i am the blood of the mountain

If I harbored one fear in revealing these details of not only my life, but their lives, to my children, it was that they would hate me or think less of me for the choices I had made. They were still young, and thus far in life they had not been forced to confront many trials or troubles. The four of them had never lacked for attention from adults, between Taliesin, Jericho, myself, and all of their other relatives that lived on the mountain. Even though they had never known what it was to have a father, it did not mean they were immune from the effects of his lack of presence. I held every confidence in my children that they could make their own, sound judgments on the information I provided them with. There was practically a ripple effect that coursed through each of them as I began to tell them about Leonidas. As my gaze swept over each of them, I saw the misgivings in Viserion's face, the way Kalseru leaned into Rhaegal and his nose touched to her shoulder, though Drogon looked at me as if he was deaf to the conversation. I pressed on.

When I came to the story's conclusion, I looked to each of them in turn, and for the first time I truly restrained myself when the instinctual need to comfort them welled up in my chest. It was best, I thought, to let them comfort each other in this, to deal with these very adult emotions would be a lesson in and of itself. The worst of it was watching my precious Kalseru curl into her brother, hiding her face from me in a way that was not meant to be adorable as she'd done when I'd come to wake them what felt like hours ago now. No, this was a motion made from hurt emotions, or perhaps from confusion. Rhaegal comforted his sister, while Drogon still just stared back at me. Finally my mahogany eyes turned to Viserion, thinking that perhaps since he knew where the story would end he might be the first to be ready to speak. But as my crown pivoted towards him, it was Kalseru's voice that filled my ears. And as I looked back to her, it was finally clear that Drogon had heard and comprehended everything perfectly fine, for his fur bristled and his for a moment it was as if Leonidas was glaring at me out of the darkness of his son's face.

The slight indignation that returned to Kalseru's voice as she spoke again was like a soothing balm to my ears. But it was Viserion who answered her, and I allowed my form to relax backwards just slightly so that I could easy shift my gaze between each of my children, and so that my blonde boy could easily converse with his siblings. Perhaps this was the best thing for it, to allow them to discuss what they had learned, and put their questions to me as the needed. But my eyes grew slightly wider in a display of alertness as a charcoal ear pivoted to Drogon, the snort was the first sound he had made all morning. He was on his feet and moving, headed back the way we had come. I had feared that of all of them, my darkest child would have the hardest time dealing with what I'd told them. I stared after him, silently pleading with him to stay, to turn around and come back to us. Mahogany eyes were kept serious, not wanting my children to see the weakness I felt in this moment. I knew I was not a perfect mother, but I could not bare to think of a life in which my children did not trust me anymore.

Relief swept through me as he turned, coming back to us, and my eyes fell back to Rhaegal who now spoke. And when he looked up into my face with an expression that seldom graced his features, I knew he was about to ask me something rather difficult to answer. For a moment my eyes locked with those of the son who had without a doubt inherited his looks from his father the most. The copper crown he wore and the mottling of colors that blanketed his back were a direct throwback to Leonidas, and the rings of hues in his eyes were reminiscent of him as well. The bright pink that ringed the outside of his right eye had been a feature of their father's that always made me grin. My nostrils flared and I inhaled deeply before meeting the moon splashed mahogany eyes that my daughter had most certainly inherited from me. "There are so many different kinds of love in this world, Kalseru. There is the love that I have for each of you, and the love that I keep still in my heart for your grandparents. There is that love which you four feel for one another, and even different from that is what I feel for your uncles Sleekwing and Taliesin and each of your aunts. What Leonidas and I felt for one another was not the type of love that Alcide and Moonglow shared. It was not true love. True love is selfless, and ours was a toxic, selfish affliction. It could never have lasted, no matter if he had come back again or not." I did not want her, or my sons, to ever lose the hope in their mind that they could find true love in their lives. True love did not exist exclusively between two imprinted wolves, as it had for my parents and my grandparents before them. I was beginning to learn that myself, being taught by someone who was becoming more near and dear to my heart with the passing of each season.

Looking to Rhaegal once more, my gaze hardened slightly. I understood why he was asking this, why I personally had saved a wolf who had hurt me so many times. But there was more than that to give in an answer. "I saved him because he needed saving," I began, my gaze shifting between each of my children in turn; this was important. "Because no matter how many times he left it, he had once been a mountain wolf - and no pack mate should be discarded. Because I was a Queen and to let him die before my eyes when there was something I could do about it would have been as good as murder." My gaze landed back on Rhaegal as I finished. The seriousness of my gaze softened though and a sigh slipped through my lips. "There was more to him than the relationship we had, and he was a very strong wolf that helped me train to take back Spirane. Leonidas is your sire, he is a part of each of you, but what you do with that part of yourself is up to you." The last thing that I would want was for any of them to resent this part of themselves. For all of Leonidas' faults, there had been many good things about him as well, and if any of them wanted to know more about him, I would never deny them that.

daenerys