Kichi was done with following voices, and hopefully ignoring them would lead them to stop at somepoint.  As it was they were annoying him less it had been over half the day since they last annoyed him.  The strange crystals and mushrooms got accusing looks for being part of the whole strange scenary.  If these were connected into the dead talking then he hated them.  

The silver wolf had added numerous more scars to him over the last year.  There had still been a lot to learn when he had found himself alone.  The boy had learned but frequently it was in a hard way.  Under his neck there was a patch of fur that didn’t grow as dense as the rest, likewise a pink scar was visible on his lower jaw.  There were other slashes along his body but the fur did a better job at hiding those.  Each scar was proof that he had proved strong enough to survive whatever the world had thrown at him.  The worst scars were the ones hidden in his heart.

Kichi had no plans to ever have friends or family again.  Only thing caring for others got you was pain.  He had come up north for no better reason than the voices had lead him south before and it was time to prove he’d had enough.  Besides, he had grown up and spent more time in the wintery cold so it was a bit more like ‘home’.  The only one he allowed the term friend was Torch, the little water deer faithfully at his side.

Kichi had stopped to rest a while.  Finding a good tall rock he carefully avoided the crystals before lying down on it.  His front paws draped off the top, gaze looking afar.  He could see far off from this vantage point, though the rolling hills along with other rocks still hid plenty from his view.  What was important was he should spot any threats before they could surprise him.  

Torch staied off the rock, the little deer kicking aside some snow as it grazed.  Kichi smiled watching it, his one friend.  Death would be a slow and painful affair to anyone who ever dared harm Torch.

~Talk~

The twilight did wonders for Alastor's complexion. The dusky light that bathed the world in its permanent shadows really helped to bring out the deep ultramarines and navy undertones of his inky black fur, and his eyes appeared more obsidian than jet black as they did in direct sunlight. He would be quite content for the world to remain this way permanently. Or he would be if the voice and wraith of his treacherous fiancée would just leave him the fuck alone. Along with this wonderland of shadow and light came a crossing over of the realms of living and dead, and with it, the ghosts of his past. Those he would be much more content leaving dead and buried in the past where they belonged. Trusting and blind faith and giving second chances had done nothing but leave him hurt and betrayed and confused. Fuck all that. Alastor had a damn good life now, and all he wanted from the past was to leave it where it belonged: squarely behind him.

Trudging on a patrol along the rocky coast where the land bridge leading to Alias Island—and by extension, his family—lay, Alastor kept dark eyes scouring the snowy terrain for signs of life: tracks, scents, any evidence someone had been poking their nose too close to his loved ones. He'd become fiercely protective of his family following the tousle with that pirate filth, and any who dared approach his kin would face swift and brutal death at his jaws and claws. Alastor Mendacium, family man... It was almost comical to think of where the demon wolf had become to where he was now. It brought his usual smile to his face.

Making his way up the hill of the coast toward the garden of rocks and stones, Alastor crested the hill and peered around the flatter terrain at the top. The world was quiet, dark, and cold... It was perfect. Large paws meandered between the rocks, nostrils flaring to catch any scents around him. The sound of crunching snow caught his attention, and the apex predator peered around some rocks to spot a small deer shifting the snow to graze at the grasses beneath. Hmm, well, it was far too little meat to be more than a light snack, but Alastor never passed up the chance to kill a helpless creature, and he wasn't about to start now. Flashing his teeth in a murderous grin, Alastor prepared to pounce, his muscles tensed and body coiled and ready to spring. The deer would be dead before it even know what hit it. Or maybe he'd just crush its legs and kill it slowly.

Before he could launch into his hunt, a gentle breeze rippled into his face—and Alastor caught a familiar scent on the wind. His tensed body froze, all of the energy sapped from him as his mind went blank. No... No, it can't be... Rising back to his paws, Alastor slowly rounded the rock and spotted the silver yearling perched atop another boulder near the deer. He was larger than Al remembered him, older too, but there was no denyhting the scent. Alastor stared at the young man for a long while, contemplating whether he was seeing ghosts again or if his mind had finally broken beyond salvaging. He stared at the ghost from his past, unable to move, unable to look away. No doubt he would be spotted if he didn't move or do something. Yet all Alastor could do was stare in stupefied disbelief. It just wasn't possible.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

Kichi had a pet deer and so damned straight he knew to always keep a look out for anyone stupid enough to want to hurt Torch.  Sure, some things might attack a wolf also but Kichi fought far more often for his friend.  Sadly he hadn’t been facing the right direction to have saved his friend should Al have launched at that moment.  Even as his head turned his nose alerted him to what was there a heartbeat later.

Torch called out an alert of the wolf and Kichi lept off the rock, throwing himself between where Al stood and the little fanged deer.  Even as Kichi’s fur stood up and gums pulled back he glared at Alastor.  It couldn’t be real.  His readiness to kill the wolf if he stepped near to the deer was waning as he wanted to ask if his eyes were telling him the truth.

How did he even feel about it was this truly Alastor?  Kichi didn’t know if he wanted to open up to him.  Sure, it wasn’t Alastor’s fault they had split up but Kichi had done a great job of closing off his heart and to care again was to be abandoned again.  That was how life worked.  For that matter perhaps now ghosts could be made visible?  Could ghosts have a scent?  

Alastor was still bigger than him, but not so much as he once was.  Memories were trying to flood in and constantly denied.  Snorting in irritation he finally just asked up front, “So, is it you or just another ghost?”  There was no cheery greeting.  A small deep part of him wanted to, that part of him wanted to charge Al and shove his head into his chest as if he were a dumb kid.  That was the part of him that always got hurt though, the part to avoid.

Torch's tail was high and flagging as it looked thoughtfully between them.  After Kichi spoke the deer let out a comical bark of greeting, taking a few steps closer to the one who nearly killed it, alert eyes curiously watchful.

Talk

Kichi turned to face him when the deer sounded the alarm. In the young wolf's blue eyes, Alastor saw anger and violence and pain. The lad was littered with scars from an arduous life. Seeing the boy he had come to love like his own son twisted up his heart in ways Alastor never expected to feel. He'd long thought Kichi dead along with Lurid. He'd found their home empty, abandoned, and he had assumed that traitorous bitch had taken him away with her when she left him behind. But now here he was, grown and angry with the world. Alastor couldn't blame him—but he could empathize with the silver-gray yearling. Alastor saw a lot of himself in young Kichi. It meant he had failed to protect the pup from the harsh cruelties of the world.

As recognition began to set in, Alastor watched Kichi's hardened expression relax some, but his guard was still up. Fangs retreated behind his jowls, but the coldness in his eyes didn't disappear. The question stung, but not as much as Al had thought it would. He mostly just felt numbness all over, his mind still trying to process how his body should feel. "It's me," he responded in a gentle husk of voice. "Least as far as I know I'm not dead yet." Obsidian eyes moved over to the deer that had been only a foot tall when he'd last seen it. How much the two of them had grown... How long had it been? Three seasons? A year?

Alastor took a couple slow steps closer to Kichi, his eyes never straying from the young wolf. He looked him over as if trying to determine if he was real as well. So many questions ran rampant through his mind. But the first priority was sorting through the emotions and figuring out how to react. He wanted to run and embrace the boy who was no longer a pup, to demand to know where he'd been or why he'd disappeared with Lurid, to laugh and to cry and to scream. "Lurid...?" he asked, the unspoken question left in the name he spoke. Was she with him, or was she totally and completely gone?


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

It was him.  Of course a ghost might say the same thing but Kichi had really known the answer to begin with hadnd’t he?  The voice was his, the expressions were his and if it was just a ghost then it was the cruelest trick yet life would have thrown at him.  The young man let out a slow exhale as he relaxed his posture.

The jaw shut tight quickly and first a scowl then a twisted grin came up at mention of Lurid.  “No idea.  Shortly after we left you she told me wait for her as she had something to do.” Kichi shrugged, “I waited, and a day passed, then a week passed.  I found no sign of her.  So, she’s either dead or left.”  That’s what happens.  Wolves die and wolves leave.  In less than a year of life he’d had the pattern repeated.  At least he’d figured out that basic finally.

The smile faded his eyes glanced off to a patch of snow feeling some of that energy deflating, “So anyway, that was that.  I think dead though.  I hear her lately at times Al,” saying his name seemed to be like a bit of magic opening emotions he wanted sealed up, “Her and my other parents.  They won’t leave me be.  It’s like I’m some damn bone they want to fight over." Kichi was still angry but now it was turned on ghosts and inwardly at himself.  Emotions wanted to leak out and the last he wanted was to feel things. The little puppy he use to be had looked at Al to be a big brother or best friend, the one he had chosen for himself. “I never did learn why we split up, if anything had happened.  She just got angry at me when I asked.”

Talk

Alastor took a few more slow steps closer to Kichi while the boy spoke, telling him what had transpired after he and Lurid had separated from him. It felt like a knife had been run through his heart. So Lurid had abandoned him and taken Kichi. For so long he'd wondered if perhaps they'd been attacked by a predator or some rogue wolves had found them when he'd gotten trapped by the snowstorm. Turned out she just didn't want him anymore. That hurt infinitely more for some reason. Alastor paused mid-step when he'd heard that, like he'd been sucker punched. The dark-furred brute had to remind himself that his life had turned out better without her, and no matter what pain she'd left him with, Lurid didn't matter anymore.

Kichi said he heard Lurid and his biological parents' voices sometimes, and Alastor simply nodded and said, "I know." He was familiar with the whispered of the dead and damned in his brain at all hours of the day. Lurid had only been a recent addition to that choir. "I think she's dead too." How else would the firefly bastard be able to take her form, her voice, her scent? His words were spoken hard and matter-of-factly, but he did it so he wouldn't feel anything else for the wolf that had abandoned him and broken his heart. By now, Alastor had come within a few meters of Kichi, still maintaining space in case the young boy didn't want him coming too close. "I wish I knew why she chose to take you away. I think about it... a lot." It was hard for Alastor to resist the urge to snarl or bare his teeth when he thought of the bitch that had stolen three years of his life and crushed his heart just to string him along.

Up close, Alastor could see the scars on Kichi's body far more clearly. The young wolf had faced his fair share of struggles and fights and proven his strength each time. "Where did you go? After she disappeared." Alastor had looked all over northern Boreas for Lurid and Kichi. He had to know what happened to him. He needed the closure.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

Al was getting closer and Kichi felt his heart constricting at the torn emotions.  Talking about the dead and especially Lurid wasn’t helping.  His muscles quivered as the hate and pain he got used to rolled in him but something worse was there.  He felt that horrible desire to step into Al again and even worse he wanted to cry, to let out the tension and accept his friend was back.  He understood Al was hurt also but for so long that hadn’t mattered.  All Kichi could handle was his own pain of being hurt

Kichi gave a sharp shake of his head at the question, “It doesn’t matter, it never did,” the words cut out.  “I went south, I went north.  I traveled up and down Boreas.” He had tried to find closure, to find something to satisfy him or to entertain him.  Kichi had never found anything to satisfy. “Where,” a pause, “were you all this time?” He had once hoped to find Alastor but had given up at some point.

Kichi squeezed his eyes shut as he fought an angry urge to blame Al for his inability to find him.  He wanted to blame Al for having been alone and hurting.  Logic said it wasn’t his fault, emotions said somehow Al should have just been there regardless. “You know, I was a stupid kid,” Kichi barked out a sick laugh, “it took a while to accept it.” To accept no one was coming.  Well, Al wasn’t going to answer Kichi’s question unless Kichi shut up.  He sat down, burying down the words of weakness, waiting to hear what Al had done.

The little deer went to Kichi, bumped its head against the wolf before turning its back to him and started grazing.  Torch was there for Kichi but right now the deer was aware he wasn’t what the boy needed, or wanted.

Talk

Alastor could see the emotional trauma Kichi was struggling through. The poor lad had been through so much in his short time in this world. Silently, the Mendacium man wondered if Kichi had ever learned the truth of his parents' deaths. Had Lurid told him what had actually occurred on that fateful day, or had he perhaps pieced it together himself? It was a terrible truth Alastor had been sworn to secrecy on. But now his promisee was dead and gone, and loose lips did no good for him. If Kichi didn't know the truth and asked him, Alastor would reveal all to the boy.

Kichi explained how he'd traveled all over Boreas. Alastor furrowed his brow. How could that be? He hadn't seen hide nor hair of Kichi for almost a year and he'd occupied an expansive territory in the north for over half the year. Kichi asked where he had been. "I remained in northern Boreas for a long while. I thought that maybe you and..." He swallowed, not wanting to say her name anymore. "I thought you'd both find your way back to me eventually. When that didn't happen, I stayed around the north just for the hell of it. When I met my mate, we ventured south to the prairies and then made our way up over here." He didn't want to provide Kichi with all the details of how his life had changed in the year they'd been apart. He didn't want to give Kichi the impression that he'd gone running off with another wolf as soon as he'd been freed from the shackles of the Amarix dynasty.

"You were not stupid," Alastor snapped a little more intensely than he'd intended to. "You were a pup, Kichi—a child. You put your faith in Lurid and she failed you. You put your faith in me and I..." His jaws clenched, unwilling or unable to say the words clinging to the end of his tongue. He'd failed Kichi when he left the impressionable pup in the clutches of the selfish faux empress. How blinded he'd been by her beauty and love that he would have let her rip the world apart and he'd have simply smiled. "I wanted to find you. I did." Perhaps it was too little, too late. He'd assumed Lurid had taken Kichi far, far away. Never would he have expected Lurid to abandon her adopted son as well. Maybe that was his grievous mistake to bear.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

Boreas was a big place.  Kichi had certainly learned that well enough.  Two wolves both wanting to find each other and it brought the question of how close had they ever passed?  Surely if they had been near they would have noticed.  Kichi believed Al but did he want to believe him?  It all went to that stone wall that kept out emotions that helped Kichi move on and looking at Al, listening to his words the wall was cracking.  It would be better to not believe, to lie to himself.  Al had looked for them, Al had wanted to find him.  

Al had a new mate, a new family.  Did he have kids?  If he’d been with her for a while Kichi assumed he did or was going to.  Kichi felt bitter jealousy well in his stomach that they might have what he was denied.  What was the chance Alastor would have room in his life for Kichi if he had a true family now?  Not that Kichi wanted to live with someone again.  Even if he did, he really didn’t.  

Kichi jerked his head a bit in surprise at Alastor’s intense response to the comment on having been an idiot.  Did being a child make up for being an idiot when it counted like that?  A whispered venomous voice in his mind told him to leave.  Lurid didn’t want him around Alastor.  Why?  What was her problem?  

Al had been different than Lurid in a way that had often drawn the boy towards Alastor when he’d wanted to play or help hunting.  It was a guy thing, a thing to do with a friend.  Standing here as an adult, or equal terms had him consider the difference between the Lurid in his mind and the black wolf still alive near him.  “Al,” time for a complete change of topic, “did she really even love me?” All she wanted was for Kichi to be hers and not listen to his mom, she wanted him away from Al who was still alive?  “Why would she want me to leave now?” The tone was curious with no depth of fear or hope in it.  His need for love from that woman was a thing of the past.  Now he just wanted the truth.  Even now that she was dead she wanted to control him, why?

Talk

Alastor saw the struggle in Kichi's eyes. He was fighting a war within his mind against someone the dark brute couldn't see. Was it himself? Or another ghost of the past battling him? The bitterness in Kichi's eyes was cold and volatile, amplified by a lifetime of pain and loss. It reminded Alastor too much of himself. The screams of his long dead siblings echoed in his head, remembering how helpless he had been to do anything about it, how it had twisted and warped him into the monster he had become. Lurid had done that to Kichi. When they'd been a "family", he'd at least had the ability to care for Kichi, to play with him and teach him and show him the love and support Al had never had. He had a chance to keep Kichi from going down the same path he had. But then Lurid had stolen him away—stolen him and abandoned him. And now Kichi was forever changed because of it. It made him hate that pallid bitch all the more for what she'd done to them both.

Kichi asked him a question that felt like a knife being plunged into his heart. Blood ran cold and hot at the same time through is veins, and the dark-furred wolf just shook his head. "I don't know if she ever loved either of us..." he admitted in earnest. "Once there was a time I would've said yes, but now... now I'm not so sure." Does that mean Kichi didn't know what happened to his real parents? Had he sussed it out on his own, or did he still hold to the belief that Lurid had adopted him out of love and a twist of fate? Lurid had been possessive of both Alastor and Kichi. Had she loved them? Or had she merely wanted them for her picture-perfect family? He'd never know the truth, he supposed...

"Kichi... do you know what happened to your parents? Your real parents?" It was a big risk Alastor was taking revealing this to the angry young man, but he deserved to know the truth. Lurid had hurt and betrayed them both. Kichi needed to know the extent of that betrayal.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

Alastor hadn’t left them after all.  Kichi reminded himself as Alastor answered he had been the one to be left behind, just like Kichi had been later on.  The only difference was Alastor was already an adult and fully capable of thriving without her.  It wasn’t the risk of dying that had been the hard part though, it had been the pain of realizing she was gone.  The pain of knowing she either died or chose to leave him.  In that regard, Alastor would have been in the same position.  The ability to try and hate or distrust Alastor faded with that bit of logic.  

Alastor’s next question was more of a surprise.  “You know what happened,” Kichi responded slowly. “I know you were told.  They went hunting with Lurid, it was a large elk and it killed them.  I saw their graves.” The puppy Kichi had to believe on faith with no experience but Alastor bringing it up and the ghosts haunting him grew a cold knot in his belly.  Did it even matter? Dead was dead. Kichi took a slow exhale, “That wasn’t it then, was it?  Lurid killed them didn’t she and you knew?” That last statement had a hint of accusation.  

Kichi had never considered it before as a pup he’d worked so hard to not think of his parent's death at first and at some point, the boy had believed his own lie that he didn’t care.  Maybe he was wrong and Lurid hadn’t killed them but what else would line up so perfectly?  He had almost just asked Alastor what it was but this was the worst scenario he could imagine.  Could he have really been that dumb, could he really? His heart was pounding louder than normal suddenly, his breath felt tighter in his chest.  No.  He misunderstood.  How much of an idiot could he be after all?

Talk

Kichi responded stating he knew what happened, and at first, Alastor was surprised. That surprise swiftly faded when Kichi once again repeated the lie that Lurid had drilled into his head since he was a pup. Killed in a hunting accident. Oh yes, how convenient... But a pup wouldn't think to question the reality he was given. A pup would have no reason to distrust the word of an adult. A man, however... Alastor saw the gears turning behind Kichi's blue eyes as he pieced the puzzle together himself. Maybe it was just the logic lining up, or maybe it was something in Alastor's skeptical expression that tipped him off. Either way, Kichi led himself to the truth, slowly but surely.

"Lurid killed them." Alastor nodded his head assent. "And you knew." "Not right away," he corrected the lad, but were they just arguing semantics at this point? Did it truly matter when he'd found out about Lurid's double homicide? "She didn't tell me until after we'd become a family, after I got to know you. She told me shortly before she ran off with you. Part of me always wondered if she did it because she didn't trust me to keep her secret." Alastor exhaled a heavy sigh and reclined his haunches to sit on the snowy ground, bushy black tail coming around to wrap around his paws. "Every malady that afflicted your life was by Lurid's design. You saw exactly what she wanted you to see. From your parents' murders to her abduction of you. She wanted you as hers, and so she took you."

That was that. The simple fact of the matter. How would Kichi take it? Part of Alastor expected the boy to explode, lash out, maybe even attack him. He was prepared for whatever outburst would follow.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

There was too much to soak in all at once.  What Lurid had done and Al had known but not right away.  What would Kichi have done in his place? Al’s part in eventual knowledge faded as unimportant for a moment as he watched memories of his life flash by.  Everything that had happened, every horror, every bit of love and faith he gave to her.  All her sweet words and promises.  How they were alone, not with a pack but where he was solely hers.

Where did the abyss end?  So many moments in time suddenly had a darker tone to them.  Kichi’s head was spinning with reality upon sick reality laid on top of it.  A low rumbling growl started in his throat after a bit, his glare was on the ground.  He was even denied revenge on the one who had done that to him.  Kichi’s muscles shook with a terrible rage and no way to vent it.

His gaze looked to Al’s.  At some point he had known.  Before they had left he had learned the truth but perhaps they had left as she was worried he couldn't keep the secret.  He could fight the black wolf in front of him and there would be so much pleasure in causing another pain right now.  Kichi wanted blood and he didn’t particularly care who’s.

“Fight me,” the guttural words dragged out with effort. He didn’t want to think of things like talking and explaining.  He wanted to let out all the rage, wanted to feel either satisfaction in hurting another or feel a different sort of pain in himself. He wasn’t waiting for a yes or no.  Some part of him was aware that the one he’d attack was perfectly capable of defending himself but that would be the last thought he bothered with.  It was his best friend who he had looked up to, and right now he wanted his blood sprayed over the terrain.

This was no strategic attack, no thinking of cause or effect.  Kichi let go of all that torturous self-control to charge the short distance between them, to aim his teeth for the neck of the wolf next to him.  It didn’t matter who, it was alive and it could satisfy his need.  

Talk

Alastor had expected an outburst of rage from Kichi. In honesty, he would have been disappointed if the boy hadn't felt some sort of animosity towards Lurid for the things she had done to his life. Al himself was no better than Lurid morally, but at least he'd never dared to think of ruining the life of a child just to get his way. Perhaps that was the biggest differential trait between himself and Lurid: where he was crazy, reckless, and violently unpredictable, Lurid was all that but without any sort of restraint to her vicious desires. Despite his madness, Alastor still had lines he would not cross. Lurid had none.

Kichi's cold, hard gaze locked with him, and Alastor tried to discern what he was seeing in the young wolf's sky blue eyes. Then Kichi growled out a simple challenge—fight him. Alastor raised a questioning brow, but said nothing. Kichi wanted to fight him? Was this how he planned to get those rampant emotions out? Sure enough, the smaller wolf hurled himself towards the giant black brute, all teeth and claws and violent intentions. Alastor watched Kichi's speedy approach with impassivity. Kichi's assault was frenzied and aimless, lashing out with all the anger burning in his heart. It made him so easily predictable. Alastor waited until Kichi was too close to stop before gracefully sidestepping to avoid the younger wolf's snapping jaws.

Positioning himself alongside Kichi, Alastor looked the boy over, keeping a couple feet of space between them as a buffer so he would have ample time to react. He did not want to hurt Kichi, but if a fight was what the boy was looking for, he'd be happy to oblige. Kichi was no longer a pup; he was a young man, and Alastor would treat him like one. "Will this make you feel better, hmm? Make you feel like you have some control over your life for once?" he questioned, flashing wicked teeth in his signature grin while obsidian eyes gleamed with malevolent eagerness. "No, you want to lose control. To cut loose and stop holding back." Swinging a large black paw around, Alastor aimed to smack Kichi alongside his face, claws held back so he wouldn't slash and ruin Kichi's face. "So come on then! Stop holding back and bite me!"


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
____________________

Kichi’s mind swirled with anger and while he knew it was Alastor in front of him, and he saw the black and red brute he could also see the one he wanted to kill there.  He imagined Lurid looking at him and how she had played him.  Her pleased smile and imagined if she was actually laughing at what a damned idiot he was.  

Control over his life for once? It was a bitter truth.  Lurid had controlled his life and even when she was gone the demon had set her on t his path.  Hate couldn’t really raise up more than it was but Al’s words were doing a good job of making sure the feverish hate stayed at its max.  

A wild attack hadn’t worked and that shouldn’t have been a surprise.  Now he tried to circle his enemy as he spoke and the words ended with a paw at Kichi’s face. Kichi stepped back, the blow connecting but there was enough distance to not pack much power to it.  Kichi ran at Al, one step was straight towards him, and even as he kept his eyes locked on Alastor’s Kichi sidestepped to try and attack for Alastor’s left side, aiming to bite the top of the leg directly below the shoulder.  He wasn’t playing around, if Kichi connected he was going to bite down with every inch of his rage.  

He’d get the enemy injured on the leg and after that, he could go for an attack to the neck again.  Everything inside of him hurt and so he’d get rid of it by hurting someone, it would have preferably been Lurid but anything else in pain would do.  If he missed and if the enemy hurt him that would be fine as well.  This wasn’t about defending himself, it was about hurting another.  

"Speech"

Alastor's paw glanced off of Kichi's face as the boy recoiled back to (mostly) dodge his taunting strike. It was fine; Al's move had its intended effect regardless. Kichi was incensed, enraged, infuriated. Good. He wanted the boy to feel what it was like to revel in pure feral anger, to let it burn through him like a wildfire and then die down into nothing. It was the rage that he had unleashed on those that had wronged him. Show Kichi the fire, then teach him how to harness it. Kichi charged at him again, but this time the boy moved to his left—and Alastor did nothing to stop him. He wanted Kichi to learn the mistakes of letting anger cloud his judgment and his mind, and this was the only way to do so.

Sharp fangs sunk into his flesh at his left shoulder, drawing a wince from the dire brute, but little else. Alastor stood just over a full foot taller than Kichi did, so the boy reaching his neck would be an impossibility unless he took Alastor down, which he doubted the lighter weight wolf could do. The pain that lanced through his shoulders immediately brought a rush of masochistic pleasure with it, and the dark dire wolf laughed with a wide, menacing grin. "Come now, you can do better than that!" His grin shifting into a snarl, Alastor took advantage of Kichi's close proximity now and lunged his jaws down for the back of Kichi's neck, which would now be very exposed. He aimed to grab the younger wolf and use his weight to push him to the ground and pin him in place with teeth biting into tender flesh. The goal wasn't to hurt Kichi, but to show him how foolish he'd been for letting his anger muddy his brain and put himself in such a vulnerable position.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
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It was like Alastor just wanted to keep him angry! One thing Kichi could easily do was stay hateful.  Feeling flesh in his jaws and the taste of blood in his mouth brought satisfaction and assured him that there was an escape from the pain.  All he had to do was keep hurting someone else and the pain would be diminished.  Even as he was letting go with plans for another attack he felt Al’s jaws close over his neck and shoved him down.

Kichi tried to get up but was given the reality of just how strong Al was.  Kichi was no longer a puppy, his muscles far better developed but the difference in height and muscle between Al and himself was still just too extreme.  He should have known it but quite frankly he hadn’t been thinking very well.  The pain actually felt good.  The physical pain offered clarity through the pain in his head, brought him into the present.  

The boy struggled at first still trapped in rage then slowing a bit and testing Al’s grip before he had to give up.  Looking at Al, then to the leg and back up at Al, “I wish she wasn’t dead,” the words were spoken softly, “I can’t hurt the one I really want to, I can’t kill her.” He wanted to state what an idiot he had been but he already knew Al’s answer to that, the giant wolf felt being a kid was a valid reason for having fallen for her lies.  

Al had hardly moved for the fight so he could have probably avoided Kichi’s bite to the leg which in a way was irritating and in another way strange.  Did he apologize for it?  Do you apologize for an action you needed to take?  Did he say thanks for letting me bite you?  Maybe neither were needed with him?

"Speech"

All the while Kichi struggled to try and get free, Alastor just continued to exert a fraction of his strength to hold the whelp down. Kichi had grown so much since he'd seen him last and the gray wolf put up a hell of a fight, but he was just no match for the stronger dire wolf. Kichi thrashed and fought, burning through his strength and anger until nothing was left and the boy had collapsed across the ground. He didn't intend to hurt Kichi, just to restrain him, but if he caused a little bit of hurt then Alastor didn't pay it no mind. Kichi looked around for a moment, the fire simmering down in his bright blue eyes, until the dire brute saw nothing but pain in them—pain he knew all too well. It hurt more than the bleeding bites on his leg and shoulder did, and those had been therapeutic for his surrogate son.

As Kichi spoke, Alastor gradually relaxed his hold on the wolf he'd cared for until he had freed him. A heavy sigh deflated the man's lungs. He simply shook his head. "I wish she wasn't dead too." He wished Lurid wasn't dead so he could put the bitch in the ground himself for all she'd put him through. "Life isn't fair, Kichi. It likes to hurt us, break us, steal from us, kick us when we're down." Reaching down, Alastor moved to try and pull Kichi back up off the ground, and if he allowed him to, embrace the now grown wolf. "When life pushes you around, you have a choice: you can give up or you can get back up and push back. We can't change the past, and we can't kill the dead. But we can live to spite them."

That was what had spurred Alastor in the first place. Spiting the ghost of Lurid in his mind and taking revenge on her by living in the present. Every time he woke up next to his family, every time he played with his children or fucked his wife, every time he went hunting with his new family, he reminded himself that this was the best way to get back at Lurid for how she'd treated him all his life. Alastor looked Kichi in the eye, not bothering to mask the concern on his face. "What are you doing with yourself these days?" he asked. If Kichi was aimless, simply surviving, he would want the boy to come meet his family, maybe join the Elysium band and forge his own way with them. If he already had plans, Alastor would always be a place the lad could turn to for support and guidance.


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
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Kichi was well aware of the unfairness of life, just hearing Al say it brought to mind all manner of memories.  Kichi got up, accepted Al’s aid with a bit of surprise.  He hadn’t needed help but getting it with no request was offsetting of what he’d grown used to.  If that had been strange enough the embrace was even more so.  It felt good and stung all at the same time.  Had anyone else tried this they would have found Kichi’s teeth embedded in them, refusing any sort of closeness.  For just a moment it felt like he was that naïve small pup again who had been so sure he could take on anything and with faith of protective guardians.

It was nice but, Kichi wasn’t a pup anymore.  Admittedly he could very well seem like one when compared to Alastor by size.  Kichi had known he never managed to grow as large as either of his guardians but it was made all the more clear at that moment just how much smaller he was.  He listened to Al’s words on what could be one after the cruelties of life and Kichi would label that what he had done.  Kichi had survived even with everyone else gone.  He stepped back afterward to regard Alastor, a part of his mind wondering what he saw Alastor as now.  There was a child inside of him momentarily that wanted to cling on to that but it was shaken away.  Kichi had worked too hard at growing up and taking care of himself to step back into wanting another to make everything alright.

What had he been doing with himself?  It was a reasonable question and the concerned look on the dire wolf had Kichi wanting to give him a reassuring answer.  What had Kichi been doing?  Roaming and taking Torch wherever.  There had been no particular reason for where they went other than climate or a place they hadn’t been before.  It was just going from one day to the next and since Kichi hadn’t cared much it had been often letting Torch have his way.  He had lived to spite the world and death, to prove nothing could kill him off, and to let Torch enjoy himself.

“I was traveling with Torch,” it was his one trusted companion.  A deer might have been a funny choice but a solid one in his mind.  “Lot of lands to explore.” It had seemed a perfectly fine way to live his life but telling it to Alastor felt insufficient.  No one could judge Kichi and he’d fight anyone who tried but it seemed there was one wolf’s opinion that still mattered to him.  For a while when he was alone he’d hoped to find Alastor and everything would be fine.  When he’d given up on it he had quit bothering with what anyone would think of why he did something.  A lip twitches for a ghost of a smile as he added on, “picked a few fights.” At least it added on something to traveling.  

"Speech"

Alastor could feel Kichi's tension when he went to embrace the lad, the tightening of muscles in response to an unwanted contact. It hurt Alastor's black heart that Kichi had been so corrupted, so tainted by his life with Lurid. Perhaps it was too late to save him; the boy was too far gone, too lost. It was exactly what Alastor had wanted to prevent. Kichi was an adult now, and his mindset was defined by the pain he'd endured. Not that he could be blamed for it, of course, but it did break Al's hardened heart. It meant he had failed him. With a disheartened frown, he let Kichi go to pull away, looking over the smaller wolf with a mix of empathy and pain. He would respect the young brute's independence and choices though—no matter his personal feelings on the matter.

Kichi explained where he'd been in terse, obscure sentences. He'd been traveling with his pet. He'd gotten into a few fights. That was it. It was clear Kichi was shutting him out, shutting him down. Alastor wouldn't press and pry. If Kichi wanted to be left alone, then the dire brute understood. Though he'd held out hope that one day he'd find Lurid and Kichi again, too much time and pain had come to pass, and maybe now their lives were too distant to try and realign. Alastor cocked a rueful smirk, nodding his head to the monochrome wolf. "I'd expect nothing less. And I'm sure you kicked all their asses," he remarked with a low chuckle. There was a greater question looming in his mind though.

"So what will you do now?" What did Kichi have planned for the rest of his life? Did he have any plans or goals? Was he roaming from place to place, living day by day, or did he have a grand scheme he was following? More importantly, would this be the last time he ever saw the boy he'd once hoped to raise like his son? He knew if he wanted, Manea would let Kichi join their band without question... but what would Kichi want?


"Alastor"

Warning: Alastor is an explicitly mature character for violent and sexual content. Read his threads with caution.
As his mate, Manea may enter any of Alastor's threads not marked Private.
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