So close. He was so close to fixing things, and righting a world that had suddenly shattered into a reality so very, very wrong. Diosa never should have gone anywhere near that battle - it had not been her war to fight, not her crime to answer for. Rogan attempted in vain to reach back into his blurred memories to figure out why either of them had leapt into the fray in the first place… but each time the vampire skimmed over those bloodstained thoughts his concentration slipped and threatened to dive back into furious madness. The russet monster knew why he’d arrived: Diosa had been in danger. He sensed the peril his sweoster faced and that terrible warning shot through him like a bullet, a switch flipped in his brain from conscious to murderous, and without actually knowing why Rogan had charged toward his enemies - perfect strangers, honestly - with the intent to kill every single last one of them. But that’s all he really recalled - fury. A wrending desire to destroy. Every hit landed upon Diosa echoed through him with the same pain, resonating with a visceral instinct to protect the vampire princess. He saw glowing eyes of blue, and a red mist descended on his vision. They would slay Diosa. They don’t even know her, and they would slay her.

I don’t even know THEM, and I would slay them!

Had his maker been ripped off to the war in a similar fashion? Had she felt the call to fight like acid in her veins, like a noose around her throat, impossible to ignore and too powerful to suffer? It hadn’t been fair. From the moment he first met the dark damsel, Rogan had known that Diosa harbored a softness that few others had seen. She thought herself a demon, but what demon could be so gentle? And patient? And so guilty for their own natures? The haunted young lady was everything Rogan could have hoped for in a leader - or in a sweoster, once he understood what that term - what his life as a vampire - meant. He loved her so dearly that he decided this reality must be broken if it wanted to punish her. And as a warrior, one whose only dream was to achieve unparalleled greatness, Rogan would push himself to the brink of snapping to find a solution.

After the violent skirmish with the Tempests, Rogan and his venerable sweoster should have had a moment to rest. To heal. Their vampiric nature meant that they would heal rather quickly from even their worst wounds, but Rogan understood in a primal part of himself that they would both recover faster in the safety of their own home. Imagine his horror when they crawled back to Caidir Olc to find it uninhabitable, the air poisoned by a mysterious blossom that exuded some scent that spiked their bloodlust to agonizing levels. Another “wrongness” that did not belong - that Rogan could not explain. And so he and Diosa had traveled elsewhere, searching for shelter and food, all the while the princess crumbling slowly under the weight of her self-imposed torture. She hid her inner wounds so well, even Rogan had a hard time truly seeing what was wrong with her. The pressure to help her mounted inexorably in his chest. Diosa needed sanctuary. She needed a home. She needed a pack. But a pack was made of wolves -

A new scent on the breeze had the roaming leech pausing in his silent tracks, muzzle weaving through the air and burning eyes narrowed in concentration. He’d been running the border of Caidir again, testing the atmosphere to see if any traces of the evil flower remained. So far, he had only caught the barest threads - strings that stabbed into his gut, but not as mercilessly as before. Soon the jungle territory would be habitable not just for vampires, but for any other wolf that decided to take it… and Rogan absolutely could not allow that to happen. Close. So close. His paws sank into the rich mud of the swamp as he crept closer to the source of the new cologne, excitement rising in his breast even though his pulse remained roughly the same slow pace. A pack needed wolves. And Rogan knew how to get those wolves. His skils at mesmerizing were not nearly on par with those of Diosa, but they would be good enough if he stumbled across a weak-willed wolf; of course, ideally, Rogan would not need to force someone to listen to him. If only he explained his intentions, surely he could convince others to fortify the kingdom he wished to construct?

Maybe it was fate that led him to this exact white male - a brute who had once visited Caidir Olc before, back when Lucyne still reigned as the sole Vampire Monarch. His white pelt looked ghostly in the night’s shadow, making him easy to glimpse regardless of Rogan’s superior night vision. Not wanting to be rude - but also not wanting the other hessian to run - Rogan gave a short, low howl of greeting, stopping about ten yards away from where the stranger stood partly concealed in the undergrowth.

“Hoy there, stranger. If you are hunting, I am sorry to intrude.” Rogan would not move from where he’d paused unless the other soldier took off. He attempted to make his bulky stature look as non-threatening as possible, while still projecting an air of strength. The rust-hued prince would not stoop to begging. “Please don’t be alarmed - I don’t wish to attack you. If you know of the vampires, you know that I could have snuck up on you and struck by now had I wanted to. I simply want…” Here Rogan paused, his carmine gaze briefly sliding away from the ivory male. “I want to build a pack for my alphess. Because she deserves to have a home.”