His mother didn't balk at his sudden display of emotion, perhaps the first time she had ever seen him so broken and distraught, but simply took in stride, comforting him in a way that he hadn't had in quite some time. Ah, Taurig, what ails me would have come anyways. A great deal happened while you were away. Challenges? Valhalla just couldn?t catch a break. If it wasn?t one thing, it was another. Her words, as well as her movement to sit, would bring the titan to pull away enough that he figured he was face to face with her, his own flank folding to kiss the earth beneath him, the stream of tears drying across his scared visage as he listened to his mother recount the events that had transpired.
His chest tightened at the mention of Vi; the red woman. He remembered his time in Tortuga, when he and Vi hadn't been very fond of each other, but had slowly come to terms and dare he even say friends. To hear that she came to take Valhalla away from his mother and her family brought mixed feelings to the beast. He considered Vi a good friend, but it tore at him to hear that she had so carelessly taken a pack and then discarded it. He knew Vi, and he knew that she wasn't one to rule a pack. Her move to take Valhalla surely must have been for someone else, but who that someone else was was anyone's guess. But his mother didn't just have bad news for him. Surreal, his adopted sister, had started a family with his younger brother Falk and Taurig was now an uncle to three little ones; Regulus, Faite, and Zuriel. He would have to congratulate his brother on fatherhood and meet the new additions to the family.
His mother trailed off and he thought she had finished, but the last bit of information she gave him left the titan with unease; Isardis had gone. One would think that the new of his absence would be welcomed, but if anything it was a warning to Taurig. The ice King was rutheless and he didn't give up his prized possessions, whether they were wolves or lands, so easily. He'll be back. was the titan's first response. Sooner or later the albino would return and with him more hell. It was only a matter of time. I've worried for you too mother. I've worried about all of my family. I've worried that I had left them behind to fend for themselves, that I had failed in my duties as a father, a husband, a brother and a son. I've failed everyone and I don't think I can be forgiven this time...Once perhaps, but not a second time... He would trail off, the tears bursting through once again, emotion tightening his throat. He had let everyone down. What was there for him to do now? Grovel for forgiveness that probably wouldn't be given to him?
"Speech"
|
