Deluge made her way north, to the great ice cathedral. She hadn't thought to try and hide the scent that lay thick across her coat. It never crossed her mind that anyone might have a problem with it. Once she thought Dread might, but he hadn't made any moves of his own so she just assumed she'd misread the situation and that he only wanted to be friends. It was no skin off her nose, but a girl had to feel desirable sometimes and she wouldn't push herself on an unwilling participant. As they dropped their heads to fight against the snow and the wind, it didn't dawn on her that Dread was so quiet. Quieter than usual.

Snow still came down here in sheets, even at the height of summer. They worked around the edges of the great structure, looking to see if there was any way in. Finally, a crack in the ice presented itself, and it was a squeeze, but Deluge managed to wriggle her way in. The difference between outside and inside, well the absence of the wind made the silence almost deafening. Scattered and toppled pews filled the largest part of the cavern, and stained glass windows encased in ice left an eerie impression of colour in the air. It was a breathtaking sight, she found herself unable to move, mouth slightly agape. Who had made it, and where were they now?

“Speech”

He'd do anything for her.

No, really, anything.

Dread would do anything she asked, but he didn't want to feel like he was pushing himself on her. And maybe he's convinced himself that he is pushing himself on her. On her, into her life. Making her feel like she has to be here. Maybe Dread has convinced himself that he's burdening her, following her around like some lost puppy.

He'd been lost for so long.

Around her he felt like he'd been found and really seen. As they walk together, Dread is at war with himself again. Torn between wanting so badly to touch her and feeling like he'd lost the privilege entirely. Someone else's scent hung heavily around their heads, enough to cast a sullen quiet over Dread. He's seething, but he knows that it's just as much his fault. They'd never... defined things. He'd been distant. It was his fault.

All his fucking bad feelings, but Dread clings to her side. His chest aches but he doesn't care. They walked together, far into the north. Places that he hadn't been since his youth, since he'd gone exploring-- told to stick close only to immediately disobey. Breaking in would have been a bridge too far back in those days. Now? Now, Dread squeezes in behind Deluge, grumbling as he does. Baring his teeth, feeling the ice dig into his skin.

Finally dragging himself through the narrow gap, Dread gazes around the room. "Damn." His eyebrows lifted, voice echoing around the stately room. Something about it tugged at his chest, though his mood was still largely sullen. At least it's pretty.

It isn't until the words leave his mouth that she realises just how long it has been since he last spoke. Suspicion takes root then, the closed in space making her own scent more evident to herself than it had been out in the biting wind. She moves towards the front of the cavern where glittering items lay out in plain view, gold, discarded. Clearly something sudden and terrible had occurred for it to be left behind. The air took on a heavier weight as she sniffed through the dust and cobwebs, even spared from the wind, the air was bitingly cold, or was that just whatever hung between them?

Paws scratched through scraps of half rotted fabric, tattered and decaying books strewn about the space. There didn't even seem to be mice in this place. She couldn't quite put her paw on why, but her hackles began to inch upwards, the scent of a coming storm on the absent breeze, or was it just a shift in the pressure between herself and Dread?

Deluge sprawled out in the middle of the cathedral, head canting as she considered the stained glass and uncorked a bottle, taking a swig and holding it out to Dread. It would take a good deal more alcohol before she was ready for whatever was to come, but sometimes, you fucked around and you found out right? She wasn't going to run from it.

“Speech”

Tension. Stillness. Quiet. It fills the space between them, and Dread can feel it driving his hackles up too. Eerie, as they move through the cavernous room. Stale air and dust around their heads, he doesn't even cough against it. He can't, not right now. He can't shatter the silence like that, so instead the man tries to squelch it in his throat. Swallowing hard, the same way he's swallowing back his feelings. Shoulders hunched against the creepy breeze, looking anywhere other than at Deluge until she makes herself the center of attention.

Fuck. Finally sauntering to look at her, to meet her in the center of the room. Everything else around them still and quiet, Dread reached out and took the bottle with a grumble. Taking a deep, violent sip from the bottle and then another. Fuck it, one more. It was dry, slipping down his throat and fueling the fire in his stomach. Dread aches, and it's his own damn fault. As he steps back to Deluge's side to set the bottle back down, he shifts the breeze. Still able to smell him on her, the boy can't stifle the growl that kicks up in his throat. More menacing than he'd admit, a dark mood settling thickly over him.

All manner of treasure, marvelous things spread out all around the cathedral. She is the finest among them-- she's not property, and yet she's his. She was supposed to be his. No. No. He's not his older brothers, he wouldn't treat her the way they treated their wives... and yet here Dread was, looking at her like she was his. Knowing that he only has himself to blame, but fuck, what was that knowledge going to do for him?

Sure, she had another bottle she could uncork, but there was no rush, despite his rumbling growls. She turned her head towards the vaulted ceiling, taking in the grungy scenes that were hard to make out after all these years. Strange furless creatures wrapped up in cloth, reaching out to each other from the clouds. Some of them even seemed to have wings. It was a bizarre sight.

She still left her throat exposed when Dread began to growl beside her. He could try something, sure, but she'd beaten him enough times to not be immediately concerned. When the bottle was finally place back beside her, she reached out and took another deep drag, relishing the fire i lit in her belly.

Her head lowered slowly, golden eyes falling on her companion silently, waiting, until she realised he wasn't going to let it out without permission. She clicked her tongue and sighed. “I'm no fuckin' mind reader Dread, shit or get off th' pot.” It was ineloquent, but Deluge was never one to put on airs. Spit it out, or suck it up.

“Speech”

--HERE ENDS THE EXPLORATION OF NEW LAND--

Her words are harsh, and Dread snatches the bottle. Kills what's left of it, immediately turns for another. Hackles still up. Movements stiff and jerky, he's trying to drown something. He's trying to drown the little voice in his head that says all the wrong things when he looks at her for her too long, when the light hits her just right. Trying to shut it up, relentless as it is. Fuck. The proximity is dizzying, it's too much-- it's not enough.

Unusually predatory as he closes in on Deluge, circling her, still seething. "You go off-- you go off for days, to fuck knows where," Dread's voice starts low in his chest, creeping up through his throat. Gaze stormy. "And you come back smelling like you did more than just scouting," tone dripping venom, lip lifting to reveal glistening canine teeth. Looming over her shoulder. Tense, teeth a breath away from her cheek. Her jaw. Unusually aggressive, but the alcohol had melted much of the seal that kept him carefully composed.

"What the fuck, Deluge?" His voice dropping, brassy. Dread's composure ebbed away as he loomed over her, threat palpable on him. She's his.

He didn't usually drink like this, it put her on edge, or might have, if her blood wasn't already thrumming with anticipation. This had probably been simmering since their very first encounter, fated, or cursed to end up at this exact moment in time. The accusations rolled off her like water off a ducks back. Her eyes narrowing ever so slightly, taunting smirk pulling at the corner of her lips, despite the obvious threat in his posture, his proximity to her throat. “I ran into an old friend,” she didn't often articulate her words. If he could hear through the ringing of rage in his ears he might even pick up on the hint of a purr. "We had a lot o' catchin' up ter do...”

Her muscles coiled and she tipped her head to present Dread with her antlers as she tried to get her feet beneath her. Laying down so casually had put her at a disadvantage but she doubted he meant to kill her, not matter how fiery the alcohol made his blood. “S'not like yer've shown any interest,” There she was, taunting again. She even threw in a batt of her eyes for good measure as she simpered, “Really, what's a girl ter do?”

Lips pulled back from her own teeth then in a snarl, daring him to give her his best shot.

She didn't belong to anyone.

“Speech”

-round 1/2 - fight with predetermined outcome-

Fated and cursed, cursed and fated. Something standing in the air between them, something that Dread can't put words to. He's alive with it. Crackling with it. Everything brought to the surface with the help of a little booze and more than a few feelings that he doesn't know how to articulate. Fuck. No, he really wasn't meant to be a diplomat. He'd rather solve this with his teeth than his words.

Words. Hers enunciated crisply, echoing off the stone floors of the large room. Dread bristled. Just hearing her talk like that, he can't help himself. The snarl is harsh, and he truly springs upon her. His teeth against her neck-- sharper than they've been before. More intent. Possessive, sharp, allowing himself to be overtaken by the darkness that's always been lurking in his chest. Letting a little more come out to play. Doing what he can to maintain control over Deluge, though he never expected she'd make things easy. Dread knows her too well for that.

"Interest--" though his voice is quiet, Dread's tone heats. "How's this for fucking interest?" The man lunges for his prize with his teeth, with his foreleg. Chancing a grapple, the gloves coming off. Something shifting in his chest, something different lighting in his system-- something different than all of the other fights. This is maybe the most important of all, and something in Dread is coming loose.

While something in her head chants not right, not right, not right, her heart sings in response to the teeth in her neck, the weight of a paw thrown across her shoulders. A small part of her thinks she should just melt into it, give over and be grateful that finally things were getting somewhere, (and damn she decided she liked him a lot more when he shed his manners). A bigger part of her though, wants to make him work for it. After all, wasn't the chase supposed to be half the fun?

Her bioluminescence flashes a warning and feline claws scrape against the stone, it really hadn't been the best idea to lay down. At least if she had been sitting she would have been half way up. She could run, but where to? They were in an iced in building, they'd found their way in through a crack and the girl was far too proud for that. She knew better than to waste her energy swinging her jaws, he'd effectively come from alongside her. She threw her weight to the side, hoping to catch the leg he had thrown across her back against the side of one of the toppled pews. “So tha's all it takes? Fuckin' someone else?” Her laugh was low and dark. “If I'd known tha' I woulda done it ages ago.” The words very well could have been a lie upon her lips, but this wasn't about fighting fair. It was about hitting him where it would really hurt.

“Speech”

-round 2/2 - fight with predetermined outcome-

Any vestige of control Dread had, slips. Getting a mouth full of bioluminescent fur, more than he'd usually intentionally take on, he can feel the tingle in his mouth. His tongue itches and his mouth waters. She's proud, and that's all the more fun. Something sinister coloring the edges, though Dread's vision is still centered on the woman he loves. Centered on her, trained on her. His. Deluge is his.

Her shoulder thrown into him, but Dread won't be shaken loose. He makes to grapple the girl, to hold her. Yank her as near as he can. His teeth looking for her scruff, harder than he'd normally bite her. Proving a point. As she speaks, Dread growls. Aiming to make use of his minor weight advantage, a better fighter than he's ever let on when it comes to her. "Didn't think I'd have to spell it out," he's breathless, fighting to maintain control over the girl. Grip tightening, Dread's voice dropping low as he speaks. "You're. Mine." Cadence clear. Possessive. All teeth and sharp edges, he's alight.

Her attempt to throw him off is thwarted as another limb wraps around her and pulls her close, teeth flash and a growl rumbles in her chest when teeth pull against the back of her neck hard, but she knows its not worth fighting, the thrumming in her veins screams enough and through her limbs are angled to keep her steady, she relaxes as best she can with the other wolf half on top of her, leans her head back to take some of the tension off her neck, but also angle her head to expose her throat, a clear sign she's letting him have this round.

No skill claims past this point.

His words were still ringing around in her head, and a smirk pulled at the corner of her lips and she snickered. She might have surrendered, but that didn't mean she was done. Her tail brushed against his hind leg as she moved it to the side. “Oh yeah? Prove it.”

“Speech”

She relents. Relaxes. Gives in— where Dread has been given an inch he takes a mile. There’s still a hard, possessive edge to the way he touches her. The way he kisses her too, a man starving. A man possessed.

Deluge asks him to prove it, and he will. Nothing says devotion like fucking on the floor of a long abandoned church. Dread is a man possessed, and his only regret is maintaining his manners for this long. All of his head overtaken in the best way. In the worst way. Everyone always knew they’d be a match made in hell.

& fade