Life has not slowed down for the young Andy since she returned from the Hallows. Things have changed, for better or worse, and the pup finds often finds herself alone in an endless ocean of faces. Wolves come and go and she knows that there are responsibilities that her father must tend to but, even when he is around, she feels often feels alone. There seems to be an unspoken rule that they do not talk about Zee and that, more than anything, hurts. It is as if her father wants them to pretend she never existed, as if, in the first few months of their lives, she had not held them, loved them, and cooed sweet words at them. Anger festers underneath the girl’s sadness and she finds it is beginning to morph into something new; resentment.

Andromeda tries to shove away the emotion fearful of the implications that it has but, the more he ignores the topic of their mother, the more that scary, unbridled feeling grows. As the pups gather around their father to sleep, the girl hangs toward the back, on the outer edges of the pile so that she can lay slip away easily once they are all in dreamland. The family settles and Andy closes her eyes, feigning sleep while listening as the breathing of her siblings and father even out and deepen. Only when she is absolutely certain they are truly asleep, the pup’s pale blue eyes blink open and a small, soft sigh rolls past her lavender lips. Silently, she stands and, because of her placement, isn’t difficult to detach from the pile and the girl is soon making her way swiftly and quietly down into the col.

The roaring fire calls to her and Andy moves to it, laying as close to the warmth as she can physically stand. Pale eyes search the dancing flames as she thinks back to a night on the plains, when the loss had been so fresh and the pain almost unbearable. She had sought her mother in her dreams, trying to bring her back so that they could talk one last time. But, she not found her and, instead of the wolf who had given birth to her, the young girl had brought with her someone else’s mother. Despite not knowing the woman, the ghostly apparition had comforted her, held her, and made her feel loved in those tender, sad moments that they spent together.

Her mind latches onto the woman as her eyelids grow heavy, the weight of sleep settling like a warm, heavy blanket across her body. Andromeda falls asleep with a name, unspoken, on her lips.

-in Somnium-

Warmth touches the young pup’s face, causing her to blink open sleepy eyes. A single word is breathed out as she lifts her head to groggily look around, “Zuriel?” Thick fog swirls around Andromeda or, at least, she thinks it is fog. Eyes blink rapidly to try and rid her sight of any remnants of sleep that might be lingering in them and a flicker of movement catches her attention. The girl stands, uncertainty rooting her legs in place as she waits to see who or what will appear.


"Andromeda Fatalis"

The feeling of a presence in this endless world of mist was no longer an unfamiliar feeling to her. Between the visits from her son and her sudden, if brief, visit to the world of the living, the small breaks from the timeless world she found herself in had become more expected. That was why there was no surprise on her features as her continual stroll through the soft field of grasses and fragrant lavender was interrupted by a small voice calling her name. Her ears perked and she turned toward the sound, the necklace hanging around her neck swaying against her chest with the movement. The voice strikes a fond memory in her mind and she moves toward it eagerly, the ever present fog and mist swirling around her as she moves. Within a couple of moments the lavender-hued girl she had held out on the starry plains comes into view and her smile grows with a comfort and relief of getting to see this sweet pup again. She never knew how much time had passed between her sporadic connections with the living world, but she could see the girl's growth since the last time they spoke and it made her heart ache. Pups always grew so fast.

"Andromeda," she said fondly as she trotted over to greet her guest, hardly having to lean her head down to affectionately nuzzle the girl's cheek. Her touch was less distinct than it had been the first time they met, feeling almost like the memory of what a touch should feel like, but the presence was there all the same. She settled back onto her haunches and lifted her foreleg in the offer of a hug if Andromeda should want it, giving her a warm, motherly smile. "How have you been, darling? I've been thinking about you. How is your family?" She remembered vividly the heartache and the pain she had tried her very best to comfort her through in their surprise meeting, but she was blind to what had happened in that time and she could only hope that time had been kind to her in her absence.

"Speech"

The mist swirls, its thick tendrils obscuring her vison and forcing the lavender girl to squint against the darkness in the hopes of seeing anything. Suddenly, her heart lifts as the mist lightens until it pulls away to reveal the gray form of the woman she had met on the plains. A large, loving smile blooms across dark purple lips as the woman says her name and she moves without hesitation, closing the gap to where Zuriel stands. Andy’s tail wags happily at the fact that she gets to see the sweet mother who had held her on the plains when her heart was breaking.

As sweet Zuriel nuzzles against her check, Andy gives the ghost a gentle, loving lick, not noticing that it feels off. While it feels like a long-lost memory of what the touch should feel like the young Andromeda pays it no mind. To her, the nuzzle feels just like the night they were in the plains when she swore the ghost was as real as she was. Zuriel folds her haunches and sits, lifting a foreleg and Andy immediately moves to press herself into the woman’s chest. A content sigh rolls past her lips and she closes her eyes, lifting her slender legs to snake underneath her arms and wrap around the gray woman.

For a long moment, she doesn’t say anything, happy to stay pressed into the woman while imagining the warmth that the hug offers. Humming a sigh of contentment, she opens her pale blue eyes and shifts backward slightly so she can look up into the dead woman’s eyes. A warm, loving smile pulls at her lips but, at her question about her family, Andy’s smile falters a moment. Another, sad sigh is exhaled as emotions war behind her eyes and the girl softly begins, “I am doing well Zuriel. Oh, I met this really nice lady named Isa! She gave a pillow and we are becoming great friends.”

At the talk of the older blue wolf, the smile grows, the love she has for Isa evident in her tone and features. There is so much good and happiness entering her life and yet… “Dad is… dad. He is still struggling with the loss of mom and I know he thinks I am trying to replace her with Isa but I’m not! I… I… don’t know how to explain it but I swear I’m not replacing her. I swear.” As she speaks, the distress that the situation is causing her leaks into her tone, raising her voice and causing her to gaze imploring at the gray woman. Surely, Zuriel will understand since she was alive for a long time and saw a lot… right?


"Andromeda Fatalis"

Of course it was impossible to miss the shift in the young woman's expression at the mention of her family and it pulled a more concerned expression onto Zuriel's face. She was glad to hear that Andromeda at least had been doing well and smiled at the mention of a new friend named Isa. Sometimes a friend was truly what one needed at the end of the day and it sounded like the purple-hued girl at least had that. She listened with her foreleg still around the girl's shoulders as Andromeda went on, speaking about her difficult father and his perception of his daughter's new friend. Her head tipped slightly at the thought, but she didn't interrupt, only nodding quietly as Andy insisted that she wasn't trying to replace her mother with this new figure in her life. She smiled softly when Andromeda looked up at her as if looking for answers and she gave the horned girl a gentle, if vague, squeeze around her shoulders.

"It sounds like your father loved your mother very much and that losing her has been particularly difficult on him," she said as she rubbed Andy's shoulder gently. "I know you're not trying to replace your mother and it's good that you've found a friend, but I can also understand your father's concerns–even if he isn't showing it in the best ways. He wants to cling to your mother for as long as he can and seeing you beginning to find joy on your own is hard. Give him some time, but don't feel as if you're in the wrong, okay?" She sighed softly with a wistful smile as she let her foreleg slip away from Andromeda's shoulders, glancing down at the ground as she added, "Love is messy and hard... I understand how difficult it is to move on and my first love ended on far from good terms."

Her gaze was distant for a moment as if she was lost in thought, her memories pulling her back to Elias and the escape she made when he was at his worst, but she quickly pulled herself back with a shake of her head. Refocusing her two-toned gaze on Andromeda's she gave the girl another warm smile. "Tell me more about Isa. It sounds like she means a lot to you already. How did you meet her?"

"Speech"

Being here, with Zuriel, in the land where dreams and the dead meet and mingle, the Fatalis pup is fully able to voice her feelings without having to hold anything back. The motherly woman keeps her foreleg around the young Andy’s shoulders and, while this place might not be real, the love and tender touches that Zuriel offers are as real as her own mother Zee’s had been. She feels the gentle squeeze that the woman offers, strengthening it in her own mind until it is as strong as it would be if she was sitting beside her in the waking world.

Zuriel talks about her father and how messy love can be, understand both what she is feeling and what her father feels. A sigh rolls past purple lips as she offers a nod, glad to have the woman’s impartial viewpoint while still having her own emotions validated. The dead wolf’s gaze turns distant for a moment and the girl gazes up at her, wondering if her own struggles parallel anything in the woman’s own past life. With a shake of her head, Zuriel pulls herself back to conversation, asking about Isa and Andy offers her a loving smile.

Reaching up, the purple pup offers a gentle nuzzle to the woman’s cheek, hoping to convey in that simple gesture, just how much Zuriel’s kindness and guidance means to her. Settling back down, Andy leans into the ghost and says, “Well, uh, it is kind of a funny story. My dad is the alpha of our pack and he rescued Isa. She was put into the rank of ‘Slave’ which, honestly, I hate that word.” She pulls a slightly disgusted face as she explains, about the name of the rank.

There are so many negative condemnations associated with that single word and she has tried to talk her father out of using it. Ah, but that is another can of worms. A smile tugs at the corners of her lips as she continues on, happiness entering her voice, “Anyway, she was injured and I thought she would be scared so I took her some food and a small gift.” A shrug of her slender shoulders lifts the woman’s ethereal leg slightly before settling back down.

With a small, shy smile, Andy finishes her tale, “After that meeting, well we just kind of… hit it off. She is teaching me how to read and write and I have been showing her around the pack!” With a happy sigh, the girl snuggles a little tighter into the crook of the woman’s leg. There has always been something that she wanted has wanted to ask Zuriel since she met first met her out on that star lit plain.

Her voice softens, she looks up at the woman and asks, “Zuriel… what happened to you? I mean… why did you die?” Her voice takes on a pleading tone as she follows up the question with an even softer, heart wrenching, “Why do good people have to die?” Since her mother’s untimely departure, young Andy has been trying to understand the deep why of that death. Zee had been older but still young by the standards of wolf life.

And then… here is Zuriel. Yet another kind woman, too young to have left on her own accord, offering her comfort when she should have been able to live her own long, healthy, happy life. r In that moment, Andy feels the bitter sting that death often leaves in its cold wake.


"Andromeda Fatalis"