I don't know morning from dark,

Days would pass, by the moon remained the same. In the midst of the vale, in the forest of pines, Aries looked between the trees and up to the sky. It's eeriness still hanging, giving an unnerving feeling. It was hard to say what was happening for it, and what it meant for the region itself whether it was a blessing or but a curse ; and the uncertainty caused her more anxiety with the thought. She couldn't turn away from it either, as every night it dauntingly looked upon the world itself..

Her ears flickered, the sound of rustling in the distance had Aries turn to another. The scent of another Duskguard member was nearby, and she gently called out with a, "hello?"

---

@Aurelia

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Aurelia sat nearby, perched atop a large boulder, completely inert as she squinted up at the sky. The red moon was also a point of fascination for the child, and she felt the muscles in her neck straining as she struggled to peer closer, limited by both the confines of mortal flesh and the lack of a telescope. From the first night it had sent her into a frenzy, scurrying around Duskguard asking everyone she came across what it was and what it meant - but mother was still away, and she was unfortunately the best candidate to answer her myriad of questions.

What horrible timing!

She almost came close to a pout, but that would have been childish and pointless. Instead, she frowned in a much more serious manner, brows knitted together as she heaved a sigh and rested her face between her charcoal paws.

Stupid sky. Doing stupid new things. With its stupid moon. She just wanted to know why.

Movement startled her, and she snapped upright in a flash, ears erect as they swiveled toward the source of the noise. Aries!

She wasn't mother, but maybe she could offer some insight.

Aurelia hopped down from her perch, padding quietly toward her guardian. “Hellooooo...” she began coyly, in the tone of one who was about to blast her victim into the stratosphere with whatever was to come next.

“I got some questions.”

She inhaled.

“What's going on? Why is the moon red? It looks closer, is that bad? Is it going to hit the earth? Is the moon dying? When is mother coming back? Does she know about this? Has this sort of thing happened before? Has she told you about it? Were you expecting it?”

Her tail wagged gently behind her, staring up at the wolf with wide, forest-green eyes, sparkling and hungry in the dim light.

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On this night she wasn't expecting one of the cubs to approach, especially since she was supposed to be asleep. Although maybe it was on her for disappearing ; they were not used to neither Tiberius or Olive being there, and she wasn't sure whether they liked her sleeping with them. An array of questions was shot at her, where Aries looked at her and had to blink for a few moments of silence to gather all that was asked, "they say the red moon is a sign of change. It could be something grand, something wonderful, but it could also be an omen. It's important to watch around and see what changes there are. It is not dying, but telling something to the world we live in."

A glory yellow gaze turned back to it. Red as tundra berries, or as the blood of one whose mortal ; it was standstill with nothing but the stars surrounding it. Barely any clouds to notice as well, but it had.. Been a while since it remained that she wasn't sure how to answer all the questions, "one can never know the signs of when we will see the moon like this. I imagine not even your mother could guess, but neither could I say what she thinks of it. She should be back soon, and maybe with so, the change is news she will bring." Aries was certain that the blood moon was tied with what was storming throughout the tundra. The upcoming war that had her tail curl around herself in an anxiety, and the way the court continued onwards..

Who knew what will happen once she returns, and what that meant for Duskguard's future. It seems the Chief had a fondness for the Dragonford leader, but they were also allied with Northfall. Even Aries couldn't choose a side, she thought death was tragic and unneeded, but was it truly unfounded? Was the end of all of this, only more death? .. All too much for a child, who looked at the same moon in curiosity. Aries turned to Aurelia, smiling warmly, without a care of worry.

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Aries was alright.

Aurelia had regarded her with suspicion for some time, thinking the woman was an imposter of Olive's with her similar coat of milky hues and quiet speech, and if there was one thing the child hated, it was things she didn't understand - or things that made no sense. Thankfully it took only a quick discussion to make amends, and although she still thought it an unnecessary burden that Aries be continually hovering over herself and her littermates in Mother's absence, she had her uses.

The pale she-wolf bolstered herself against the face of explosive inquiry, took a valiant breath, and began.

She started with the red moon being a sign of change - well, obviously. It looked super different already. Boring.

Oh. She continued. Change like, something really awesome, super fun, or - an omen. The child raised an eyebrow skeptically. Although Olive was a mystical woman, Aurelia was a touch more rooted in the realm of reality, and had only a certain tolerance for voodoo-nonsense before she would grow tired of the hypothetical and run off to go bird-watching.

“I heard the moon affects the tides,” she said in her high, girlish tones, shifting her own emerald gaze back toward the sky. She wasn't entirely sure how that worked either, but at least it was rooted in actual (alleged) knowledge and not some woo-woo magical figure that resided in the air or something. “Does it being so red and huge now make them different too?”

The girl sat still, mulling over the tidbits Aries had given her. Well, now, the part where she doubted Mother being able to guess the intent of this crazy event was ridiculous; Mother was all-knowing and omnipotent, even if she liked the woo-woo stuff.

Maybe she would get into it too one day, with enough exposure... but just not yet.

“What do you think's going on at the Council?” Aurelia quipped, flashing her eyes sharply back toward the woman. Her stare was uncomfortably intense, almost piercing through the very being she would direct it toward. “Why did Dalmatia get to go and not me, or Euphemia, or Tiberii?”

She loved Dalmatia - but everyone knew all she did was cry.

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"The closer the moon is, the higher the tides. But I don't think that the color would change that. The moon is often dressed in other colors, sometimes we see it even in blue, and I had heard once every so often, it's as purple as a violet." However it was a rather assumption then facts as she thought of it, because Aries has never seen the ocean and how wild it can get when a supermoon arises. Though she does notice at times when it changes it hue, to either a more reddish tone that is like a brown, or otherwise a blue like glacier water.. So light and unnoticeable, barely seen.

"The council is greatly helping settle the strife. With your mother there, I believe it is going peacefully." Though she too was actually wondering, but with no messenger or a rush to bring news to Duskguard ; at the very least she believed it didn't mean anything bad. Kuhn was also there, among the wolves of the council.. But so was the enemies that attempted to take his life, unsuccessfully. Would that be alright? Harm to a tiger was a near impossible-feat, but his scars shown a grand battle occured and even more, she wondered if he held a grudge.. But at the very least, it meant Olive and Dalmatia were safe.

"I think that your mother wanted your sister to spread her wings a bit. She always has been afraid of strangers, and maybe it could help enlighten her."

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Aurelia remained silent, curling her tail around her haunches as she listened dutifully with curious eyes. She'd never heard anything about blue moons or purple moons before, but if red ones were possible, then they didn't seem entirely out of the question.

“There ever any green moons?” she asked, childishly hoping such a thing existed because - well - her own eyes were green, and it would have been cool. “And why does the moon being closer affect the tides? I don't usually see any more fish than usual, and none of them ever wash up when it happens. You'd think they'd be stressed.”

Leaning over to scratch at her ear with a hind paw, the girl shook her head, sending her cheek fluff flying in all directions as she did. Aries was doing her best, but Aurelia would have appreciated a little more detail in her responses. For every answer provided, five more questions sprang up in its place, and she grew frustrated that none of the adults could keep up with her pressing need for understanding.

Aries shifted talk toward the council. It was all perfectly reasonable, of course. Dalmatia would hopefully benefit from so much social exposure, being the least outgoing of the pups, but it still didn't feel fair that Mother could only bring one of her daughters. Why not two? Why not all of them? Surely if the meeting was supposed to be peaceful, it would've been safe for kids.

“Whatever. It's still not fair,” she snorted. “So - the moon controls the ocean, which is fine, but I wanted to ask about the stars. What all do they do up there?”

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"Hmm, there could be. Sometimes shooting stars are green. It seems possible." Though Aries never heard of the sorts whether the moon could be dyed in green, but maybe it was something yet to be seen. No one knew why shooting stars would fall with different colors, but sometimes within the streaking sky, she could see the look. As well as when the aurora beamed well to the tundra sky — the tones were always there that it made it seem possible.

"No one really knows. Many different cultures have different thoughts, some believe the water is being pulled to the moon, or the moon is trying to borrow some water." She didn't wish to tell Aurelia how she didn't know, afraid to disappoint the curious little girl. As a child she too remembered feeling fustrated when adults did not know the answers — but the best that she could pull was fables and theories, passed through knowledge and the wonders of others.

"Like the moon, no one truly knows, but everyone has different beliefs. Many believe those are our ancestors, lives who long since passed and are eternally in the sky. Others believe since the moon too, glows like them, it's millions of other moons across the sky. Maybe they are a land much like our own, but too far for us to see them." She turned to look at the sky, where the moon and the stars were. Glistening as they did, always still, never moving.. Eternally in a painting.

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Aurelia nearly audibly gasped. She had only seen a shooting star once in her (short) life, but she remembered the wonderment that accompanied the event. Her head had rolled so far back it nearly went off her shoulders, though it hadn't been green at the time, as Aries had stated.

She hoped she might see one someday.

Aries did her best, plunging raggedly on against the torrent of her charge's endless barrage of questions and demands that seemingly had no end. The child was by no means malicious - she just really, really wanted to understand, and sometimes the puzzle pieces didn't add up.

“The moon can't borrow water,” she scoffed dismissively. “It doesn't have arms, or a mouth, or anything to come get it. I think it's gotta do with what keeps it in the sky - or something. Probably. Maybe.”

She squinted up at the stars as if she might force their secrets out through sheer will alone, but only silence greeted her in response.

Now, the theory about all those stars being ancestors seemed more plausible. It didn't make sense to her that all these thoughts and feelings and things that made her - herself - should be born just to vanish in a puff of dust one day down the line. No; Mother was spiritual, and in some ways, even Aurelia clung to the mystic beliefs of her maternal parent.

“Them being a bunch of other moons makes sense,” she said thoughtfully. “But I like the stars being people we knew... better.”

Aurelia sighed, wishing she had all the answers as much as she wished she could enjoy the idle fantasies of youth - but every day she grew older, and every day she recognized what a practical, system-centric world they lived in, and how every leaf held a purpose.

“You'll be a star one day for sure,” she said suddenly, shifting her forest-green gaze toward her companion. “A really bright one.”

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