[private] Mesmerized Skeletons || Lepis ||

[Wolfbane]

WOLFBANE

He can’t help it; Wolfbane starts to pace. Looking at her and seeing her aren’t the same thing, really. He needs to listen but not be drawn in by the look of confusion, so instead he turns one way a few steps, shoulders rolling and neck bobbing, then the other way to trace the line again. Of course you should stay, he wants to bite back, not if you didn’t - don’t want to though. He thinks, torn by indecision and how she seems so unsure of… them. Of this. Taiga and all its problems they’ve played a part in creating.

But he holds his tongue, still understanding her enough to know there’s more to come and when Lepis speaks again Bane’s pacing irritation slows to a halt. He stands with his body perpendicular to her own, giving the Comtesse an ample view of the shapely curves that used to warm her on the coldest of nights. “We both needed our space.” He consoles her, sighing and (for the first time in a very long time) wishing she would fabricate some sensation of peace. Bane knows better than to trust his emotions right now, and yet pride prevents him from asking.

Pride and… guilt.

Taiga is so dark and cold in the winter. Her quiet corners and blanketed valleys soften harsh words and vile tempers. Wolfbane remembers the feeling of his claws grasping her throat and squeezing, shaking his wife’s head like a piece of raw meat. It would’ve been so damn easy to just snap, so easy that he trembles quietly thinking about it. If she hadn’t told him to go the end result could’ve been far worse.

It’s then he realizes: she should go. Far away from him and this place, back to Castile and the comfort of Loess where she belonged. Away from the cold of the north and the threat of his grandmere, Heartfire. Away from a disgusting creature who hardly knew himself these days.
Wolfbane held his breath and looked back to Lepis, feeling the remaining vestiges of his already soured heart breaking for what he was about to say but - damn him, damn this body and this fucking curse - he still wanted her happiness.

If she stayed here, Lepis wouldn’t find that. She’d only find, “The truth… is that I’m not quite sure I love you as a husband anymore, Lepis.” He swallowed, the fine mist of his warm breath drifting away into the air as he said it. Don’t you fucking stop coward, Wolfbane urged himself on, sick in the head and truly sick in his soul. Hurt her until there’s nothing left to cling to. It’s best. “I betrayed your trust. Our vows. I-” He closes his eyes in the moment and turns his ears down, lifts his head to the dark boughs of so many black branches and just … lets go, “-am falling for another. Feeling things I’ve only felt with you - in another’s embrace.” His eyes open again and they turn on her, hardened by sheer willpower despite the overwhelming urge he feels to cry.

And Wolfbane has not cried since his father beat him close to death. Not even for Gale.

“I don’t want to fight anymore either.” Her Commandant concedes. “I just want this to end.”

Commandant of Taiga // Champion of Loess

@[Lepis]