All my life I had looked up to Kalseru in one way or another. She was my big sister, after all, and from my youngest days I had always thought her to be beautiful and strong hearted. As we both grew, and circumstances changed, that appreciation had grown into respect. I'd still been a child when our family had made the exodus to Diveen, but it was a time I would never forget. Of course first and foremost it was the first time I had really considered how quickly everything could be taken from us, but it was also close to the time Jericho and Sansa had disappeared. It had been a troubling time in my life, in all of the Mountainborn's lives, but in the end it had only served to make us all that much stronger. Even upon foreign soil the strength of the mountain lived inside our hearts in perpetuity.
When Kalseru shifted to face me more straight on, I shadowed her movement and turned my body towards her. My ears pricked forward, listening as she began to speak. Finally a small smile pulled at the edge of my lips as she spoke of her own childhood aspirations to someday sit upon the throne of Spirane. Our mother had alluded to as much in our lengthy conversation when I had first stepped forward to claim my place as heir, but it was interesting to hear it from Kalseru's perspective. I chuffed a small breath of a laugh as she spoke of her attitude towards it all in her youth. She went on to speak of the time that followed Mother's single defeat in combat, when Roman had plunged the mountain into a desolate time of silence and stillness. But where it had ignited a fire within my then yearling heart, it had been something different for her.
My eyes softened as she continued on, expressing her concerns about how she had come to rule the pack, about how she might be viewed by the pack and me. Darkened ears flicked backwards momentarily, before pricking forward again. All this time I had been concerned with my own struggle to find a new place among the pack, not taking into account the struggle my sister had gone through in taking that place that I had long worked for. I wanted to tell her that I'd never blamed her or been angry with her - I'd made my choice in looking after Daenerys instead of stepping up to take her place - but I could sense that there was still more that Kalseru wished to say.
The weight of our situation finally came to settle on the ground between our paws, hers of black and mine of grey. And yet as the topic came to a head, it was with a smile that Kalseru spoke rather than the grave feeling of disenchantment that I felt welling up inside me. Who would walk away from the peaks as their leader this day? It was only as she asked me to work with her, to lead together that a fog I hadn't realized clouded my judgment seemed to lift, my vision clearer than it had been in more than a year. Perhaps I was more my mother's daughter than I had ever realized. All my life I had envisioned myself as a warrior princess, one who would fight to the bitter end to protect the pack and defend my place here. Daenerys bore the scars of the many battles she had fought to keep Spirane as the stronghold our foremothers had created, and instinct bade me to follow in their footsteps. My first instinct was to fight, but this was where Kalseru showed her true strength.
Suddenly I could see it all - I could see the years unfolding with us working side by side to ensure a better future for our pack. There was no struggle between us for power, for we respected one another and the pack saw strength in our unified leadership. Spirane flourished, and once more we branched out into Moladion to lend our strength to our brethren. Vortigern was there too, as well as some conjured dashingly handsome male at Kalseru's side, and together the Mountainborn family was stronger than ever before. A quiet smile slowly grew across my features, fire-rimmed eyes looking deep into those that were moon-rimmed.