He took a step back, shaking his head. It hit him harder than Hika. It was personal. It was a tragedy. She was an orphan. All their children were. He shook his head again, and finally his eyes looked to Deluge, but he was still denying what he was seeing. “No. No, that can’t be all that's left of Sirius’s first son.”


"Speech"