I am surprised to find the fields as familiar as they are - they feel no different beneath my paws, the grass smells much the same, and it feels the same as it brushes against my flanks. New wolves, a different sky, and perhaps the trees wear different leaves and wave different branches but it is all very much the same. It has been years, hasn't it? Years since I have spent any real amount of time in the fields, or any other place in fact - when you become a king, these places become little more than detours and paths rather than grounds in which to spend your days. But here I am on the cusp of fall, having departed Glorall with Elohim before he left to the west - as for me, I do think I'll spend some days in the fields and forests to satiate my curiosity. Who prowls the grasslands now? Who rests within the forest stumps and crags' crevices? But for now, it is the river that runs into Glorall where my attention lingers.

I take my rest beside the river, carving out a path through the reeds so that I may rest my paws in its waters. I have spent the morning weaving through the fields and sniffing out every new scent I can and now, I merely watch the water flow; it seems weaker now, the current does. It seems too weak to carry a body as it did. I glance down to the soil, wet and dark, but it lacks the bloodstains I remember so well. Ah, it was not too far from here, was it? I can only think of Solaris with a taste of disdain in the back of my throat, but I can recall it all nonetheless without it. That day, after all, was one that seemed to consume many for years after. I feel my lip twitch in instinct as I recall it - recall him, I suppose. How foul it is to look into the water and have the reflection show so much of him. Have I not killed all my weakness? Did I make his mistakes and replace one with another time and time again? I laugh beneath my breath.

Remove the weak children, distance yourself from the others. But I was not as he was, not blinded by narrow definitions and an unwillingness to change those that did exist - Badar and her mother, Nari, are no weaker merely because they lack a voice just as Eva has her strengths despite her hearing, or Enoch by his bastard's eyes. He wanted Serafina dead, Haziel too, and now both dwell within Glorall's boundaries. Confined, confined, confined. I remember that word well enough - its memory brings a grin to my lips as I push my paws out into the water and feel the mud between my paws. Was I the confined one now, simply not bound by a body but by territory lines?

Solaris never did get what he desired though, did he? Peace comes and goes. If peace had settled into place after Heyel's death, it was but a coincidence I am sure; it faded too, just as every other time, and chaos rose its head once more. Cycles are natural, after all. I cannot help but laugh at it all and taste the memory as if I am there again, a child on the cusp of adulthood discovering secrets that were never quite secrets at all. I stifle my laughter and peer down at my reflection, swishing a poor so that it ripples across the water. I see Asriel in it too, and I can't help but wonder about him. I suppose when the time comes, perhaps here would be a good place as well. It would be quite a fitting thing, no? Perhaps that will be the legacy of my blood: we will purge real weakness here where a man claimed to have no weakness in his blood at all.

I shrug and shake my head, stretching my legs once more before I rest my head atop them. I allow myself to truly rest, basking in the midday sun, thinking of where my curiosity will lead me next.