OOC: Arpeggio first, then anyone

Harmony's steps were hesitant, slender paws and shaky legs carrying her slowly across familiar lands. They seemed to have taken on a golden glow in the light of memory, and despite the hard times she remembered them fondly. Her brother creating the pack, her youthful quest to learn healing and lead the healers there. Chord's wandering ways that had always brought him back to them with tales of far away places. Rhythm's gentle humor and genuine love for them all. Motif's fierce protectiveness. All of Bass' children, and Motif's, and Rhythm's. Yes, there were hard times there. But they made the good times all that much brighter in her fading sight.

Beside her Peggy kept up her cheerful chatter, the same bright voice that had kept her going for this entire journey. Oh, she didn't know what she'd have done without the child. Of all the things in her life that she regretted, all the promises broken, she could not regret having broken her vow not to bear children for the fear that she could pass her condition on to them. Her children had been a joy to her beyond all that she'd known, a brightness to the past year that she might not have otherwise had with all of her siblings gone. That she did regret - that she'd been too physically weak to follow Bass and bring him home where he belonged.

She sighed aloud, and Peggy hastened to support her. "No, sweetling," she spoke in a faintly crackling shadow of her old warm alto, seeking to reassure her young daughter with a tremulous smile. "Don't worry about me. It's just... old memories." She'd come all this way already, knowing it would be the last journey she ever made - she wouldn't let this momentary weakness keep her from returning home to lay her bones in the cradle of the plains Bass had loved.

When her mother had first proposed this journey, all five of the yearlings had immediately protested. Surely with her age and infirmity she would never even survive the journey. She had barely survived the journey there when she had left Abaven after their uncle Bass had abandoned it, and she had since then had a difficult pregnancy and even more difficult birth that she had never quite recovered from. But their mother had not been asking, and she gently but firmly insisted. Arpeggio had elected to go with her.

Though neither of them, nor her siblings, had spoken of it, they all knew that it would be a one way trip for both travellers. Peggy had no intention of simply leaving her mother there, regardless of what relatives might still remain there to care for her and, for Peggy knew it would likely happen sooner rather than later, guard her grave. No, she would be there for her mother every step of the journey and beyond.

It wasn't simply loyalty that drove her on this quest though. She was curious about the rest of their family, craved to experience more than the homeland she knew. She wanted to walk where her mother had in her youth, where her unknown aunts and uncles had made their lives and where her cousins still resided.

So she followed beside her mother, hunting for and supporting her, until they finally came to the border. They stopped short of it, of course, and Harmony sank to the ground. Arpeggio hastened to help her get comfortable, trying not to seem like she was fussing, but Harmony still waved her off with a request to call to announce them. With one last smile and a gentle lick to her mother's brow, Peggy stepped up to the border and raised in muzzle in a howl.

She'd been getting braver now, wandering around outside the den with greater frequency, though she often waited for one of her parents or sibling to leave first. Today she'd started the day off by wrestling with her brothers and losing their play fights miserably until it was no longer any fun. After spectating a bit, that too grew uninteresting so the young girl started doing a little more exploring on her own. The plains were pretty big, with lots of plants and naturally the occasional snake which she had to steer clear of as soon as they came into view or she heard them doing their creepy slithering in the grass nearby. So far Rhea wasn't really fond of snakes.

Serpent related thoughts vanished when she heard a call at the border. Peering around to see if anyone else was close by, she didn't really see or smell anybody. May as well be brave and see who it was. Rhea trotted through the grass with her small, bouncing puppy strides until she saw someone through the grass. Slowing, she eyed them and noted there were actually two someones!

Rhea waited a bit, studying them and deciding if they were dangerous or not. One lady looked older, and the girl next to her didn't seem bad... with that, Rhea crept forward, little tail wagging as she greeted them, "Hai, I'm Rhea, whas your names?"

Sparrow really wasn't in the mood to be playing babysitter, but she also wasn't in the mood to have the pack's pups wandering off and vanishing like Storm's pups. Good thing Rhea seemed to be in an adventurous mood. Sparrow had every intention of going and dragging the girl back to her den and telling them of the phantom pups that went missing when they wandered around unaccompanied and now seek to lure the living pups away from their families forever.

Aaaand of course there was a call at the border now.

And of course the pup was heading to it.

As Rhea crept forward in her little greeting, Sparrow sped up, aiming to slam a paw pointedly right in front of her tiny puppy nose, a low warning growl in her chest.

"We don't approach strangers, Rhea. Haven't your parents taught you that?" The question was meant to be an 'of course they have' statement, but given who her parents were, Sparrow wasn't really sure they had ever had that talk.

With the pup secured, Sparrow looked up to see who called. Her eyes rested on a yearling with a simplistic yet pretty coat. Behind her there was an older woman.

Wait.

Sparrow knew that woman.

"Aunt Harmony?" she nearly stammered. The shock was evident on her face. Her eyes bounced between Harmony and the yearling. It was the eyes that tipped Sparrow off, but she still wasn't entirely sure.

"Is this your...?"

Tears stung at her eyes, but she held them back. She wasn't sure what to feel. She wasn't even sure she wanted to feel. Sparrow stood there, dumbfounded, waiting for confirmation. She wasn't dreaming, was she?

Harmony raised her head with some effort at the pitter-patter of little paws coming in answer to Arpeggio's call. A fond, though tired, smile crossed her muzzle as a young pup crept up closer to them. The markings under the girl's eyes - in another pack it would have been easy to dismiss them as coincidence, but they were too similar to the markings that ran in her family's blood, it would simply be too incredible a coincidence for an unrelated pup to be born in Abaven bearing them. And then... Immediately on the child's heels came a familiar face. "Sparrow," she breathed out a sigh of pleasure to see one of her nieces here, healthy and well. For a moment she wondered if the pup was Sparrow's, but her words to the child implied otherwise. The shock on Sparrow's face upon seeing her brought a pang of pain deep within Harmony's chest, guilt at having left them again, though not like she had years ago when her disorder had first taken a grip on her body and she'd left to protect them from it. She'd been selfish this time, leaving rather than face an Abaven without her brother there. "Oh Sparrow," she said again, her voice trembling. "Oh, I should have been here for you. I am so sorry, I..." She struggled to her paws with Peggy's help, then had to stand there a moment leaning on the girl's shoulder before the weakness passed. She was so tired, tired of this body that trapped her. But she couldn't leave this world without taking care of this one last thing that weighed so heavily on her. She had so much to say to the girl. She knew Sparrow had always felt alienated from her family, wished she'd been able to help her and her brothers connect the way Harmony and her own littermates had. She wished... "This is my daughter, Arpeggio. Arpeggio, this is your cousin Sparrow, one of Bass' older children." She closed her eyes against the tears that pricked at them, but a faint, tremulous smile touched her muzzle despite them. "I'm afraid I waited a rather long time to finally have pups of my own. I never thought I would, or should, have them at all. I'm glad I did though, I'm glad..." Her smile faded. "But I should never have left you and your siblings alone like I did. I was selfish." She opened her eyes again, watching Sparrow with a troubled gaze. "Do you think you will ever be able to forgive me?" ""

Peggy watched as a small pup moved to answer her call, and she couldn't help the warm grin that she sent the girl's way. Such an adventurous little thing. How adorable. Her smile only widened when an older woman came up to scold the pup. It wasn't so long ago that her mother was scolding her for rushing to talk to strangers, though of course it was considerably more dangerous for a loner's pups to talk to strangers. This young girl would always be able to count on her pack to have her safety in mind, and that was a wonderful thing to Peggy.

Then the woman looked up, and met Harmony's eyes, and Peggy's grin faded into seriousness as the woman and Harmony exchanged words. Her mother started to struggle to her feet, and Arpeggio hurried over to help and lend her strength to the frail wolf. After a moment Harmony introduced her and the stranger. Peggy gave Sparrow a bright smile and couldn't help but wag her tail with the excitement of the moment. This was one of the cousins her mother had told her about so often? "Pleased to meet you, Ms. Sparrow, and you, Rhea," she piped up, with a grin for the pup.

The moment fast went from exciting to serious, though, and Peggy gave her mother's shoulder a comforting lick. As much as she wanted to give in to her playful side and immediately go jump into a game of tag with the pup, this reunion was clearly difficult for her mother emotionally, and she needed Peggy's support.

The younger of the pair seemed very friendly, making Rhea feel safe enough to offer a small smile in return. It disappeared when suddenly a paw appeared between her and the strangers. Her ears fell to the sides, large green eyes going wide as she stammered quietly, "Uh, I'm s-sorry aunt Sparrow," Tail tucking the girl curled in on herself a bit, expression sheepish as she turned to look at the ground "I won't do it again.

That was all the more she could manage as her eyes began to shine with the faintest hint of tears that threatened to fall. She blinked them away quickly, not wanting to be treated like a baby by her siblings lest they show up and see her cowering and crying. Her mood shifted as Sparrow started talking to the older lady. So, she knew this wolf? Rhea remained silent, not wanting to interrupt the seemingly serious discussion.

When Arpeggio greeted her Rhea would peer bashfully out from behind Sparrow's leg, suddenly growing shy. Her little tail wagged a bit at the friendly woman, but she grew still when the adults continued talking.

It was Harmony. It really was Harmony, but she was old and frail. Sparrow felt that their time together had already passed. If she was this old, then their father must have been equally aged. It somehow solidified his absence. He wasn't coming back.

Sparrow couldn't look away from Harmony, but she couldn't meet her gaze either. Emotions that Sparrow had been focused on shoving aside were suddenly being torn to the surface.

She swallowed them, deliberately and forcefully stuffing them down. She couldn't start feeling again. Not this. Not now.

"Pleased to meet you, Ms. Sparrow, and you, Rhea," Arpeggio said, snapping Sparrow out of her daze.

She nodded slowly, almost as if unsure.

Harmony said she shouldn't have left them and Sparrow looked away. Harmony asked if Sparrow would forgive her.

"You have nothing to be forgiven," Sparrow mumbled. "You did nothing wrong."

The words were mechanical. She felt that despite any feelings making her feel uneasy, it was easier and better to put them aside at this point. She felt disconnected, disjointed, from her own feelings. She didn't want to reunite with them. She wanted to be a cool and calm alpha. She didn't feel like Sparrow anymore. She was simply the alpha of Abaven.

"Come. I'm sure Lark would like to see you. You should meet the rest of his children," she said, finally looking up to Harmony. "You both are welcome in Abaven. This is your home."

The Easter Bunny hops on by!

On her way through, she drops an egg at the paws of Sparrow.

Her newfound cousin's reactions to Harmony weren't really what the young Peggy had expected, and her gaze darted between the alpha and her mother in concern. But they'd been invited to stay in Abaven, and Peggy quickly dipped her head towards Sparrow in acceptance. "Thank you, cousin," she said, speaking for both her and Harmony, who still seemed lost in her memories as she gazed sadly at Sparrow. She wasn't sure if this emotional reunion was really all that healthy for the aging wolf, but it really wasn't her decision to make and, after all, what did she really know about the effects of high emotions in this case? Maybe it would help Harmony feel more well if they worked through this. If they had time to work through this. "I'm grateful for the chance to get to know you all, and live with the pack Uncle Bass started." She smiled with tentative brightness at her alpha-cousin. She'd never been part of a pack before, so she really only had her mother's stories and coaching to go off of as far as what this all meant.