Sludge

 The forgotten prince grew, puppy chub stretched and pulled like warm dough, malleable and changing. 

 He knew @Warwick and @Teodora loved him, just as he knew @Célnes did not.

 It was an odd life, to be a spare cog in a machine well-oiled and working. Seaver didn't mind so much, it gave him a chance to explore. 

 Every day his world got a little larger, like a flower unfolding in the earnest, expectant sun. Stepping up to the water's edge, he drank deep from the forest stream, nose wrinkling at the sour aftertaste. 

 It took mere hours for him to vomit blood. By evening the pup lay wasting, dead and rotting in the setting sun. A spare part rusted early and disposed without being used.

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In a way, the Queens latest brood were almost like her own children. The closest that the maiden was likely to come, she thought. Where @Célnes fell short in her love for her second litter, Teodora, @Warwick and @Hawking had filled in. The little babes were precious and though Teodora had her head in the clouds, she wouldn't have ever cast any of them out of her love. Teodora adored children and they were no exceptions.

Love was perhaps what made her heart break even more when she stumbled upon Seaver.

She stood in a short distance, mouth agape with shock as she looked at the scene before her. "Seaver," Teodora whispered as she surged forward on delicate paws, "sweetling," her nose twitching with the smell that came from him. Dried blood and vomit lay near him and Teodora's ghostly gaze gleamed with tears. The tall maiden would whimper as she bowed down to the boy, ignoring the smell and the little scene as she tried to nose his nape. "Please, little love," though it was useless, he was gone and she was crying.

The taste of salty tears touched her lips as she settled her belly down, wondering if the Queen would feel it in her heart that one of her brood had died -- and she dared not wonder if she would care. Teodora had never looked further into the Queens mind, not certain she would ever understand though loyal she was. She cast her saddened gaze down to him, dead before his time.

She swallowed, thinking of Warwick and when he would return, the news would be there for him. 

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Investigations would need to be done, and see how far their water was poisoned, and whether a source could be found. There was noticement of particles of the deceased dripping down the streams, something occured but they could tell what. There was maybe an assumption an elk had died within it and now fouled the water, but in the meanwhile, the Queen knew she would need to warn the pack. At the very least as a temperate region, there was streams all-around and would need to venture away from The Elk's Crown to quench a thirst — mountain-water, was surely not affected. Her thoughts swarmed that she would need to send someone to do that, but needed to..

Her ears flickered, the sound of sobbing within the distance that brought Celnes to find Teodora — covered within the salt of tears and herself, standing over the son of grays and browns. She froze within the spot, for the stillness of one and the rancid smell of the waters around brought a heightened sense, a quickened heartbeat.

The elken woman approached, her expression unreadable — saddness, placid, neutrality, anger? She wasn't even she how she looked, when she bent down and gently nosed one of her youngest brood, cold in body and still to the touch. There was no beat, there was no breath — and the blood that was nearby in a vomit induced.

She whispered, "Seaver?" while nosing him, not truly believing his death to be real.

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The guard had partook in the same water as everyone else, and even he had to admit everything seemed a bit blurry at the edges. He would hang in there just fine, or at least he wouldn't complain about it, that usually only made the body feel worse. The stomach had been fully purged long ago.

Providing his service to his client he accompanied the mad woman, to the scene of a dead pup. He, never met the poor child who didn't seem to ever get a shot at life. None of this really surprised him with such a poor and stupid leader at the helm.

Even in his groggy and dizzied state, a pool of rage came up inside him, the arrogance and poor leadership of the queen had cut another life short. Though, he would never show it.

skip unless addressed

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