This particular diamond was extra special.

She was beginning to fill out where sickness had previously stripped her bones of flesh, and her coat appeared significantly healthier. Maral found the strength to hunt more often, compelled to feed only on the freshest and most nutritious meat. Throughout the daytime she'd prowl the neighbouring Jawbone Crag for small goats, but on that particular night she hungered for bird.

Maral picked her way quietly through the forest, nose working to detect any sign of turkey. They were a common prey among the Elk's Crown and she thought back to the day before the poisoned waters when she and Rohesia had felled an impressive beast. Saliva pooled in her mouth at the thought, the recollection of the taste, and she swallowed.

Her hunt brought her deep into the woods, and at last her sharp gaze located a smaller specimen. It lurked in the dark, looking for a safe place to rest; Maral crouched low and silently carried herself closer. Nostrils flared, she inhaled deep and veered to the side where the bushed provided shelter, keen to avoid being detected - but something else seemed to startle the fowl. The shadow straightened herself and huffed a breath in disappointment as she watched her prize flail away, then turned her muzzle to look between the trees for whatever fool had ruined her hunt.


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 Since joining, Rafferty had spent most of his days exploring the territory, patrolling and strengthening borders as he traveled.

 Trotting long through the changing undergrowth, he heard a scrabbling gobble and a flutter of wings. 

 Then he saw Maral.

 “Oh, shit. That was my fault, wasn't it?” He huffed and offered her an apologetic tail wag. “It's good to see you again, though.” Straightening a little, the tufts of fur on his chest jutted out. “I'm official now.” A new pack. A new home. A new life.

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Much to her surprise, a familiar figure stepped out from between the trees and into her line of sight. Maral blinked up into his dark features, velvet ears springing forward; all frustration drained away from her as she sought the scarlet of his single eye. He accepted blame for the loss of her intended prey and she listened quietly, unsure how to respond, and her toughened exterior cracked when he noted that it was "good to see her".

... was it?

She twitched a whisker, and flicked her tongue over her chipped canine. Maral averted her gaze downward for a moment to consider how vulnerable that simple statement made her feel, then tried to straighten her posture. She didn't like relying on others and had resigned herself to believing that she did not need anybody - but was it so terrible to crave affection she'd been so deprived of?

It was dangerous for Maral to think too long on that, so she decided to stride forward on limbs that suddenly felt shaky. She reached for Rafferty, moving to invite herself closer and gingerly attempt to press her brow to the curve of his throat.


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 It was the first form of contact he'd felt in months, a gentle touch that wasn't followed with the promise of teeth. The tension in his shoulders snapped, muscles banded now sank, melting into the warmth of Maral's small gesture. 

 Arching his head, he tucked his chin and head around her own in a subtle hug, breathing her in before he stepped back. 

 “I think I owe you a meal. Still feeling turkey?”

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He did not remove himself from her touch, but instead shifted to welcome it. Maral felt something unfamiliar within her chest, a small jolt, followed by the flurry of butterfly wings in the pit of her belly. Was that was affection was supposed to feel like? The shadow wasn't so sure what she thought of it or if she even appreciated it, but she continued to lean into the gesture - eager, suddenly, to explore what else she might discover. Her eyelids closed and she emitted a soft sigh, prolonging the moment.

Rafferty broke the contact, and Maral was sorely aware of the void he placed between them. She flicked her tongue nervously over her upper teeth and blinked up at him, uncertain, and pricked a velvet lobe at his mention of owing her a meal. Her appetite had dissipated, and she swallowed.

“It's fine,” she responded simply, because she didn't feel that he owed her anything. Fiercely independent, the shadow hadn't relied on anyone for anything in a long time - she wasn't prepared to start now. She did appreciate his consideration, though, and she even managed to muster a smile. “Do you like it here?”


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 Hugging her felt like hugging Celia. While Rafferty tried to keep Maral as her own person, he was catapulted to all he'd left behind at the sight of her white touches and dark chocolate pelt. 

 “I do, I think. I like it so far.” Rafferty looked at her and found a gaze that was as earthen and warm as she had been to him. “But...” There was a brief flash of hesitation before he steeled and forced it out. “I don't understand your religion.”

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Their eyes met, and Maral felt heat rush to her features. Her cheeks warmed and she found herself unable to hold the stare. The shadow didn't understand, considering how she'd conjured nothing within herself but frustration and sorrow in recent months - so how was it she could be genuinely content in the presence of an outsider? Rafferty claimed to be officially of Elkshire, meaning her mother had welcomed him among them, though quietly she fretted over the Queen's thoughts of her newest recruit's pallid markings.

He was like her, at least in terms of outward appearance. Dark, earthen fur wrapped his frame and he was tipped by alabaster, albeit in different parts of his coat in comparison to her own. Still, there was a comfort in her to know that she and her own little siblings were not the only ones among Elkshire's hierarchy to have been "stained". Perhaps her mother truly was coming to accept those who'd been considered to carry marks of sin.

“What don't you understand?” Maral asked, a velvet ear twitching as she attempted to meet his bold eye again, “perhaps I could help.”


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 There were no jeers or teasing due to his ignorance, just an open, quiet question and an offer to help. 

 “You're kind, thank you.” Rafferty took the thread of gentility and held it against his heart, protective and cherishing like a child over their favorite stuffed toy. 

 “You worship the High Elk, right? And you don't eat elk or deer. Edith said the High Elk represents life.” The last two rattled off facts gone over for his own benefit. “How did your family come to view them as God?”

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Ah, the High Elk. He who bore a crown of a thousand horns. Maral took a moment to consider how best to describe her own feelings for Elkshire deity, and she struggled within her own mind. She furrowed her brow and looked away through the trees, an ear turned toward her companion so he'd know she wasn't ignoring him. The shadow had worshipped Him quietly throughout her lifetime. She'd prayed in silence when a private moment presented itself, until she simply... stopped. She was not ad devout as her other siblings: Edith and Calhoun came to mind, though it was Aldritch and his deranged words that lingered at the forefront.

“We protect the deerkind,” she offered, “and in return, the High Elk protects us.” She shifted to face Rafferty again, her eyes seeking the contours of his rugged and handsome features, for she was eager to see his reaction. “It is said that our ancestors made this arrangement with Him long ago, and we have not strayed from His path.”

Some would not agree, but Maral liked to think herself loyal enough - regardless of the "marks of sin" upon her hide.


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 Rafferty listened, and he found that talking to Maral was easy, even when discussing something as vast and personal as religion. 

 He listened to her, the low lilt of her voice. The notes held the eloquent precision of someone who picks and chooses when to speak like a chef choosing ingredients at morning market. 

 It made what she had to say more valuable to him. 

 “Is that the main ideology? Are there any other tenants your family follows?”

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Maral, having already said more to Rafferty than she'd collectively spoken to anyone else throughout the past week, blinked at him as he asked for more. She'd offered to help him understand, sure, but she'd sort of expected her little summary of her family's deity to have been enough. At her companion's question, the shadow let a long moment of silence hang between them as she contemplated an appropriate response.

“Not really,” she offered, a waver of hesitation to her tone. Honestly, she felt like she ought to be the last wolf in Elkshire to share knowledge of the High Elk, yet there was some sort of desperation within her to talk to Rafferty. He wanted to know about their religion, their customs, and as Maral dwelled on those she swiftly encouraged herself to believe that he might want to learn who she was.

It both excited and terrified her.

The tip of her dense tail gave a curious curl and she looked down at the alabaster that tainted the toes of her left paw. “He covets those with brown pelts,” she shifted then, pressing her foot to the soft earth of the forest floor to mask the dreaded white, “though it is said that those marked with white are destined to sin.” A sigh escaped between parted lips. “Growing up here was not easy.”


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 Rafferty blinked at her, taken aback. 

 He was struck silent, the quiet stretching long and awkward. The teen took Maral in, staring at the wide swath of ivory along her chest, the accents of light on her body - those had always been his favorite parts of her. 

 Quickly, he ducked his head to glance at his own white adornments, the splash across his neck and chest. His tipped ears twitched. “I...” His entire face scrunched. “What the fuck?” Softening the curse with single chuckle.

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She lifted her paw from where it'd scraped the damp, loose soil of the forest floor. Earth clung to the fur there, mostly masking the white of her toes, but she shook it off to reveal even more. Maral, a lifetime later, was still unable to love the more "tainted" parts of her. As a little girl she'd tried to hide the dreaded markings on her body with mud and clay, but she did not enjoy the feeling of being dirty. Unable to find comfort in using the earth to hide the worst parts of her, she instead found it more acceptable to seek solitude to hide her stained self from her family who saw the white on her before anything else.

Maral lifted her dark eyes as Rafferty responded with foul language, and she splayed her ears to hear such a word. “It is believed that anyone with white fur were born to bear the sins of their parents,” she explained, a frown tugging the corners of her mouth, and she stole a glimpse of the alabaster that tipped Rafferty's ears and snout. His own mother had committed such, as was Déorwine belief, though seemingly not as much as she herself. “Those like you and I can be saved, apparently, but you will never see a wolf with a pure white coat within this forest.”


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 Rafferty opened his mouth to apologize when he saw the line of her mouth turn down and her ears pin back. It wasn't her he was offended with - it was this backward belief. 

 “I hope this doesn't come off as disrespectful, Maral. But I don't think the color of someone's coat determines the color of their heart. You've been the nicest to me so far and you're the only one I've met with white.”

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She was offended, in some strange way, because she felt the need to protect what was hers. Her mother had bestowed her beliefs upon her brood at a tender age and encouraged them to follow her teachings. Maral was not as devout as some of her brothers and sisters, but she did want to please the High Elk. He was important to her, and she was fiercely loyal. When Rafferty gave voice to his opinion, the shadow straightened her posture and sought his scarlet eye.

"Nice", he called her. Previously he'd told her she was "kind". Those two words were not ones with which she'd ever thought she could describe herself, and heat burned beneath the dark fur of her smooth cheeks. “It is simply our way,” the shadow said coolly, choosing to dismiss the sweetness of his compliments that roused a fluttering within her belly. She agreed with Rafferty: darkness came in all shades. She'd seen it come in many forms, though the most notable was that of her own sister.

She lowered her gaze and stared at the Wintry hue of her companion's throat, and considered how very much she wanted to press herself to it again.


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 It didn't take an emotional savant to know he'd stepped in it. Rafferty's ears swiveled back and his head dipped, the same show of apology he'd given when he'd killed the elk fawn for a meal. 

 “I'm sorry. I'm just trying to understand.” So much of what he'd known had been lost. His reality had warped, and he was working hard to adapt. “But I can leave if I'm bothering you.”

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It was the way of Elkshire's royal bloodline and those who'd come to adopt their customs, and although she'd accepted her mother's teachings she knew right at the heart of her that such discrimination was not right. She considered it quietly as she watched Rafferty's ivory swathe, and with every fibre of her being wanted to believe that her family could truly shed such unfair practices. Welcoming Rafferty among them could be the beginning of that, she hoped.

He apologised, and again she wasn't sure how to react. The shadow lowered her dark eyes further, to her pack-mate's broad chest where the fur grew darker and coarser; it bothered her, how vulnerable he made her feel. When Rafferty suggested that he leave, Maral's gaze snapped up once more to seek his remaining crimson eye and made a hurried step forward to accompany her hushed plea: “no, don't... don't leave.”


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 So, he stayed. 

 There was another swell of silence, but this one was less uncomfortable, a natural ebb to the conversation with all the assuredness that it would come back and flow, like a tide. 

 “I wasn't raised with religion. My parents didn't believe in anything.”

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You wanna fade here?  :)

---

He remained with her, and Maral felt a little silly to have pleaded for him to do so. She averted her dark eyes as silence filled the void between them once again, and with a low chuff she beckoned him to walk with her. The white-tipped yearling flicked her tail, hopeful that by directing the negative energy she'd accumulated into her stride that her anxiety might dissipate.

“What were they like?” Maral asked, genuinely curious, “your family.” Nothing like hers, obviously. She liked to imagine that Rafferty had a mother who was gentle and kind, who treated him less like a pawn and more like a gift. She fancied that his siblings were warm and accepting, children who saw him as more than the white of his fur.


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 The change in expression was subtle, the lid of his eye narrowing, a twitch at the corner of his mouth. “My family wasn’t anything special.” But they’d affected him, nevertheless.

 “My sister, though. She was my best friend. A light. You remind me of her.” He said, turning back to Maral and offering her the rueful echoes of a smile.

 He would have done anything for Celia. He’d lost an eye for her, after all.

---

and fade!

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