ORIGIN

Brief resentment flared in him--that sort of self-destructive pride he'd felt so often when prodded by the likes of Reseda--and for a flash of an instant, he wanted to lash out, to snag Dread in his magic and break his bones against a tree.

But he had not enough magic for that; the dragon had done nothing to deserve it, either, and... well, if he failed...

It was, all in all--Pride wisely decided--a poor impulse. A very bad idea.

Teeth gritted, and he looked down at the mud again, eating his humble pie and focusing.

There was a soft squelch, and the mud parted as another gemstone thrust up from beneath. Again it was gold-sheened, this time large and smooth-faceted. Pride looked up and felt an intense surge of relief upon seeing the satisfaction, the greed, in Dread's eyes; the dragon's gaze was locked upon this newest prize. He pulled this one, too, beneath his body--in the other foot--and looked at Pride.

"This one is a good one," Dread informed him, no tone in his voice. "I can only carry two. You will give me the rest in your cave."

Pride knew what that meant: Dread would return these stones to his own hoard in Monoceros, and then come to Orion for more. "Of course," he offered, with an incline of his head--all politeness on top, but seething anger again flared through him.

He pushed it down. It was not real pride. It wasn't healthy, or good. It was nothing but impotent rage born of fear, and he couldn't let that control him. "Thank you for your help, and your patience," he added, trying for humor--and when the dragon gave him nothing but a disinterested glance, he had to fight off that anger once more.

Pride stared as the dragon winged away, lifting above the trees and into the darkness.

Silence was all he left in his wake; the quiet left after the thump of wingbeats had wholly receded. The mist churned and coiled back into the space Dread had cleared, settling back over the muddy, uncovered chrysalis, now sunken half into the mud, but holding.

Sudden exhaustion--mental as much as physical--gripped him.

Since Pride had been a fawn, he had taken care of himself and everyone he had met. Reseda had tried to manipulate him. Envy had been a fucking wreck, their entire life, and Pride had done nothing but shore them up, support them, constantly offering advice and reassurance, and putting up with all their various, infuriating issues. Patience had been difficult to maintain. And then there had been the Bloodberries; war and death on every side, judgment cast on him by his own damn allies. The decisions on what to do, what not to do--these had always lay on him. He had given up his own health, assumed a mantle of severe illness, again and again to help one of his allies.

He had always stood strong, in the face of it: done what was right, protected those close to him, even those not, and had never faltered.

Suddenly, unexpectedly, in the wake of the cruel battle and the departure of the savage dragon, watching the chrysalis quietly lying there, Pride felt himself crumbling.

He was, abruptly, on his hocks and knees in the mud, head low, breath quivering in his throat as sobs threatened to choke him. He fought it--half-bewildered, wondering where this had suddenly come from; half-exhausted, so worn down by everything that he found himself simply succumbing to it.

He had not rested enough--not even with Mercurius, not with the children; he had always thought of protecting, defending them, providing his own support to the sensitive lion. As for himself-? He had never considered it, but apparently--as he was abruptly learning--he needed a fucking rest.

The stag lowered himself fully to lie in the mud, antlers clicking down softly and then resting against the chrysoprase cocoon. His breaths--barely-controlled--came shuddering and breaking, his ears sagging down.

Some part of him with vague remaining self-awareness felt wryly glad that the Bonebound and the rest were not here to see this. And another part was distantly puzzled; what had prompted this-? But there was no one thing.

It was everything; it was nothing. It was standing up, never standing down, it was war, after war; it was death and illness and a sinking chrysalis; it was magical exhaustion, and a dragon staring down at him-...

The stag closed his eyes and rested there, chest-deep in the mud, struggling to control his too-rapid, ragged breaths.

His own ragged breaths, so loud in his ears as he fought to even them out, must have deafened him, because he did not hear Nassir's approach. But then, the cat was a cat; stealthy (and was that racist? perhaps) even in the mud-

Pride's head came up, eyes wide and blinking, caught unaware at the sound of Nassir's voice. He tensed, and felt that mask slipping back on; frightened, somehow, of being caught out like this. It wasn't... right. And it wasn't right to lay it on Nassir, either; the leopard, caves knew, had problems of his own.

But perhaps... it would do the leopard good, to help him. It was a little manipulative, perhaps, perhaps selfish or selfless--he didn't know, and he wasn't exactly in any condition to work out all the moral aspects right now--but Pride knew that if he let his guard back down, talked to Nassir, perhaps it might bolster his confidence too--to know he had been useful. More than useful.

It wasn't arrogance or aloof superiority that made him think this way; it was, in a sense, kindness, a grim sort. Had it been someone else, he perhaps would have slipped that shield back up, dismissed the offer with a simple excuse of being magically exhausted--but caves knew he could use someone to talk to, though he still wasn't sure what about. And Nassir-... They all needed somewhere to belong. Some purpose to serve. Didn't they-? So, arrogant perhaps, to assume the role of offering the leopard a role of his own, but it was Pride's thought process, nonetheless.

All of this flashed through his mind--more emotion than real coherent consideration--in a few seconds; he had tensed, staring up, and now he relaxed, lowering his antlers back down to rest against the stone, his shoulders again loosening.

His voice came thick--even to him, and it surprised him--with emotion, guarded as it may have been. "I-... would not mind speaking," he managed, quiet; "but I am not sure what to... what I need to... speak about."

He paused, taking another breath, a waver in his voice as he continued. "I did not expect this. I... don't know what prompted it." A shaking breath, and his head raised a little, eyes searching the swamp absently. "Exhaustion, perhaps..."

Pride turned wearily to look back at Nassir, tiredness etched through every line in his face. He made no move to raise himself from the mud, lying chest-deep and slicked near-black. "And you-? How are you holding up?" he asked, quietly.

Any thoughts of morality, right, wrong, and purpose had already faded from the stag's mind--it had been fleeting, as it was--and now he was trying to get his head on straight. To actually look at the situation logically--but he is right, isn't he? When is the last time that I rested--truly rested?

Pride could not remember.

He gave a quiet, humorless laugh, looking again to the leopard--still making no motion to pull himself from the mud. Rest now was as good a time as any.

"We have neither of us done much resting, have we-? I was sick, aiding Amazon. And then Livius left us. Both of us. And Raheerah-... And then Nemean, with her demands. The insect swarms. This battle." He sighed. "Is this normal-? I do not know. We have no one to look to, to tell us what to expect. We are all, I think, making it up as we go along. And I imagine you and I are both trying our best to keep things..." Pride trailed off, watching Nassir without really seeing him as he searched for a word. Orderly? No, that wasn't right. He'd never particularly tried to install order in the caves. Good, then? No, 'keep things good' sounds ridiculous.

The stag sighed and shook his head. "To make things as good as they can be. I suppose Zothra running off and leaving us in the lurch did not help, either." He should not have trusted her; she must have been a child, still, at least in mind. "Resting" for cycles. Not reporting back. Shirking her duties. Hrmph.

Some part of his mind went immediately to planning--to figuring out how to strengthen the Seven, to build them up, to take the weight and pressure off of him. And he stopped that part immediately, condemning it for foolishness. It would only put more responsibility and work on his shoulders, and Nassir was right; he would have to rest, first.

But what was 'rest?'

Pride looked to Nassir. "I hardly know how to 'rest,' I think. You are right, of course--but how, when each time I do, I see things so terribly wrong? I took refuge in Mercurius' garden, and they were chased from Eridanus by Astraea." He shook his head. "Every place I would go, or any thing I would do, to find peace only shows, in stark relief, what is so terribly wrong with our world." He paused, watching Nassir even now. "It is the only reason I have kept this concept of the Seven alive. I fear what might happen if there were none left to stand up for what is right."

Memories of his confrontation with Rift briefly surfaced--doubts. Of him lifting the cat up into the air with a snarl. He'd doubted himself, then; but then Rift had failed to even bring forth the promised trial. His actions had proven Pride's... concerns. No justice had been done. If Pride had been in control, the trial would have happened within days, and he knew it.

Reseda's bones still decorated Orion's Thrones. Gruesome, perhaps: but the stag got results. And were the caves not safer without her?

His thoughts ran in this circle, and he blinked, and looked to Nassir with wry humor. "If only I knew a way to simply stop thinking, for awhile." A pause, then, as he studied the black leopard. He wished to ask what it was that troubled the cat, but he didn't know how to phrase it. To ask "what is bothering you" implied that Nassir had nothing important enough to trouble him--and Pride didn't want to sound that way, nor did he believe it. In truth he didn't know what responsibilities Nassir might consider his own. He didn't, he realized, know Nassir well enough to know what he did when away from the Seven, or what he valued. He knew the cat had had a rough time of it, and was struggling to train himself, some. But beyond that-?

"What is it, specifically, that wears on you?" he asked, his phrasing careful, his emphasis on the 'you.' Perhaps he could help--and it escaped him that taking on some of Nassir's burden was rather antithesis to the concept of "rest."

Dragons and dancing lights and insects crawling out of our noses. Pride offered a soft snort of amusement at this, but otherwise simply listened. Safer to improvise? Nassir was older than he was, certainly; but Pride doubted whether it had been less safe to improvise in a time of quiet. He said nothing, though, still listening to the black leopard speak, watching him fumble earnestly through his words, propelled solely by purity of heart.

You had no part in that - none of us could have helped it.

Here the white stag shook his head. "No, of course not; I do not blame myself for that, nor anyone else. But it highlights how difficult it is to find peace, or rest. In aiming for it I too often find nothing but more conflict awaiting us."

The stag glanced back toward the rest of the swamp. "Oh, it is not that I have no faith in our allies, do not get me wrong. I certainly believe that some of them, at least, have their hearts in the right place." Aure seemed every bit as earnest as Nassir; and Dragon, if not kind, at least held survival in high regard. The survival of all of them, from what Pride could tell. "But I do not think any of them go out of their way to change things." They stuck to their own caves, their focus their families; but then, how was Pride much different? Dragon had at least arranged meetings of them all, in the past, but Pride-? Was training his few allies worth anything, in the end? They had come here--they had helped with this, certainly. So perhaps.

He found his head swimming again, trying to balance the good they'd done with the actions of the others in the caves, trying to weigh it up: was it worth it? What had they accomplished, really..? But Nassir was speaking again, and he looked to the leopard, blinking. "Knock me--no, I don't think that will be necessary," he answered, amused.

Nassir's confessions were grim, at first--Pride knew some of it, but even so it was heart-wrenching to hear it laid out so plainly. Pity flickered in him, but uncomfortable surprise quickly replaced it at the black leopard's thanks. "For-? I have--I have done nothing to be thanked for," he blurted, genuinely taken aback. What is he thanking me for-? Inviting him to stay in Orion? Training? "You are a friend," he added, simply, still confused.

The stag's priorities were, needless to say, just a little screwed up. One moment, apparently, he could condemn a goose to death, and half-kill those who defended her; and the next, he could genuinely not grasp why anyone would possibly thank him for offering safe haven and personal training.

Ahh, well.

"In any case, I think you quite deserve to feel 'fine,' and I hope that you can come to terms with it. I suppose I can understand how foreign it might feel." Pride wasn't sure if he'd ever felt that way, himself--either he was so cold that everything felt a constant "even," or everything was so constantly terrible that he'd never reached normalcy. Given his time, peaceful and content, with his family, it was likely the former; the stag simply took war in stride. Until, apparently, it became too much.

Pride looked away, thinking for a moment--lost in what looked like philosophical contemplation--before looking to Nassir once more. "But tell me something, Nassir. If you were able to shape this cave however you desired--in a cycle, a year, a decade; where would you wish to see it? What would your... ultimate vision for the caves, shall we say, look like?"