continued and backdated from here

Pride's glance to Wilder, at her request, had been empty of visible emotion. He had shown none, either, when asking Alek and Casimir to give him a few moments. He wasn't sure if this conversation would tie up loose ends or shred fresh threads loose to lie about as new ones, but the slight tip of his head had indicated cold acknowledgment that he would at least listen.

His hooves punched staccato holes in the earth as he moved just out of earshot of the rest, turning to face Wilder with an imperious gaze.

"Yes?" was all he said, empty of inflection, and left that one word hanging indifferently in the air. His mind was opened, too, a silent open door ready to hear what she had to think, as well. Trust, here, would not be given a second time.

red deer img credit - dan seagrave

@Wilder

Wilder was nervous. Actually, nervous was an understatement. Every nerve was alight and alert, her paws felt vaguely numb, and she was certain that Pride would be able to hear the wild thump of her heart with how hard it was beating. She felt like the last time she'd interacted with the stag, she'd been an entirely different gembound. It felt like...like everything that had happened before her trip to the surface had happened to a different Wilder, or at least a different version. Would he even recognize the way she spoke or held herself? Would he think she was manipulating him, with how different she acted now? Why was she even doing this in the first place? She should forget about him and never think of him again...right?

No...no, it felt like wounds were still open - distant, old wounds, but wounds nonetheless. And if she wanted things to finally scar and heal, she couldn't keep ignoring them or put it off. It felt like a different Wilder, but it still had been her that had lied to him, that had befriended a murderer and tried to protect her from him, it had been her that had betrayed him. She knew better now, of course, but it was something that surely had happened.

Pride might be able to hear some of her pondering, feel her nervousness and dread and the pain of bringing up old wounds. But when she finally sat down and spoke, her voice was surprisingly calm. "I just...wanted to say I'm sorry. For everything that happened. I know that it's been...a long time since then and I know that sorry probably doesn't really cover it, but I thought I'd give it a shot." She tried to add a bit of magic into it, to maybe make Pride a little more agreeable, but in her nervousness the spell rebounded. Instead of releasing pheromones that were nice and attractive, she started to...smell kinda bad and sweaty. She didn't exactly notice it, with the stink of fungus all around, but there was absolutely nothing nice about the smell she was currently putting off.

@Pride

He stood stock-still, perfectly composed.

Behind it--suppressed, for now, but waiting--lay his deep, intense grief at first seeing, and then again losing, his friends. Wilder was not speaking to a calm Pride, a Pride who'd contentedly awoken from a nap at home, a Pride who bore patience and a level head. She was speaking to a Pride mired in a dozen disparate feelings--that grief, rage at the Masters who had taken the once-living, a deep concern for his family and what they, too, must have just experienced.

And her-? What did she see?

He could not bring himself to care. It wasn't just disdain for Wilder; he was simply too distracted by all else. But he did listen, or try. It was in silence, with a cold and distant stare, his mind half elsewhere. But he listened, and he paid as much attention as he could to her mind. There was turmoil there, honest pain, but it was difficult to pick through her emotions when he was already wrestling with his own. She was hurting. She was trying to fix that pain. And is that why she is apologizing? Not for those she harmed, but to suit herself? He didn't care. He wanted to be off with Alek, with Casimir, reassuring them. This was nothing more than a delay. Even her attempt at magic, at manipulation--whatever she thought her motivations were--was met with nothing more than a slight raise of his chin, as if he felt his faintest suspicions confirmed.

He didn't mention it.

He wanted to simply say "noted" and walk away; to leave it at that. Let her think whatever she wanted, so long as she stayed the hell away from Orion and his family. But one lingering, almost malicious thought prompted him to ask: "Why?" It was a quiet, flat question, empty of inflection or even interest. It was almost a challenge, though there was no challenge in the blank tone. "Why are you apologizing?"

red deer img credit - dan seagrave

@Wilder

Wilder stood in silence for a second, waiting for Pride to berate her or insult her or refuse her apology, but he said nothing. And then he asked - why? She froze, confused. Why apologize? It hadn’t really occurred to her before that there needed to be a reason. Maybe it was a selfish motivation, to get some closure for herself, so she could stop lingering on the past and move on. Maybe because it felt wrong to be on the bad side of one of the caves gembound protectors when they had some of the same, or at least similar, goals. Maybe because there was nothing else left to do but apologize. Blackberry was gone, Livius was gone, and Aure was a lost cause.

She opened her mouth to respond and then properly looked up at Pride. His expression was….blank. Hard to read. Harder than she thought it would be. Something was wrong, the prickling at her neck was telling her there was a tension in the air that shouldn’t be there. She tried to listen in, unaware that Pride was doing the same, but her temperamental, unreliable magic gave her only deafening silence that made her head soin and a migraine to begin forming rapidly, while all the thoughts Oride was hearing were amplified. Hearing each and every one of her thoughts and feelings over the last minute - the pondering, her worry and curiosity, and, of course, frustration that she couldn’t get a single god damn spell to work after Emuh did that shit to her.

Trying to keep a calm face, she grimaced and shuffled her feet a bit. ”I don’t know. I didn’t really think about it. I guess I’m just doing…what I can? Because nothing can change the past. I guess. But you’re fully in your right to not accept it. I understand.” She remembered the warm feeling in her vision, of love and companionship, of loving in return. And how empty life was now without that feeling. Because of her and her stupid mistakes.

So yeah, it was selfish. But after everything she’d been through, her failures and misjudgements, her eyes opened on the surface, the knowledge she carried weighing her down like stones in her heart, Wilder figured she had the right to at least try and fix herself before she split at the seams again.

@Pride

He searched her, and found turmoil; he searched himself, and could find nothing. He couldn't bring himself to care, past his own distracted feelings. Couldn't find the deep disgust he normally felt for Wilder, nor rage, nor pity.

"Noted," he did, in fact, say at last--imperiously cold as ever but without a haughty edge. Instead it was distant, not-really-here. And it wasn't that he meant not to give her his full attention. He simply could not. He even let the magic slip away at last. There was no sign that he fully rejected her apology, nor did he ask for further details, or clarify his own standing. Had he the mindset in that moment, he might have even been more gentle: explained that deeds would need to take the place of words to convince him, rather than simply dismissing her so poorly. But as it was...

He simply glanced back toward his family, then back down to Wilder. "Was that all?" he asked, and his look back down at her was fully empty, his mind wholly elsewhere.

red deer img credit - dan seagrave

@Wilder

Wilder stared at Pride, shocked at how he was taking it. There was definitely something else going on here. Or, at least, Pride was distracted. She had expected him to be disgusted with her, to tell her that an apology wasn’t enough, that it was too late, and whatever else he had in mind. But he was just…taking it. And so dismissive.

Hold on, she needed to take a moment.

Magic flared and everything slowed for a moment. Not that anything particularly exciting was happening, but it gave Wilder a brief moment to think more, try and figure out what was going on, what she was doing wrong. She thought this would be more of a conversation.

But…oh.

It occurred to her then, probably a little late, that this probably had something to do with Paradise and what they had all witnessed. Pride had probably seen something that had him distracted, just as she’d seen something that had spurred her into this action. Looking into his eyes again, studying them in her brief moment of suspended time, she could really feel the mistiness, the distance between him and her. This had been the wrong time.

As she released the spell, she took a step back, feeling heat under her fur, embarrassed that it had taken so long to come to the realization. ”Uh…y-yes. For now, I guess. I just wanted to tell you that.” She paused, tail sweeping through the grass behind her. ”I realize this is probably not the time. Sorry for bothering you. I’ll…see you around.”

Hopefully, at least. Not wanting to stretch it out anymore when Pride was obviously not in the mood, Wilder turned and quickly scooted away into the trees, feeling a heavy sense of awkwardness in the wake of the conversation. That…wasn’t how she expected that to go. But when did anything go the way she thought it would?

*exit

@Pride

"Very well," was his half-murmured response, and though he paused as if to watch her go, he didn't see her leave. His mind was back to his family--and his body, a moment later, hurried to follow.

He hastened back toward them, hooves clicking a rapid staccato on the rock.

As for seeing him around-? I certainly hope not, was the thought, but even that was distant and just as quickly forgotten.

red deer img credit - dan seagrave

exit Pride