She asked not to get his dad involved, and well he couldnt understand why, he knew it was her secret, her past. "I promise." He said quietly, and meant it. He would never tell anything she wished him to keep secret. "When in a yearling." He vowed, still soft-voiced. He considered the idea of losing those he loved to hurt more then any other kind of pain in his life. He really wanted to help her find out what had happened to those she had left behind. If she wanted a little revenge for the death of her mother, he would help with that, too.

Of course the conversation was brought to a sudden, and shocking halt at Mal's cry. He started, looking up, and saw the threat bearing down on them. After seeing Mal cru, after hearing about her past, he acted on the impulse that suddenly, and violently gripped him. He threw himself into the path of the dog that launched for mal. He rolled with the attack, bringing himself, and the creature, away from her. There was still the second dog, but it brought her a few precious seconds to prepare.

The pain of its teeth around his jaw and ear juttered through him, and he bit back a yelp. He didnt want to distract Mal from her own fight. The two were still rolling down the small incline, and the next time Mort found himself on top, he flared his wings. Fighting to balance himself, he only slowed the next loop, and his wings hit the ground. Spread out flat they acted as a stop, but at the cost of a lot of pain. It felt like they were going to be ripped from their sockets. He fought for a deep breath, but the dog was on top of him, and he did t have any time. He kicked out violently with his front paws, as it lifted its teeth from his jaw and launched for his throat.

She had braced herself for the impact, ready to take the dog down with her, but Mal didn't expect the boy to suddenly move in front of her. "Mortis!" Her cry was one of anger and confusion, but there was no time to reprimand him for the bullheaded moved he'd just made. Did he think he was saving her??

The second dog was coming, and as it did she launched for its side, her steel claws shredding along its ribs. It yelped, but Malalia sorely underestimated the creatures abilities. As soon as her claws touched him, it curled around in a c-shape to sink its own teeth into her haunches. Mal gave a cry of fury as she rounded on the dog, her claws tearing savagely into its own haunches as they crashed to the ground.

He kicked out violently, trying to keep its teeth from his throat. It thrashed and snapped them, saliva dripping from its fangs, as through it could already taste the sweetness of his meat. His blood hammered in his hears, his heart pounded. He had never been in so precarious a situation in his young life. He heard Mals angry cry, and could only assume she wasnt doing too well either. He gave one, final, angry shove, bellowing with his own frustrations, and knocked it off balance. He got to his feet, and made a rocky mode. He turned to Mal, trying to see if she was okay over the ruckus of the fight. For his troubles, he felt fangs in his hunches as his own opponent took advnatgae of his distraction.

Anger growing, Mortis turned back to own dog. He smacked it hard on the snout with a wing, it yelped in surprise and released him. The pup lashed out with his cat-like claws, and scored a splash across its nose. It leaped at him, and he brought down his wing, it crashed against it. The boy winced with the impact, but didnt waste the moment. He leapt on the dog, this time driving it to the ground. He tore at it violently, his coat shaking with a momentary madness, until he felt its throat quiet by accident, and the dog bleed out before him. He pulled himself from the corpse, still shaking, and turned back to his friend. "Mal!" He cried, running to see if she needed help with her own enemy.

Mal was... fine, and she was not. Her earlier panic had shaken her, slowed her movements and softened her blows, and initially, she did struggle against the wild dog. As its jaws clamped repeatedly into her haunch, she only sunk her steel claws deeper, feeling them tear through skin and flesh as she raked her claws down the animal's side. Focus! She snarled and ripped her leg away, rolling out of the dogs reach as her own blood trailed behind her. Focus! Rolling quickly onto her own paws, she was up before the dog could even know where she went.

Mal barreled into the creature, tackling it to the ground and pinning it on its back. She dragged her steel claws down his chest, his belly, raking back and forth even when the dogs own paws pushed her back, its snarls half whimpers at this point. Suddenly, it surged upwards, lunging for her throat. She dove for him in the same instance. Malalia sunk her teeth into the thick skin of his neck, lower than was lethal, while the dog grabbed onto her shoulder. They tussled and rolled, its own teeth piercing her shoulder painfully.

But she could deal with it. Mal's ears were pinned as she snapped higher, and higher, until she felt a gush of blood on her tongue and the jerky, frantic movements of a dying animal.

In a daze, she removed herself from the entanglement, rising to her paws on unsteady legs.

He ran to Mal, one wing dragging across the ground, limp. He bled freely from where the dogs claws had caught him on the face, near the ear and jaw. The blood trickled down his face, but he ignored it. He had rolled a small ways away from Mal and her fight, but he hurried back to her now.

He arrived just as she finished her own fight, and rose, bloody and weary, but victorious. The young wolf rushed to her, and moved to brush his tongue across the wound clear, and bright across her shoulder. He winced in sympathy at it, even well feeling his own aches and wounds. “That was… that was more intense then my other fights.” he admitted. It had caught them so off guard, and after hearing Mal’s history, about losing everyone she loved… he had been lost in the thought that losing the wolves he cared about sounded like the worst kind of pain. When those dogs had barreled towards them… “I panicked, i’m sorry Mal. are you okay?”

For a moment, after she'd put down the dog, she could barely feel anything. Adrenaline still coursed through her, and cloudy eyes looked down as Mort soothed at the wound on her shoulder. Then, it all came flooding back, her body slammed with the ache of new bruises and the stinging gashes in her haunch and in her shoulder. Dizzy with the feeling, she peeled back to look at Mortis, anger and horror flooding through her at his own crop of wounds.

Had she been another wolf, she might've exploded with anger, the sounds of her rage audible from across the plains. As it was, her voice was quiet, but sharp, as she turned to drill her green gaze into his own. "What the hell was that, Mortis? You don't -- " A rueful laugh escaped her now. " -- you don't jump in front of me when we're about to get slammed like that. That's an easy," and she couldn't stress it enough, "easy way to get yourself killed! You worry about you!"

Mortis flinched at the anger in her. He had seen anger plenty of times, especially in his own father, and especially when the man thought he was being foolish with his own life. “I-I’m sorry Mal, after you told me about how you lost everyone you loved…” he flushed with shame, for well he could only think it, Mal had lived it ”...And that sounds like the worst kind of pain imaginable, to me. Then the dogs attacked, I didn’t think, I just felt. Like I said, I panicked.” The boy admitted miserably. The idea of Mal dying had hurt, and he had acted on that impulse. He really cared for her.

His one good wing dropped, the other didn’t move much, and he took a step back, giving her room. He knew he had made her mad, and she had good reason to be. His act, well his heart might have been in the right place, had been foolish. He had caught her off guard, too. If she had hesitated because of it, she might have been in even more danger, because of him.

Mal gave a long exhale through her nose. Maybe... maybe she never should've told him. In the few short minutes after she had, he was suddenly proposing to, what, go find her aunt? And then he was throwing himself in front of wild dogs for her. Putting himself in danger, for her sake. The yearling was wracked with guilt for how quickly and severely things came to a head. She didn't deserve his protection, and he didn't deserve all her shit putting him in danger.

His words only stung her more, if that were possible. "Losing everyone she loved" -- "the worst pain imaginable" -- each phrase sent another stab to her heart. And she was still guarding so much of it. She had relayed the story as clinically as possible, and it had almost been like seeing herself talk as she watched from above. She couldn't even bear to say the words he had so clearly, obviously stated himself.

"It's fine." Her voice was no longer angry -- just bone-weary. "It's okay. Let's just... not talk about this anymore." Her tone was final, as she moved back to Bird's garden, motioning for Mortis to follow so that she could examine him. She would see if there was anything there that she could use. "What are your injuries?"

He could tell his words hurt, which had never been his attention. He wanted to say he understood, but the truth was, he could barely comprehend the edges of what she had told him. He wanted to fix it, to help his friend. He just didn’t see how. How could you make something like that better? He wouldn’t mention it again, or at least he would try not to. But he would remember, and once he was a year old, he would gently remind her of his vow to take her back there. Perhaps, with a little more time, she might be in a position to appreciate the chance to face her past.

Sticking with objective not to mention it again, it was easy to do as she said. Staying quiet, he followed her back to the garden, dragging his wing all the way. His face screwed up as he climbed over the fence, but he said nothing, and didn’t utter his pain outloud. He had made enough of a mess of this.

Once in the garden, she would ask his injuries, and listed them as clinically as he was able. “I think I sprained my wing, cut on my face, some bruises from the rolling, and a bite on my back.” He detailed.

Luckily her back was turned as she searched for whatever herbs she could scrounge up in the dead and dying garden. She was the older one here, and therefore responsible. Had she kept alert on their patrol, none of this -- telling him about her past, being surprised by the wild dogs -- none of it would've happened. Thankfully, she had time to school her features as she turned around with a few marigold flowerheads clutched in her teeth.

"Sit still for me?" She twisted around to pull out the doeskins she'd tucked into her bracelet. Gently, she cleaned away the blood from the cut on his face, then the one on his back. Trying her best not to hurt the boy in doing so, though she new it could sting.

With one more free patch of doeskin, she chewed up the marigold petals into a paste, and spat them onto the smooth side of the patch of hide. Then, she took the bottle of honey that Cairo had given her and added a few dribbles of the golden mixture to the herb. It would help the paste stick to the wound without sloughing away. Carefully, she began to apply a bit to the cut on his face, and then padded around to reach the wounds on his back. She would have liked to use horsetail, but the garden was bereft of the herb, unfortunately.

He did exactly that, settling in before her. The mood of the two had changed, and he knew she was angry at him. He tried not to show how much that had hurt, that he didn’t understand what feelings had gotten in the way, muddied him. He had acted without thinking, and he already knew that was never a good thing.

He thought of the day he had looked up at Azure, as his brother stood on the cliff, looking down at the brother he had pushed. The moment he knew he and Azure would never be the close knit friends he had deeply desired, that his brother would betray as easily as breathe. He swallowed back emotion, terrified that he had broken this friendship, too.

He was subdued as he sat there, and his voice very soft as he said, “Yes, Miss Malalia” She cleaned his cuts with gentle precision, and he scarcely winced at the sting of her gentle touch. He kept quiet and still, letting her do her work.

His subdued nature hadn’t gone unnoticed, and Malalia chewed over what to say to him to make things right. What she could say, if anything. Maybe it would be worse to bring it up again, but she didn’t want Mortis feeling like any of this was on him.

His response elicited a faint snort from the gal.  There was a sadness in the sound, but genuine humor, too. “We’re going by formalities now?” A brow raised high. “I think we know each other better a little than that,” she murmured. She wiped away a few more specks of blood from his cheek. Mal put down the doeskin, and raised her foreleg to softly, softly poke him in the head, as she’d done many times before.

“I don’t have anything here that can help with the bruises,” she revealed, after a moment. “You can take a quick dip in the stream to keep the swelling down, though, and willow bark for the pain.” She gently nosed his sprained wing. “I don’t know how to deal with your wing, either,” she sighed, her ears leveling out. Silently, she wished she’d taken more lessons from Iolaire. She was sorely lacking in the ways she could help him. “I don’t want to make it worse, so you should probably see Io about that.”

Finally, Malalia stood. Ideally, they should’ve checked to see if there were any more dogs lurking the moment they'd subdued the first two… but they were well past that point. “Let’s find someone to relieve us, yeah?”

He lifted his eyes from the ground, glancing at her as she snorted softly at him. A ghost of a smile might have traced it way across his muzzle, she didn’t sound that mad at him. Surely she couldn’t have let go of her anger that easily. He was holding still, allowing her plenty of room to complete her work. When she was done, she poked him gently upon the head, as she often did when the two of them were joking together. This time, he really did smile, through it was a shy thing. “That’s okay... Mal, the bruises will heal fine.” He had gained himself enough of them in his short life to know that. He winced as she mentioned Io. wouldn’t his Auntie be mad at him, too? He didn’t want to tell more wolves about his folly. “Did you want to talk me through looking at yours? Or are we going to Io” he asked when she mentioned finding someone to relieve them. He supposed he could call for Bast, the leopard could fill in for them in a pinch. "Mortis"

"I know..." Mal only shrugged. "Sorry. I feel bad about getting us into this mess." He was correct about the bruises, though that didn't ease the churning in her gut. She wished she could do more for him. He shouldn't have had them in the first place. She should've kept them alert for their patrol... she should've done a lot of things better. Still, the shy smile he offered up was enough to soothe her guilt, at least for a little while.

At the mention of healing her own wounds, she considered the question for a moment. What she wanted to do was find somewhere to sulk, and lick her wounds alone and in peace. The smart thing to do was get patched up, though... but she'd used the few marigolds available for Mortis' own wounds. His expression at the mention of Io did not go unnoticed, and she bumped her head against his shoulder in sympathy. "She should really see about that wing, Mort." A sprain wasn't the worst thing in the world, but the she-wolf was feeling bad enough already. She didn't want to make things worse.

"Speech"

“You?" he said with some surprise. Why did she hold herself to blame? He thought she was angry at him, for his foolish moves. “No Mal, this isn’t on you. I should have been thinking when the fight happened. As for the dogs, if we hadn’t lingered by the garden, they could have slipped right past us. Maybe they would have found little Bird, and hurt him before anybody knew any better” he pointed out to her. He was surprised she was feeling any guilt at all. What had she done to get them into this? He sighed softly when she mentioned his need to get the wing seen to. He then gave her a gentle bump back, smiling at his friend. He was starting to feel that maybe he hadn’t hurt this friendship, but he had perhaps learnt some lessons. He would do better, for Mal. “Alright, I'll get the wing seen to, but only if you let Io look you over, too.” Perhaps they could tell Io how heroic they had been, guarding the border. "Mortis"

Her tail lashed behind her. "Maybe you're right about the dogs," she conceded. He had a point there, and even if they were distracted, they had been in the right place at the right time. "But I didn't see you throwing yourself in front of Resin, or Natha, when we found them the first time," she pressed, remembering their first encounter with the pack of wild dogs.

"Yes, it was reckless, but you only did it because of me. If I hadn't distracted us, maybe we would've been better equipped to handle them. We're lucky we aren't worse for wear." God forbid they suffered more serious wounds, or worse.... One distracted moment, one look a way was all it took for a snap of jaws to become fatal.

She shook her head. "I'm older than you. I'm the responsible one here. And at the end of the day I should've kept us on track. Or alert, at the very least." A nod answered his request. "That's a deal." Her own wounds were starting to throb, and suddenly getting them treated sounded a great idea.

"Speech"

“You aren’t to blame for what I do Mal. I’m a big boy, I know what I did” he pointed out, a little dryly. “Resin and Natha are like... my elders, but even then. I threw myself in front of a bear that was trying to steal back its fish from Natha the first time I met her” his grin was a little sly, and a little shy, and a lot impish, as he tore apart her example. He could be stupid any time, not just around Malalia. He looked a little muleish as she continued on, trying to take all the blame. He wasn’t having any of it, and he was happy to make himself look like a moron if it meant she would stop blaming herself. “Actually... As Adversary Heir, i’m higher ranking than you, at least for the moment” if she won Reaper that would no longer be so. “So as the higher ranking wolf, it was my job to keep us safe, and I failed” he flicked his tail at her, and gave her a gentle grin. Hoping she would see he wasn’t pulling rank, just pointing out how foolhardy it was for her to think that all this settled down on her shoulders. “Alright, let's head to Io” he said. Hoping they could spin this into a tale of heroism, and not Mortis’s foolisness. "Mortis"

She pursed her lips. "Maybe not. But I — I can't pretend that what I said didn't affect you," she finished softly. He'd said it himself, after all. That, after listening to her story, he acted on his feelings, which must have been a little intense at the time. Everyone was responsible for their own actions -- well, she couldn't argue against that. But, to Mal at least, that didn't mean she wasn't culpable. Not by a long shot.

Still. She'd gotten the younger boy stuck in her head as a "kid," someone she was at least in some way responsible for. Maybe she wasn't giving him enough credit.

Then he brought up the hierarchy, even if in jest, and Malalia was raising her brows. "Wow. Wooooooooow. So now you're pulling rank on me, huh?" Her tone, if a bit soft, was teasing now, and she returned his grin with a half-smile of her own. "....Okay, you win. But you know, Adversary Heir or not, you're still a little squirt," she finished. Malalia moved out of the garden, nodding at his suggestion. On to Iolaire.


"Speech"

”Of course it did, you're my friend, and I care about you.” It was almost like she was trying very hard to wiggle some blame onto herself with all this. It was such a strange experience. Had he been with Azure, the other boy would toss any blame onto the winged pup. “I would happily take a hit for you Mal, but thats because I care about you, it would be on me, not you” “Heck yeah i’m pulling rank, move your tail or lose your tail, Malalia” he said, playfully swiping at his friend. He was happy to move the conversation on to anything other than Mal blaming herself. “This little squirt is going to kick your ass next time we spar” he promised her, following her out of the garden. They started to walk towards the cottage, and he tossed back his head to call for Io, so his Auntie would know they were coming. "Mortis"

Oh no... The howl of her nephew reached the woman's ears and she rolled her eyes and sighed. Every time she received a call from her nephews, someone had gotten hurt. Who was it going to be this time and how damaged would they be? She was ready to shove all of them into a cave and just slide food through the door on occasion. It might keep them from murdering themselves and would definitely keep her from going prematurely grey. Coming out of her cottage, the small dame wiped her paws on the grass. She'd been filling clay pots with herbs so she smelled richly of lemongrass and basil at the moment. Going out to meet her nephew, she happened to see Malalia tagging along with him. They were both coming towards her. With one silver brow arched, she intercepted the pair, instantly noting the scuffs upon them. "What happened this time?" There was a slight smirk on her face. Neither of them seemed grievously wounded. They were both laughing and carrying on, so she couldn't be too upset with them. "Speech"