Private The Docks The Blood On Our Paws

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

(Closed thread between Jeshal and Tanya following on from Such Devoted Sisters and Drinks All Around)

The walk back to their ketch had been agonising, if only for how much emotion Jeshal wanted to spill out before they got there. At one point, he'd had to physically hold his snout shut with his own claw to keep in his words, for how much his imbibed cider desired them aired. It was the longest silence of his life after they had agreed to wait until they were away from prying ears, broken only by necessity with forced small talk for which he had no mind or effort. The only thing keeping him from jumping into the bay and screaming underwater was the knowledge of how disgusting the sea would be so close inland.

Because Jeshal had never lost anyone, not really. Not anyone of importance. He had never known his parents or any siblings. His family, for want of a better word, had been whatever pirate crew he had been dragged along with at the time and loyalties had been few and far between, to say nothing of friendships. They had all learnt to use each other. Jeshal knew how to survive and how to manipulate. Family was something he had learnt during his life with Tanya, and retrospectively he had realised it had been the crew of the Golden Hide. Leaving the Imperium had not been too difficult for him, not when his tunnel vision had cared only for his wife. Anyone else he had cared for he had foolishly kept in stasis in his memory, as if nothing would change so long as they were not around.

Back in Bouillabaisse, so much had flooded back, if hazy. And so much of it was gone. Everyone he had known, gone. Anithias dead. Julia dead. Armina... Vaelora — he couldn't even reconcile that name with her — dead.

If we had stayed, they might still be alive. If we had stayed, we might all be dead with them.

He wanted someone to blame. What was wrong with this damned place? Why had they not tried harder to stop Kinza and Lorcan from coming here?

As soon as he and Tanya had got below decks on their boat, he prepared to say something eloquent to sum up everything he was feeling, every muscle tight with the need to blurt out a thousand words and plans and schemes and complaints and promises.

Instead he put his gauntleted fist through a cabinet.​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

Whilst in public Tanya made no mention of Jeshal's distracted nature. If anything her reticence to confront the situation allowed her to fillmin the gaps with small talk, deigning to make no notice of her husband's evident attempts to stifle himself. It was, if anything, a way to preserve his dignity until they reached privacy. That something was so evidently wrong was, of course, alarming in itself: outside of what she had witnessed him learn from that red panda's book, she had to wonder what else he might have picked up.

For the vixen loss had ever been one of the constants in her life. Death had stalked her since childhood with the promise of stability an ever elusive, dangerous promise ready to be ripped asunder at the instant one relaxed. Indeed, she had taken several seasons to accept once they reached Kutoroka, so convinced that a quiet life would never last. Grief would ebb and flow like the tides to be dealt with by all manner of destructive tendencies, though rarely would she try to articulate herself. Tonight the tide was crashing in and she was treading water. She had refused to cry in front of her sister, nor yet give vent to the grief and guilt burning like molten lead in her stomach: she could, and would, handle this.

However, despite familiarity with the swamping feeling that the deaths were inevitable, news from Dusk had still blindsided her. Deep affection had led her down the same assumptions as Jeshal - that the dangers and risks of the Imperium would somehow not touch those they cared for, not in their absense. Theose beasts were preserved as though in amber which had shattered on the moment of reaching the shores once more. How fitting, then, that Armina and her had spoken in the cemetary.

Tanya flinched at the splintering of wood, an uncharacteristic reaction drawn by mounting nerves. Her mouth opened to make a complaint about needing a carpenter now; she closed it immediately.

"Talk t' me, Jesh."

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

It was always precarious, that awkward moment of having to withdraw oneself from an act of idiocy. In Jeshal's case, this was literal as he resisted the urge to yank his beautifully crafted false fist out of the debris and instead slowly extricate it. His paws trembled with the urge to lay waste to more. Shame, coupled with his distaste for damaging their current home, held him back.

He turned slowly toward Tanya, hardly able to look her in the face for lack of knowing what to do with himself.

"We feared as much it would turn to hell, but I never — not like — they'd always been..." A soft snarl left his muzzle before he found the words and met her eyes. "They say 'Nith killed 'Mina. Had her killed at the least. Tell me it not be true, Tox. Tell me it be just another swathe of conveniently placed lies. I told enough of them in my service. Did it with a smile on me face, that I did. But this... Freedom hanged? This gull-scat about slaughtered doves? Did they tell you?"​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

Beneath the horrors of the conversation and the ache in her chest to dwell upon them, Tanya was grateful at least that her husband already knew. Whatever he had been up to prior to his arrival in the tavern had garnered him no small amount of interest and some good will from the new generation of citizens: it would have been a wrench to the evening to be the one to deliver the news this late.

Her own paws were shaking and sought refuge in the pockets of her coat where claws could catch on loops of thread and find some semblance of stillness. With any other beast she would have buried the pain and delivered harsh truth in the same manner she had personally delivered bereavement news to the families of her crews. Not Jeshal. Though she was seeking to retain composure, she did not see the need to mask the pain on her face nor the wavering of her voice.

"I met my sister today," she began by way of answer. "Dusk. Had her beasts bring me in, seeing as she's a Minister now. Turns out she's wanted to make amends after all these seasons and for once I believe her. She filled me in on...well, a lot. She needs me right now, an' I'll explain that later, but...but she told me. She told me that same story. Fitting as it'd be for 'Mina to get her revenge on us for doin' a bunk and leaving her with the funeral arrangements I don't think it'd be in her nature." She laughed, eyes turning skyward to try and stem the threat of tears. She made a gruff noise in the back of her throat. "She'd adopted some kits. Dusk said...for all the stories...she was happy for a time, though. Properly happy."

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

Though Tanya trusted the current Minister of Misanthropy, Jeshal had yet to be convinced. He knew he should trust his wife's judgement, and yet this sudden change of heart from Dusk seemed terribly convenient. Now that they had returned and were ripe to become pawns for the games of the Imperium once more. He had never minded before, playing it whilst it served his own ends, caring little for the cost when he had been young and driven by one goal alone. There were things to lose now and the pirate blood in the todd's veins itched rebellion.

He wasn't sure if it helped or not that Dusk's account was the same. Did it only reinforce a lie told from high up that was what had been disseminated to the populace, or did it confirm a tragedy he did not want to hear? To know that Armina had claimed family, in some way like he had, and had it ripped from her. Would it have been better she had never had it at all?

With Tox so close to breaking, Jeshal's fists clenched at his sides and then relaxed, the claw rattling. A sharp sniff left him, plugging the breaking dam with all his might.

"She were loopy, but she was ours, our family. And for as much as we tormented each other, so was he. I be missing pieces, Tox. Why? Why would the Ryalors make her into a martyr? Why would Anithias be so *&%!ing scatbrained as to harm her?" He hissed out another breath, trying to ignore a wayward tear. "All I be told is she turns out to be one o' them and somehow Freedom be blaming her for some rally explosion. 'Gates knows she always pissed him off and he raged at the Ryalors, but at her? How could Julia let—? Did he kill 'er with his own paws? What the hell happened?"​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

Staying still felt counterintuitive. Every cell in the vixen's body was screaming for movement; for frantic pacing and clawing and screaming hoarse her grief at the thought of any beast harming the vixen she had all but considered a daughter. It still did not feel real. To see no body, to have not been present, left an aching void of closure she could not grasp. Armina could not be dead, merely absent. She would always be thus.

"There was-...we spoke about so much," she began slowly, "I'll try an' remember details, but it's all...you know." She waved a paw, voice cracking before sucking in a quick breath. After a pause to compose herself she accessed the part of her used to make her reports. It was easier, after all, to detach and access mere narrative.

"You an' me will need to do some more diggin', but from what I've gathered...it got complicated. It always does. 'Mina wasn't always well, we knew that as y' say. By the sounds of it, without help, she unravelled to the point of bein' a danger others could manipulate like a weapon. She burned the Hide, killed beasts, went on a rampage. Long story short 'cause I don't know details, the Ryalor side've her family came to her aid. If aid's what you call it. Faked 'er death, medicated her, dyed her fur white an' reintroduced her to the city as Vaelora. Princess of the house." The disgust in her voice was impossible to mask. "'Nith had never gotten on with her, suppose he saw through the attempt or just hated the house. Whatever was going on in his head pushed him to kick up a killing of Ryalors and she was one of them, though it weren't by his paw personally. Talinn hit back, saw to it he and Julia were killed in turn. Their kits, an' the ones 'Mina raised, are still out there doin' alright by the sounds. Alive at least, if not well."

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

Jeshal's eyes widened on hearing about the Hide's searing. The more he heard, the more it felt like their presence might have somehow saved her. Or perhaps they would have burned along with their beloved ship. Who had she killed, he wondered. Maybe no one of import to him if Tox wasn't saying so, or perhaps she did not know. His jaw set, fists clenching again when Tanya went on to explain what the Ryalors had done. In 'saving' her, they had paraded her and provoked the opposition.

He should have focused upon the positive note that the children had survived and grown, that Armina had had children and they were well.

But —

"Talinn... killed Julia?" His tone was a powder keg. One of the few beasts who had shown him genuine kindness, who had seemed to see goodness in him however much he had cared for it or not, had been that kindly vixen. His memory of her was only of warmth, cradling babes, and having to deal with Anithias and Armina's spats. Now it had led to her death.

The Ironclaw took a few seething breaths through only his nose.

"Tell me," he said quietly, "be it entirely necessary for your sister to retain a husband?"​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

The laugh which barked from Tanya at Jeshal's query was neither humorous nor kind, something despairing in it as she broke a tension she could hardly bear. Delivering the news was painful enough: navigating her husband's reactions would prove to be another matter altogether. By trade she was a fixer: that there was no reversing this, that it was a pain they had to endure, rankled. No death was going to bring them back, satisfying as the moment might be.

She shook her head. "From the sounds've it if there's any beast who should be seeing to that, it's Dusk herself. 'Sides, revenge on revenge is how this all happened in the first place; Talinn sending beasts after Julia, 'Nith putting some after 'Mina. With the kits finding their paws in the city I don't want to do anything drastic and put them at risk." She scrubbed at her face, inhaling sharply before laughing again. "Don't mean I'm not against having a word or three, though. We deserve as much as getting a full picture of the what and why. 'Gates, it was bad enough when we were here, let alone..."

There was still so much bubbling in her mind that knowing where to even begin was a challenge. What could she even begin to process about Khan when she was reeling from Armina - now Vaelora? How could she come to understand what had become of Anithias when Dusk's complex dynamics were rattling in the back of her mind? Perhaps a visit to the Keys would give her space. Still, that meant leaving Jeshal.

Tox groaned, heels of her palms pressed against her eyes. "This is all my mess I've dragged you into through marriage."

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

Slow breath left the old todd as Tanya reminded him of the consequences of revenge. What had once been a driving force of his own had led him down a path very few were so fortunate to achieve, and that had been by changing the goal. He was a patient creature, however, was Jeshal. He did not need to run hot after Talinn. What he did know was he wasn't going to wind up marrying him. One day there would be opportunity. Or one day something would satisfy him enough to let the matter drop completely. Something that would not fall back on his family.

Truly taking in the situation now, stepping out of his rage, Jeshal saw just how barely his wife was holding it together, recognised the pain that he now wanted to raise storms to soothe.

"Remedy," he said softly, one of the petnames he had given her over the years to subvert the play on her toxic moniker, "ye dragged me from death, from stupidity, into power, and off the rosy cliffs, but never that."

He stepped in close and wrapped his arms about her.

"It be our mess. Ours. And, 'Gates, I can't tell ye how sorry I am about... Mina. What she... meant... to you." His voice cracked, tears finding their way, whether it was truly from his own grief, or because Tanya was hurting, he might never be certain.​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

So engrossed was she in trying to claw back some composure for herself before she could set about smashing the first object to paw that Tanya only registered arms around her once she was enfolded in their embrace.

“Don’t- I can’t-” she had growled stiffly, the word choked out through a barely contained sob as she froze for a lingering moment. It was at its heart a toothless warning: the floodgates were on the precipice of opening already.

For all the pet-names he might have given her, the comfort of Jeshal’s embrace was enough to undo so much of the anger. He was as much her remedy. A remedy against the years of anguish, the losses and duties she had undertaken which drove her to feeling so unsafe in her vulnerability. For a vixen who had made a lifetime career off being stoic, it was testament to their relationship that with him she knew she could give him every ounce of her emotions and that he would hold them.

Tonight was such an occasion. Without the rage, grief was soon to follow. Burying her face in her husband’s chest Tanya did not deign to respond with words. She screamed her anguish into the fabric of his coat as she gave vent to the shock and pain which had been sitting in her chest since the revelation, claws gripping until they near punctured the heavy material. She sobbed brokenly, as only one who has kits of her own can. Despite the relative closeness of their age and the refusal she’d have had made to Armina - Vaelora’s - face at such a claim lest it come across as condescending, she had loved the vixen as though she was her own. She had not only failed her, but in doing so failed the promise she had made her own brother to protect his daughter.

There were no words, for neither could she manage to find breath to form them nor an expression grand enough to encompass loss.

At length Tanya managed to regain her breath, staggered though it was, and still the wracking sobs into the occasional spasmodic gasp. Her paws squeezed Jeshal again, in reassurance and thanks and affection, trying not to let guilt settle in her chest after the expulsion of pain. Jeshal had cared for Armina, too. There was loss for them both. She needed to give him his space tonight to grieve, and thank him for giving her some. The primal, all-consuming nature of it had, for the moment, helped to vent some of the pent-up agony she had been holding on to for the day.

For a beat, though, she knew she needed to distract herself if only for five minutes before the pain drowned her. Tanya nuzzled against her husband’s chest, as much to wipe her eyes as seek comfort, and mumbled, Her voice was hoarse. “D’you remember Khan? Miserable old bugger. Should’ve known when he started drinkin' like a fish. Dusk said he’s our…”

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

A few tears of his own shedding, Jeshal focused on letting Tanya release her grief. In those moments of holding her, there felt a small eternity in which he could plot the downfall of every beast responsible for bringing her pain. Somewhere behind his eyes was a spark that could have set Bully aflame and not merely a few ministry buildings. He hoped that they could sell the idea that he was not a danger to the Imperium, but if anything ever happened to Tox, any oaths he made would be dust in the sea breeze.

Keratin claws stroked Tanya's nape to soothe himself as much as her. Their motion paused when she spoke of Khan, at what she inferred. Somehow it all made a horrible amount of sense.

Oh, for Vulpuz's sake...

Jeshal leant back to look at her, incredulous. "Tweak me blasted tail. Really? No wonder the bastard tried ter kill me. What else does yer dear sis have ter say? How's that sit with you?"​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

Comforting as Jeshal’s paw had proven, Tanya nearly distracted herself by complaining when he paused and leant back. It would have been tempting to dismiss all with a joke and pursue physical comfort in the arms of her husband, but he deserved to know as much as she could communicate. There was hardly much time, after all: the Sparrowsong would need preparing. Damn it all, I just want the night with him.

“I don’ even know,” she mumbled, scrubbing at her eyes with a paw, “I spent a few hours in that office an’ came away with more information than I could hold. I s’ppose it hardly matters as he’s dead anyways, was always miserable an’ never told me a thing. Then Dusk goes sayin’ I was all he spoke of at the end an’-” She inhaled sharply. “-an’ I’m angry.” Her paws squeezed where they gripped Jeshal, a ghost of a wry smile on her lips. “Good thing you was always one step ahead of ‘is plans, eh? Stupid ol’ fox didn’t even get to be a proper grandpa to the twins in the end.”

Wiping her eyes once again, Tanya coughed despite her raw throat. “I’m…trying to put it all in order in my head but ‘Mina was…well. Main thing. Khan was another. Then there’s all what’s happened since. Talinn’s now my brother-in-law proper again: married Dusk.” She snorted. “Kept that one quiet. Got several kits of their own out there though the two aren’t exactly close right now. ‘Nith and Julia’s kits are out there in the city. I got my Brushes back…” She drew breath. “…And I need to ask you a huge favour, sweet’eart. Turns out this family’s got bigger and bigger. I’ve another niece overseas needs bringing home ‘case they come to harm, and doing it quiet-like would be best. Would you be alright with keepin’ an eye on the Ministers, maybe getting a better paw’old on what’s gone on since we left while I do this?” She studied his face for a few moments. "I don't intend to leave 'ere for a few hours at least, so I'm not rushin' out on you. How's all that sit with you?"

 

[Jeshal the Ironclaw]

Though he had loathed Khan, Jeshal still wondered what his loss meant to Tox. To find out she had had a father, that he was that, and then to have lost him. How different could things have been if there had been no secrets? Maybe not so good for Jeshal, or maybe better for all of them. Family was a discovered joy for the todd and something he had complex feelings about, yet not nearly so complex as Tanya. What was it like to have grandparents? Even parents? He had been taught not to have attachments, had that reinforced time and time again, and so all he had learnt was obsession. How he had navigated parenting himself was a miracle. He owed that to Tox and to Kutoroka.

The confirmation of Dusk's marriage to Talinn sat uncomfortably with Jeshal. This continued connection to the Ryalors nagged at his insecurities when he allowed them. He was advanced in years now, better that he had enjoyed blissful ignorance until his temper grew less hot, and yet there was always that reminder that he was the second husband. The bastard. The pirate. Tox had assured him over the years of her love, and he did not doubt her. It did not fully stop him from feeling he competed with a ghost now that they were back on these shores. Not with the reminder of that family, not being stepfather to another todd's kits. Jeshal pressed himself to focus on the facts, the information, the old habit of collecting details that could be used. Dusk and Talinn had children. Anithias and Julia's kits were all grown up.

Another niece? What mad politicking be going on now?

Jeshal made a raspberry sigh.

"I'll be fine, love. Can't say there be much I can glean on the goings-on 'less I get me paws up a few rungs and in more pies again, but I will have your back while ye be gone. But quiet-like sneakin' off ter fetch a niece? Already ye be roped into Ryalor mess. No point asking ye if it be dangerous. What matters is that it be your choice."​

 

[Tanya Keltoi]

Though she knew she’d no need to seek his permission, relief and gratitude still showed itself on the vixen’s ageing countenance. Returning had been discussed long before embarkation on their little ketch, but in the absence of much knowledge as to the Imperium’s state owing to the distance, family had been a minor consideration. Tanya was rapidly discovering this foolish on her part: she had considered herself mostly disconnected from the Ryalors after Falun’s death, but Dusk’s marriage cast a new light on relations. Poor Jeshal.

Ryalor mess. Would that Jeshal could have heard her condemnation of the house itself but a few hours prior: her loyalty had always extended to family but never to the house and its aims, though to be in their service at once was…quite the choice, she recognised. In the absence of family of her own through her youth she had always sought to grasp onto what she could in search of connection, a desperate scramble to preserve tenuous links across the seasons. Now, with a husband and children and decades of separation, why was she so eager to please and rush off no sooner had she landed, all at the whims of a sister who, last they had met, had been so well known for manipulation?

Because they weren’t there for me at that age, and I couldn’t do that to Mina Rose.

“Funny enough I don’t think it’s goin’ to be all that dangerous,” she explained. “Looks like there’s been pirates in the Keys: Dusk’s worried this niece of ours could have come to harm. Any attack’ll be long gone. Her paws are tied as Minister keeping things settled here, so it’s a quick job. Couldn’t leave some young’un alone out there, could I?”

Reaching up, one paw gently stroked her husband’s cheekbone with affectionate care before taking his face in her paws, rising tip-paw to kiss his forehead. “Thanky’, love. We'll get through this together. Should have known as much things change they stay the same here. Can’t say it’s been an easy day, this, but looks like you’ve had your fair share of…whatever it was you was up to.” One paw dropped to his shoulder, coming away with a small remnant of white on dark pads. She arched a brow. "I even want t' know how it is you got yourself an entourage within a few hours?"