You just breathe that moment down

For @Nymeria but others are welcome! Generated prompt: Your character is traveling awfully close to a pack. Yet there is a fox coming out of it, with a clearly hunted prey. Do you face said fox, or let it on its way?

---

It started as a gentle downpour– a soft outcry from the fattened clouds which wept from their heavenly pedestals. Drip, they echoed, followed by sodden drops as their tears collided and burst into fragments of liquid. The sun, even, dared not to venture beyond its shrouded throne, simmering quietly from behind a grayscale canvas of clouds. The air crackled with an unspoken tension and the trees bent beneath the steady current of water, as if praying to appease their grieving sky.
 
Rather than pay her own homage to the aboveground, Galene had put her stock in something more… tangible. A betterment to the society that had welcomed her with open arms and freed her from the unknown-- the guideless happening that had brought so many others here. She strode with intention through the dampened clutches of plants, through the forming puddles of water and around the ruins that she now called home. Under these conditions, a wolf afflicted by incompetence could have retired to their nest– but Galene was anything but.
 
She took care to brush past dense thickets of dry foliage, mingling her scent among those of the forest. Her scent, one of the many belonging to Labyrinthian– a keep-away sign that signaled for those of nefarious intent to keep out.
 
Satisfied with her venture, she pivoted back on her own trail, her footfalls angled toward the crumbling pillars of stone.
 
But suddenly, she paused.
 
The rain did well at guising many of the faded scents that had once lingered– but it did not squander the subtle trace of something canine that seeped from a corner of the structure.
 
Nor did it deafen the sudden shrieks of chickens, called to action by a frantic urge to flee.
 
A snarl ripped from her now-flashing fangs as her limbs, called to action, rocketed toward the source of the commotion. Shallow pools of water splattered from her hastened heels as she rounded the bend, entering the clutches of the crumbling stone–
 
Only to watch as a skinny fox, slicked thin by the persistent rain, released its hold on its prey to cower. Cower, cornered on all sides by impenetrable obstacles– some armed with stone, and one teeth. 
 
Kill it. That was what Labyrinthian would want.
 
She tried to reach that wicked corner of herself; the one that wolves spoke of when they mentioned the inherent darkness that lived in all things. One of malice, one of hate.
 
But even as the feeling bubbled darkly in her breast, her fangs faltered– her eyes locking on the mortified, reddened perpetrator.
 
Kill it!
 
She couldn’t. Not when it was looking at her like that.
 
“Get out,” she settled, the snarl tinged with venom as her teeth snapped at its fleeing hocks. Filth.
 
She exhaled, releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she’d held captive.

the staff team luvs u

^^

The wraith had taken to hiding her kills -- in all states, open, closed, ravaged, untouched -- within the roots and in the shelves of stone, aiming to return when she wanted to. Some she had taken their innards to perform her spells, cultivating strength and protection for the Pack. Her chin, doused with watery crimson dripped and dropped with each bouncy step that she took though it was perhaps more interestingly dripping from the intestine that dangled from her pink mouth with a bone that stuck further back in her teeth.

Her latest kill was strewn somewhere in the distance, it's corpse not needed but it's innards and a singular leg gone required. It was then in her bouncy steps through the light rain that she had heard it, the demand coupled with a snarl. Curiously did the wraith's silver gaze move until they landed upon another, one she had known to be recent with Labyrinthian but not one she had personally met. She danced over with interest, eager to see who was the victim for today and she stopped when she saw the flurry of red barge past, skinny from sodden fur. Nymeria blinked before she turned her stare back to the woman, the wolf and she dropped her props to the ground, clattering and splattering to the wet soil.

"Death," she stated loftily. "They deserve death," Nymeria all but cooed as she swung forward with a glint in her silvery gaze that spoke of glee. "It is our way! Our way," she sung, "yet you let it live." Nym pouted as she would tut, looking upon the much taller woman with disappointment. This was who Morty was allowing to bear their name, their divinity? "Not fit," she muttered as she shook her head, "you do not fit." She snarled the last word out as she hauled herself backwards, muttering to herself as she searched around for the props she had come with.

Their divinity would be defiled with the likes of this wolf, weak to purge their home, their home! of unfit beasts. In doing so she made herself just as unfit! Nymeria stood, hunched over at the shoulders as she stood above her items and she cast her cast her gaze towards the wolf as droplets of rain dripped from her sodden feathery cheeks. "You must kill it," she warned, "kill it!" Nymeria demanded, "purge, purge, PURGE!" ^^

the staff team luvs u

Bile churned in her throat as a feminine voice tittered from nearby.
 
Shit.
 
Reluctance grappled with her steps as Galene emerged from behind the tangled mass of roots, her countenance expressionless. Had there not been such distance between them, she could have sworn the relentless drumming of her heart, spurred to motion like a hapless bird– would betray her faux exterior. Speckled with blood and glinting with madness, the wolf who she assumed to be Madmortigan’s sister paraded closer, discarding her bloodied objects like toys as the tirade began. She was small, punitive– her size something to leer at, had her name not been something carved of utmost importance. Galene found herself recoiling as she swung forward, horror stinging at the realization of the words–
 
You do not fit.
 
No, no, no.
 
This would be remedied.
 
“I’m not finished,” she hissed, aiming to brush past the mismatched woman in pursuit of her quarry. “Move!”
 
Nothing would stand in the way of her ascension to divinity.
 
Nothing.
 
The fox may have earned a head start, but Galene was hot in pursuit– her nose running flush against the dampened soil as its musk gowned her, signaling where it had stowed away. There, embedded among a dancing clump of ferns, was a fleeting glimpse of telltale red.
 
Kill it.
 
She lunged forward like a snake coiled to strike, her fangs flashing– and this time, finally, she did.
 
Her jaws encircled its neck in a deadly embrace, a sickening crunch resounding through the rain. Her teeth found their mark and gouged into bulging veins, severing tender flesh– letting loose a bubbling stream of red that ran freely from the open wound. The fox fell limp in her jaws, the struggle all but soundless and futile. Iron flooded the buds of her tongue with an acrid tang and she resisted against the urge to gag, to recoil at the horrific deed she had just committed–

No. She had done the right thing. The thing that this world needed as its saving grace, the thing that had–

She retched. Everywhere. Her flanks heaved in rebellion to her deed and her limbs buckled, leveling her with the corpse strewn aside her keeling form. It had to be done, she repeated, cycling through the words, stifling the pit that had opened in her stomach. 
 
Her gaze steeled, and she recouped– her lids clasping shut, briefly, as she clutched the lifeless creature in her jaws. When at last the stones encircled her and the gnarled tree bent into view, Galene hurled it– tossed the broken body of her quarry toward the assembly of bloodied trinkets that the woman had discarded. 
 
“Another token for your freakshow.” Outwardly her veil remained emotionless, but her heart clenched at the sodden thud of its body against the stones.
 
Had it been enough?
 
“Satisfied?”

the staff team luvs u

^^

Success.

She had forced the paw of the other woman, seemingly lighting a fire up her tail as she hurried to say that she wasn't done and swept past her after the sodden fox. Nymeria cackled as she watched, saliva pooling in her lips as she swayed her tail merrily behind her, eager to see what the other would do. Nymeria did not follow her in her hurried run, not someone to chase another yet she would wait, eagerly and patiently for the return.

Return she did.

Smelling of blood and throw up, her cackles high and delighted as the other woman tossed the broken body of the fox towards her current collection. Had she or the fox thrown up? If it were the other woman, Nymeria wondered just how long she intended to remain with them if she couldn't handle death. Her ghostly gaze drifted to the fox and she pranced closer, the womans voice echoing in her ears as she lifted a paw to press down harshly on the fox's eyes. "I want you to want this," Nymeria cooed as she felt the squelch between her toes but she pulled back as she wiggled her paw and looked back to the woman.

"You are with us, Petal," not a rose, because they had thorns and they could be dangerous -- no, this one was simply the decorative petals until proven otherwise. "So be with us!" Nymeria demanded as she lifted her chin, wanting to see just how far the other would go to prove she was meant for this. "It's eyes," she cooed lovingly, "take it's eyes." Or would she cower? ^^

the staff team luvs u

She wasn’t. Would anything she did manage to quell her doubts?
 
That question was quickly answered as the nymph, bloodied and buoyant in the face of her torment, thrust her digits into the socket of the carcass with a sickening squish. Galene fought the urge to recoil as liquid spattered from the damaged sockets and trickled down her waving toes– but she maintained her composure. Somehow, despite the bulging ache that had lodged itself in her throat.
 
So be with us!
 
The words resounded with dim fervor in her head as she stared blankly at the mangled fox.
 
Then, without so much as a change in expression, without so much as even an inclination that the action incited any feeling within her– she set to work. Her jaws gnawed at the welling sockets, rivulets of red staining the earthen fibers of her fur. Pop.
 
One down. She discarded the pliant orb at the side of the carcass.
 
Pop. Two down. The second was discarded close to the first.
 
But she wasn’t finished.
 
The rain continued to pour and drain slowly from her ruffles, washing away the vibrant tints of red that stained the edges of her fur. The liquid pooled at her feet, a watered-down river of crimson that trickled at the edges of the chiseled stones. Her teeth– once pure, once clean, now sullied and forever stained with the weight of her sin– began to rend flesh from bone, severing the skin of its nape and pulling, pulling…
 
Snap!
 
A head dangled from Galene’s jaws, its empty gaze piercing back at her own. Perhaps it was better that Nymeria had ordered it be stripped of sight– better that she couldn’t feel the accusatory glare of its lifeless eyes. Her head began to tingle, numbly, with a dull buzz that reverberated in her ears.
 
Her jaws unhinged, and the skull plummeted against the wet stone. “I am with Labyrinthian.” Blank, emotionless.
 
“So if you have any further concerns,” she began, eyeing the smaller woman with a dubious glint in her eye– “I suggest you bring it to the Harbinger until you have earned that rank yourself.”
 
She didn’t know where she was going, not really. Only that she needed a reprieve from the shelter of the ruins; a venture out into the open skies, where the rain could wash her clean of sin.

---

Exit Galene unless stopped

the staff team luvs u

^^

Nymeria laughed.

She laughed and it was loud and it was cutting, her silver gaze glinting with amusement and cruelty. She had done as she requested, wanted, demanded -- and Nymeria couldn't help but feel delighted. It was obvious to her that the other didn't fit properly, she hadn't wanted to do what she had yet she felt like she had to and she did.

The Wraith wondered just how far the other would go to ensure her placement within the ranks she had opted to join. There were plenty of levels below killing a fox and taking its eyes and Nymeria was hopeful she would be there to see her descent into hating herself. "We will see each other again soon, Petal," Nymeria cooed to her retreating back, grin wide and toothy as she danced towards the discarded eyes that lay by the carcass.

"You will be useful, little ones,"  she had just the spell they could be used for. Nymeria swiped up the slimy, squishy, damaged balls and did the same to her two other discarded items and with a full, disgusting mouth, she pranced away. ^^

the staff team luvs u