Her womb emptied and the gentle mewling and suckling haveing begun, she settles in as the sun begins its setting and the chill of darkness hovers close. The stars begin to rise and the child at her teats has stilled with only the barest of rising and falling at its white fluff of a belly. She loves it as dearly as she had loved her other children - those that are lost to her. Delta had lived but she had left. Too much of her mother in her, too little reason to remain when she had no mind for love or family. She had felt drawn to them for a time - but the wolf in her had grown apart from her family as females were wont to do when they came of age. It had torn away Dimitri and Sabriel had always been a good enough boy that Pei felt him satisfiably matured to allow him his adulthood. That is why she lives here, why she told Isola that she would be Diveen's mother. She had found the den as promised and as soon as the next winter came and went, there would be comradery amongst the mothers. They would raise the children of Diveen with the amassed knowledge of many minds and many births, each playing midwife for the next and nursemaid for the pups of those around them.

               She had laid her head upon her paws to rest when a howl wakes her from her dozing and she finds that the note holds a tone of question. The howl was one that makes her tilt her head on her paws, chin rolling so that her ear could lift up and hear the song funneled into the floor cave of the plateau, leading to a entry to the slot canyon she claimed as the mothers-den. She groans, not sure if she wants to raise song with him or listen to the beautiful notes that play into the night sky exposed over her head through the skylight. The alarming thing was that a second howl reached out to entwine with the song, a voice from a past she had not thought to see again. She is as keen as the blind mole, hearing the tremors of unrest that Makism had proven too ambitious for his own good. Pompeii had been torn at the news, having thought to invite the gypsies to take refuge with the Divinian people if Isola saw the benefit of more wolves for a time to keep their home safer with more eyes and ears - even if just for a while.

               She aches at the sound of Tarquin's voice, her former protector and would-have-been father of pups shared by he and Makism despite her dislike of Makism's fathering skills. The newest turn of events had removed that possibility for her loyalty to Diveen having become solid with the love of Yojimbo and his subsequent love of this land. Well, that and her own investments that lay in the large basin den and the oasis behind and within the tunnels of the slot canyon below the feet of the males above. She can tell that Yojimbo is not far - likely not even feet from the hidden entrance above her head. The same, then, is noted of Tarquin as his scent wafts down from above and The Red Lady tenses. It will not be good for him to have come and yet she craves his familiar scent as strongly as she craves that of her brother and her children - real and adopted all. She was going to send up a howl of mournful wariness and warning, warn him to go back - to return to Makism and her brother....

               The next scent that flows through the mouth of the skylight silences her, however, and her babe stirs with the snarl that breaks the once song-filled and greeting-filled peace. Azrael is right to defend his home for those who would defy it's borders and yet it is not this that concerns her - as much as she may wish tarquin was not to face the teeth of those who she now bore the scent of. She smells of the canyon now, smells of stones that formed where lightning struck sand. She flattens her ears as she considers letting Azrael do what he must to defend the land of his sister - the land of the high woman of white and black and red that was almost as scarlet in color as her own coat. Almost. Considers. This being a clear indication that it is not what comes to pass.

               Her heart skips a beat as a whimpering mewl exits the mouth of her babe in response of fear struck by the second growling rumble of the Queen's Brother - and she is like a fury from the bowels of hell. With claws that screech on the flat stone like nails on chalkboard and a snarling roar, she leaps over her child and up the stone ramp up and out to the plateau flat above. The pup would be warm enough for the time it took to demand peace once more, the nest she created warm with sand and her own shed fur and leaf litter. She is maddened by the fear struck into the heart of her newborn and enraged that she was parting from his side. With spittle and snarls and all the glorious beauty of a mother wolf with every flame of righteous rage alight, she rips into the air between the males. She does not see if it is Azrael or Makism or Yojimbo, only that retribution is necessary for the child and that she will see to it that it is meated out with extreme prejudice. When she has harried the men a ways away from the hole into which she hid her child, She stands a good three inches larger in appearance than anyone would have recognized, sides heaving and eyes bright with threat

               She is beyond words, she is beyond the foolish language of civil tongue and her bared teeth part to let her tongue lap over her nose's wrinkled flesh. She snorts mid-snarl and lifts her lips again. Her body speaks to them then, her tail thrown high over her haunches - for she is the greater in position at the mouth of her den. It is her haven and she would see none ruin the peace of it, no matter their station in amongst the pack. The den was apart from pack, was a place where rank mattered as little as a grain of sand in the desert. Her head arches forward. Their savior is a mewl from behind her, his first meal well and truly not enough, and she looks over her shoulder with an alertness - head snapped to look into the dark mouth of the hole that was once hidden. When it quiets and she is sure it is because the sound was from the pup dozing again, she turns back and it is a visible transformation between the face that had been for the child - quiet, sweet, caring - and the hard threat that returned there. Yojimbo and Tarquin will understand why she does not speak at first, but her face twists up and she manages to half-growl and half-speak a small phrase.

“You. Will. Be. Still.” there is no room for argument.