I like it when you take control

Now that they were growing older, and slowly hearing more and more of the Deorwine lore, the Queen brought her newest four out of the den. She would generally teach them as she did for her first brood, although wasn't so onto 'royal' duties, for these young would never truly be close to the throne like the rest were. They carried a title that meant nothing to ; but she still looked at them with all smiles, and ignorance to her own neglect toward them and the gradual distance given.

"The Deorwine family is a long lineage, where they follow the High Elk ; he with a thousand horns. It was said when one of our ancestors betrayed them, the High Elk marked him by stripping away his colors. To future generations, white is a warning of those who have more of a chance to become a lost soul, someone who turns away from the light of He." She gazed at the few, particularly @Faust and @Weirs who were lightly marked in such a color.. However the son, @Seaver, was an oddity altogether, colors fashioned together that indicated of such an unknown lineage that she truly wondered who the bastardly father was. It was frustrating, she couldn't remember. An embarrassment.

Her claws dug into the dirt, as she continued explaining, "to those who are not, it is up to them to help guide them. Such as you, @Selwyn, protect your brother and sister to a path that is said they are more prone to follow. Yet, you are all wonderful, and I believe you are not destined so, and that the High Elk has blessed you all."

Where she dipped, and touched each of their heads with her own. An affection, even though some lies were mixed to her truths.

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Recent weeks had been filled with learning for the young wolf, and this still only marked his beginning.

Weirs' narrow spectrum of understanding was expanding. He had already figured out that those around him possessed a wealth of information--of all kinds, it seemed. He appreciated when they shared it with him, too. Often it was their mother near the greatest source of this, so when she came to them to grace them with what she knew, he certainly listened.

Gathered among his siblings (and situated nearest his sister if he could), he absorbed this--easily charmed by thought of a thousand horns especially. Their lineage was long, their history.. particular. Before pride could burble, he felt it curbed, thinking to his little absence of color on his hind toes and chest when the queen mentioned such. Subtly, slowly, his ears splayed out. A warning. There had always been a sense of something that made some of them in their family different. Even in his youth he could pick up on the hints of this in the older siblings and beyond, some louder than others. Now he was able to know, and to truly see better why that was.

He was silent, internalizing this facet. To find out he was more prone to following a path of a lost soul just because he had white on his toes felt strange. Even if Selwyn (who he trusted in greatly) was to be their protector. Even if Celnes concluded with reminding them they were wonderful.

He was going to need a bit for this to set in properly. Instead of questioning it further, he only nodded. For now.

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Faust listened to her mother, and as she explained about.. White, and their brother, her gaze couldn't help but drift toward. Specifically gazing at herself and Weirs, who both werw of cold browns and hailed with white toes. Although she carried it a bit more, touching to her paws, her chin, her tail and chest. Then he, who carried some toes and his lil chest ; the two that were similar, besides their brown and gray brother and the other that shined with a more golden, orange-hue.

But they were destined to the wrong path because they were not like the rest.

Different, but the same, under the High Elk's law, but born from the same womb and holy mother.. Strange, she thought, and questionable. Yet none of her other siblings raised a question and nodded, and she too simply looked and nodded — but something about it was unsettling.

She didn't agree to the ways.

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^^

In the world he knew little of, everything made sense. Or well, he thought it did. It made sense that he knew his family, his litter-mates and the odd older sibling who came to them, he knew that his mother not... oft around through the days. He supposed lately he saw more of @Hawking and @Teodora more than mother yet it was her that the title was given to. Selwyn's brain was still young and could not properly understand the ins and outs and went with the norm, that she had been the first one he had seen when he opened his eyes so it were her that he favoured.

Even if the deer and the maiden were of his favourites, too, being the only other creatures he saw nearly as much as his littermates. Still his loyalty even for one so young ran thickly and deeply, knowing he didn't want to see Mother, his siblings, the stag or the doe-eyed maiden away from him for good. It was with rapt attention that he listened to Celnes, his back straight and chin lifted, the image of a knightly young prince.

Or so he tried, anyway.

She spoke of the way the High Elk stripped a betrayer of their colour and in its place was white. White signalled the lost, the damned. He crinkled his brows as he cast his blue gaze towards his siblings who held that very colour. They were not damned. They were loved, they were his. Selywn didn't understand.

Still he would unfurrow his brow and listen, not the boy to not intake the information as it was provided. Mother called his name, anoininting him the Protector. Protector of his siblings, more so the ones touched with white. She hadn't needed to tell him, for he would have protected them anyway but with the way his mother announced his protection, it settled something more serious in his soul. "Yes, mother," the boy intoned, reaching up to bump his head against his mothers softly.

Selywn looked towards @Faust and @Weirs, something intense in his belly. ^^

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"These warnings only follow elk, deer, and wolves. For us, if we see one of the Apostles carrying white.. Pure white, they should be hunted down. Some is a warning." She drifted away from the talk of coloring upon themselves ; there wasn't much to be said that hasn't already, and there was no questions at the moment. Just nodding of understanding, and a smile at her golden-brown son, sun-kissed and a sun-guardian to them all despite the youngest.

"It is black though, unspoken by elders and to keep away. Something onimous and forbidden — perhaps a sign that something is to come, but we know not if good or bad." Though in truth the Queen hasn't even see a black one. She had spotted one divided of black and white, where he ventured away from the land with a doe as well ; and Celnes though lightly, that didn't @Rahma look lightly like that doe? A coincidence most likely, that she thought no more of.

"Gray is the least liken color, but means nothing. Gold is more accepted, and yet not exactly of the blessed brown.."

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Listening onward, the queen detailed more specifics of who this doctrine applies to, and when to consider it a warning. He still felt a curious burn of dismay. Although he was interested in the other colors, how they compared, and all that, he felt like he had to slog through the haze of his.. possible wrong path. Focusing didn't come easy, but he nodded small again. The blessed brown still was the ideal and that truth would remain.

Through this after, Weirs did not sit as proudly as his brothers did. Distracted, maybe, at least in his head--the boy internalized the tumult best he could for now. There was a lesson to be had in this, surely. He had a lot to learn and he needed to be present to the here and now.. not getting tangled up in what ifs that he didn't even have the proper imagination for--it was just scary to think about something unknown and so ominous-feeling.

Always, this served as a healthy reminder... and best not to let his minor white toes trip him up already; he wanted to hear more so kept his mouth shut neatly, ears tall, at least.

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There was a lot of focus on colors in particulary, often mention of their colors that the reminder that it focused highly on elk and deer was often left in the mud. She hadn't seen any of those colors, only reminding vaguely of Rahma and Hawking, though one gently siding with some unusual marks and colors, wasn't too stray off the path that their mother mentioned so.

She was sparked with a curiosity, if there was an ungulate that looked like her siblings and herself. And how unusual, was it to diverge then to only wolves after. Were other species, not affected? They ate white rabbits, they touched the black birds, and they cared little to the unusual colored cats.. Faust furrowed her brows while listening.

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