Though years had passed since her death, the eternity between her last breath and her opening her eyes once more passed unrealized by Gwenevere Adravendi, to whom it felt as though no time had passed at all. It was therefore with some surprise that she realized she was in no pain from the bear attack, that her breathing had cleared of the pneumonia, that she moved with more ease than she had in years. But the world around her had not had such a rejuvenation - in the moment that it took her to blink it had changed to darkness, and strangeness, and that was when Gwenevere realized that she was dead, because surely this strange world was the afterlife she'd never really believed in. But that seemed odd too, because even as she stood there puzzling over it she realized that the world around her seemed far more... substantial than she herself was. Like she wavered when she moved too fast, but time was still passing at a normal rate. Grass still rustled in the wind, she could still hear the normal small sounds of animals and birds as they went about their lives. Was she, then, a ghost? She thought it might be possible, though she in life had never really considered it.

Drifting aimlessly she wandered the moor that had been her favorite haunt in life and was, apparently, now to be her haunt in death. The amount of changes confused and unsettled her - not just the changes like the weird sky and the glowing plants and crystals she passed, but the changes to the pack structures. The wall was larger, with platforms and hides and all sorts of things. The sprawling den she'd built was all but abandoned, quiet and lonely feeling without her pups there. Where were they, anyway? Where was everyone for that matter? She flowed to the center of the stone circle and sat to think, troubled and unknowing that she sat upon her own grave.

Since meeting his grandmother, he’d held out some small hope that he’d see his mother, too. However, his patrols couldn’t be ignored, so he padded along the wall, nose working, eyes and ears alert. But it was Crystal who informed him that there was a stranger far within the pack boundaries, all the way at the stone circle. “Let the able-bodied ones know, just in case there’s an ambush. Keep it downlow.” He leapt into the milky miasma with a swirl of mist, slipping along the familiar paw-paths, stealthy as he made his way toward the Circle, while Crystal winged off to inform the others on patrol to be alert. But when he crossed the scent, his froze, midstep, before slipping forward again, not stepping into full view into the circle until he’d taken a good look from the shadows at the wolf sitting within. It was a little morbid that his mother sat right over her own grave site, so far from everyone else. Still, he was far more prepared now that he’d met Epiphron walking around, enough that his greeting was practically casual as he stepped into sight. As much as it hurt that she was still very much dead, it was still so good to see her again. “Hello, Mother.” He paused several strides away, studying her. He had to look down to make any eye contact. Way down… had she really been the same height as Aurielle? And grandmother, too… he realized. Walk ---- "Speak" ---- "Hear" ---- Think

While the changes in the pack's structures were a tell that time had passed unheeded, it was when her gaze swung around and up to meet a familiar-unfamiliar blue eyed gaze that she really understood just how long she had lost. She felt this understanding as a bolt of electricity that shot through her to the very marrow of her bones, or whatever ghosts had for both bones, and marrow. This was a face she'd last seen as a gangly barely-yearling, barely more than a pup. Now he was a man grown and in his prime. Years had passed, not moments.

She closed her eyes briefly against the rush of sadness and loss that realization brought. She had missed so much... So much time with her children she could never retrieve.

Also it made it far more obvious now that she was, in fact dead, but somehow... returned?

She opened her eyes once again and mustered a soft, if slightly confused, smile for her son. "Cairo," she breathed. "I've been away so long... it feels as though I've only just woken from a deep sleep..." She shook her head incredulously. "What has happened here?"

Seeing him visibly struck her, and he wondered just how long she’d thought she’d been gone. Mere moments? Centuries? No, there’s have been relief there had it been centuries on her mind… Where would Valhalla be in a century? Such a long time, so many generations to a wolf. Quietly he padded forward, lifting his muzzle to the sky and uttering a brief at ease howl before he settled to sit before his mother. No need to have Valhalla on edge over a ghost who would never have harmed the pack even in her living days. At her words, he smiled faintly, a bit sadly, “Only about four years.” His eyes scanned around them, gazing at the changes that were an awful reminder of just how much had gone wrong this winter. Domari and Justice had been taken by the plague, and still so many were sick. The pack was at the smallest he’d seen it for a while. “A very dreadful plague. We started seeing traces of it in the winter but then it really got worse in the spring. We just lost Justice and Domari. And Aurielle, her son, Ardyn, a yearling Aurielle took in as a young pup, Drachen, one of our best… They're all sick. Caelia’s okay, Viv was okay last I saw her; she left to find a cure. Artur… no idea. He ran off years ago. Meriadoc, no idea—oh! Meri’s Geoffrey. You have grandkids through him, by the way. He went missing, taken by pirates, and his children’s’ mother’s band saved him and, well, one thing led to another kind of thing. Huge litter, mom. All very free spirited.” He rose back on his haunches, front paws stretching wide expansively, a genuine grin touching his features for once. No matter how grim an outlook the world had, he’d always be a proud uncle. Six kids at once was nothing to sneeze at. Had things been different, would he have had children of his own, by now? “It’s been a shit show of a Spring.” He was frank, though he glanced almost apologetically at his mother, adding, “Pardon my language.” Walk ---- "Speak" ---- "Hear" ---- Think

Only four years was better than she'd begun to fear, honestly, and she relaxed slightly, though his mention of a plague brought an attentive frown to her face. He ran through the highlights of what she'd missed. She was worried to hear that Artur and Geoffrey - though it seemed he was going by his middle name these days - were missing in a dangerous time, but heartened to hear that Geoffrey - Meriadoc - had had children of his own to continue her line. She smiled again at his apology for his language. "You're a grown man," she said dryly, "I'm hardly going to spank you for cursing. As for Justice and Domari..." She sighed, shaking her head. "I'm sorry to hear that they've passed, though being dead does not seem to be much of a barrier now. Perhaps they'll make their way back to the world as I have." Though all things considered, while she'd missed a great deal in her slumberous afterlife it hadn't been so bad to be so unaware at the time. There were worse things to experience than a temporary cessation of existence. "You've told me a great deal about how the pack is coping with the plague, and your siblings, but how have you been, Cairo? Have these four years been kind to you?"

Ah, the dry humor he remembered from his puphood. It took him right back to the between days of fighting off one cold after another, when he’d been feeling a bit better enough to play pounce with her tail in the times when she was able to settle in from patrols. Her words on Domari and Justice brought a faint smile. “Perhaps.” She turned the conversation to himself, and his eyes dropped away, thinking. There was much that he’d accomplished in his five years. He’d worked hard for it, beaten two broken legs and several broken ribs and made it out still strong. He’d had two amazing best friends, and lost them both. “Ah, well. I worked hard and made it to Sentinel. Aurielle made the change to Valhalla shortly after you passed on. Essentially, I’m the primary Beta. I don’t have a partner Beta – a Lodestar – yet; I thought for a long time it was going to be Caelia, but she fell behind and lost motivation. I had a best friend; two of them. Both gone, now. Nolan Adravendi, Aurielle’s cousin through Baine. He fell from a cliff in the north and he didn’t make it…” The loss still hurt. The tall young man had barely begun adulthood, only for it to be snuffed out at the bottom of a long fall. “And there was Malalia. She wasn’t in Valhalla. There’s a pack called the Ashen Armada, led by Sirius Fatalis. Things are a little tense right now. Lia went missing and, Sirius being Sirius, I don’t doubt he thinks I did something to her. I spent a little time healing in the Armada after I fell off a mountain, so I got a pretty good idea of his character. Paranoid, if determined to take care of his pack, and possessive. Lia made it to Reaper before she was even two. From what I guess, that’s like the alpha’s right paw, like you were with Aurielle.” His lips pursed, considering, before he admitted, “Over time, I’ve come to understand that there could have been a lot more than friendship with her, but… I could never have asked her to leave her pack and family that she’d found there for me, not with what Sirius’s mentality seems to be, and I cannot see any home I would ever want but here in Valhalla. But I refuse to believe she’s dead, not until I see a body.” His toes flexed, bear claws digging into the soil with a faint creak of leather strips. Crystal drifted in to land on the nearest standing stone, and his eyes drifted to the owl. “I made a couple of friends of another kind, though. I found Crystaloria here with a broken wing and she’s been with me ever since. And a Mandrill named Enito. Grumpy and usually ready to smack someone with a stick if they look at him crossways.” His head tilted thoughtfully as he went one, “We won a raid the winter prior to this last. Aurielle picked the dead of night in the middle of a blizzard for it. It was pre-planned with our neighbor, Aerie, for practice. I lost my fight.” A rye smile and shrug. Walk ---- "Speak" ---- "Hear" ---- Think

Gwenevere

You smell a scent and remember you can scent mark too! Better do it while you still can.