It’s been a few months, he thinks. Busy months filled with change: settling back into the rhythm of this damned world without his mother, only to find Merida again and start a new life with her. As it should be, the shifter thinks, padding on overlarge paws right through the border of Sylva and straight into the heart of her red-gold wood.

Gryffen was gone but the memories he’d given Crevan were not. They spring to the forefront of his thoughts as he winds with familiar ease through this land, nose tipped skyward to catch the black bastard’s scent. Oh, Morty had been there during the coronation - Crevan remembers distinctly how the clown had watched he and Thana rip apart that red mare (Raxa, right?) and he hopes, knows the black stallion will not so easily forget him.

None who see him in action ever do.

It’s that particular creature he hunts today, ears forward and mouth closed tight. There was unfinished business here with Modicum, with Sylva herself, and he has plenty to say on the matter. This forest was becoming a laughing stock, Beqanna-wide, filled with nothing but strange stories that outsiders circulated as gossip. While Morty and the rest of this dismembered body thought themselves wicked, the rest of Beqanna’s powers - Tephra, Nerine, Ischia - were banding together and forging alliances.

He stops, catching the old scent of Sylva’s new-fashioned leader on a nearby trunk and there he stands, lifting one hind leg to piss atop the worn smell in order to make it new.

The wolf was home.

Expecting to find one black horse, Crevan is readily sitting when Mortem reaches him. From afar the wolf’s eyes, hewn from dark gems, flicker slightly when the clown-nosed stallion greets him. It would seem that not only the memory of his skin, but also his name is still fresh in the dark folds of that strange mind. Good. It would make things faster.

His snout twitches, tongue pressed against his teeth to interrupt when a rustle near them catches the shifter’s attention. The footfall is irregular … not horse, but large. And certain; there wasn’t any sense of hesitation in the erratic thud, thud that was swiftly nearing the two. Crevan considers the idea that perhaps it’s another shifter, or perhaps some chimaera come to greet them, but what weaves past the ancient trunks and comes to stop just shy of the light is something altogether … bloodcurdling.

Modicum finishes, but his audience is only half-listening.

The creature moves - something unholy and impossibly graceful - and Crevan will not tear his eyes away from it. Along his nape the dark, chestnut-colored hair stands rigid, though his face betrays little. It chirps (distinctly effeminate, but still unsure) and in doing so, causes Crevan’s imposing head to tilt with sharp curiosity. What was it?

“This isn’t a visit.” He snaps suddenly, jerking his sharp nose back towards Morty. A frown replaces the earlier look of interest, yet his eyes slide around to glance at the hell-being one last time before the taupe wolf stands and holds his ground. “You know why I’m here.”

Crevan exhales a short-sounding rasp of air from between his teeth, nettled already. If this was how the clown greeted all trespassers, the terrifying Sylvian reputation he’d been circulating wouldn’t hold for much longer. Of course, Gryffen wasn’t exactly snake-crafty either … or the pair of doves (what were their names again, Dahmer and Ellyse?) that came shortly after. Then there’d been another, though who or what they promoted was lost to his memory. He’d been dimension hopping, then.

All he knows is that eventually, this brute will die and perhaps even his unique friend too. Possibly sooner than either expect. Not Crevan, though. He’ll see a thousand leaders come to pass, and then a thousand more, and still the end won’t come.

But Sylva is here; as long as she remains, so will he - at home beneath her boughs and howling to her stars at night. “Do you really think you can manage without me?” He smirks, tail stiffening as it comes to curl above his hips, “Or stop me, for that matter?” The wolf tests, locking eyes with Morty for the breath of a moment.

“Beeesides,” The shifter huffs, breaking the tension with a curt wag, “Who else is going to finally convince you to let these creepy-crawlies you’ve been hiding away go loose?” Crevan toys, shifting his stance so that he can finally face the chittering oddity.

“What do you say, hmm? I think Hyaline deserves a peg or two knocked loose. Maybe Tephra. Some fresh goodies lounging around on the beach there, getting fat and complacent.” He questions, half-expecting there to be no answer. All the same his ears stand ready, that similar intrepid look blazing through his eyes. “What do they call you?”