[Oriana]

---

The quiet stream of a river and the subtle scent of water was enough of a reminder to Oriana that had it been a while since they’d rested. An encouraging glance and a small smile to her traveling companions she’d directed them toward the stream.

Oriana inched down toward the edge of the gentle flowing river, finding a stable shoreline to allow herself the ability to reach down and lap at the cool liquid. It tasted… different, certainly nothing like Saboro’s water. It was a strange concept to come to realize all of these new, minor things and comparisons to her home. Her beautiful home, the place she loved so much. The weighted decision didn’t ever leave her shoulders as she continued to drag herself and her companions through the mud, wondering how they felt about returning. Oriana figured everyone at the back of their mind felt the same; going back was not going to be easy. But was it better than staying out here?

A nearby snap caught her attention as that oh-so-familiar paranoia rushed their her veins. Water dribbled down her maw and messily down her chest as her ungraceful reaction opted for water being half-lapped being sprayed everywhere. Oriana made sure her party was accounted before, turning her head back toward the source of the sound. It was within the other direction, one that Oriana truly had no idea was closer or farther from Saboro at this point. “I will check it out.” Curiosity had no bounds, and she knew if anything went sound she’d have three (maybe only two, she had no idea how Ciello was at fighting…) pack mates to help.

With a sharp resolution on her head and paranoia on her back, Oriana found a small pinch in the river’s girth and was able to skip across it with the assistance of a solid rock or two. From there she pulled herself up the edge of the dip, opposite to where she’d come from. Skulking close to nearby trees, Oriana decided to have this be a more reserved approach than last time. With her body low to the ground she swayed her tail, surveying the area for any more movement or noises, inhaling to catch any scents of what continued to creep closer to their little group.

---

[Jezebel]

Destiny played itself on repeat in her mind, retelling the story fed to her by Andruil and speaking aloud the Gospel of her Uprising. Soon enough, there would be songs howled in her name for the acts of atrocities she will commit, all in the name of her newfound Godhood, all for the betterment of her future people.

Jezebel is not benevolent, she is not kind- make no mistake, she will never be a Just Ruler, and that is where her fellow companions come in. She is no Judge's gavel, she is the swing of the sword at an execution, she is the spread of wildfire to cleanse the Mother Earth, she is the blood spray of a slaughtered lamb , and her eyes are the red aftermath of a necessary sacrifice.

Where Andruil is cunning, spinning sweet words and preparing an altar to entice the Devil to do her bidding, all she had to do was simply ask. The future Theros, who is cruel and proud, would have shed blood for the fun of it all. In fact, the Deity of Autumn could have promised a position beneath her and Jezebel would've accepted, but she- the wind of Summer- is cunning, too. Her mind is still young and quick, sharp as the teeth of a puppy, and she seized the moment and was not torn down.

Not like she had been in Saboro.

The musings of her rotting corpse of a home stopped her in her tracks, head raising to taste the air as Keanu taught her. Annoying as the Peregrine was, she had something about 'gut instincts', and the thought of her motherland sent something sour straight to her gut. There is someone out there, there is something that triggered her thought process to swerve down that path, and she is right to believe so.

There are smells- some familiar, some not- that sends the girl into an array of emotions: panic and fear at first, to boiling anger, then resting at an unsettling calm. Her mind picks away at the smells, pulling apart the individual musk of those close enough to her, but one stands out.

One boils and freezes her blood simultaneously.

One is the very wolf who took from her everything, and in that same motion, sent her down a path Saboro never would've allowed.

She feels hatred and love, or perhaps only one, but she was never able to decipher which was which. It wasn't Oriana's fault the girl never learned the difference, her Golden Queen had done everything she could for the fledglings. Crenate had no excuse, other then that he was absent and keeping the seat warm for her when the time came, but it never did.

And here she is, in the open, head turning to catch the winds while her ears listened for footfalls to match her mother's gait.

It didn't occur to her that the Queen had not seen her yet, but it made no difference. The Deity of Summer curled back its lips in a grin to show off the very teeth she was always so proud of.

"Yana, my Yana," her voice rings out in song, not befitting of who it came from, "Come out, my mother," her fur bristles as she recalls the teeth of a crestfallen Queen bleeding her face, but she is not a child any longer, she is the fury of their Mother Volcano, she is a God reborn.

[Oriana]

---

The air started to feel more tense and Oriana followed suit. At first there was little noise, the sudden movement from the unknown source became scarce if not non-existent. For a brief moment the fallen Queen debated turning back, not bothering with a threat that no longer posed any harm. A shift in her coiled muscles relieved a certain relief to one leg as her head turned back, looking to make sure there was no rear ambush. All she'd seen were the openness of the land behind her, the dip in the earth where the stream flowed quietly behind her. There was a second of appreciation, inhaling the smell of the area, that smell, that...

"Yana, my Yana, Come out, my mother,"

... voice.

Oriana swung her head back at the child's call (it wasn't the voice of her child; she wasn't your child anymore, remember?) as she sang out the one word no other being had every called her before. But, accompanied with it was mother. A near-haunting word as Oriana felt her heart wheeze in guilt. At first, she didn't want to believe Jezebel was here. How could she be, wasn't she safe within Saboro's walls? Why her, why Ang, why any of them? Oriana reluctantly moved from her place of shrouding, curiosity (—killed the cat) dragged her out to see with her eyes that her battered daughter was actually here, within these forests, within eye sight.

"My dove..." She was a dove no longer, but an eagle, a bird of prey. "Jezebel.." How befitting for the adopted daughter of a phoenix, one who still would soar to the heights of the world one day. As her eyes landed upon the matured face of her volcano child, Oriana smiled. It was small, but a smile nonetheless. She was prepared to hear the screams, the shouts, the nasty words as she faced one of her mistakes in her eyes. Jezebel was a reflection of madness, of uncontrolled emotions, of pain. Oriana was no Queen here, and Jezebel was not her daughter. Not anymore. Oriana stood and awaited her atonement to a child who didn't deserve what she received.

Wasn't that the way of Saboro. At least Jezebel got out alive with only few scars on her face; little did the Queen know of the fate of her other volcano children.

"Why are you here? Are... you hurt?"

An ironic question, as the red marks around her eyes burned where they no longer laid upon her daughter's face.

---

[Jezebel]

Had she only smelled Oriana, perhaps things would have been different. Had she only heard her mother figure, maybe- just maybe- the future could have been changed for the little blue devil, but.. as curiosity kills the cat, satisfaction will bring it back. Oriana stepped out into the light, no longer hidden by shadow, by what Jezebel believes to be heart felt guilt over what had been done.

Because why else expose yourself?

Why else coo words that awakened something inside the blossoming young girl? 'My dove,' her false mother says, accompanied by what she can only imagine is truly a false name. Not that it mattered to Jezebel, but a part of her wondered what her real parents had hoped to name her. There would never be an answer, and for that, she buries the thought, but not for a later day. Simply, it is to be forgotten.

'Why are you here? Are... you hurt?'- the very thought brought a smile to her lips, her teeth bared in what could only be a grin, and to someone who hadn't had a hand in raising Jezebel, perhaps it would be deemed as a threat. Her happiness was hardly genuine, or joy or amusement was well practiced, but this? This evoked a gentle laugh from the growing girl. "No more hurt than when I'd left," but that was a lie.

Here and now, she stands tall and confident, but when she'd been escorted to safety from prison, she did so with her head low and her tail tucked. She was too young to snatch back the crown that had been dangled in her face and ripped away, but now? NOW they were lucky she had not been allowed to grow among the jungles, to thrive in the darkness like the brooding spirit she'd always been.

They- Oriana, and her absent father, Crenate- were granted mercy, as soon enough she would take what was rightfully her's, but this time, she had ascended beyond what even they had been. "Mother, I was never meant to be Saboro's queen, was I?" her tail lashes now behind her.

She wants to love Oriana. She wants to draw in close to the Golden Queen and reveal just how much she- the little devil girl- missed her mother, but she couldn't do it. She could only move close enough to give Oriana the luxury of seeing for herself that Jezebel was, in fact, fine. "That's alright. I've found my purpose out here. Keanu found me on the border, Hirc-" her red eyes flash with something- not pain, but perhaps regret?- "...Mm, Keanu escorted me to a place for people like.. her, people.. like you.. but it wasn't.. for people.. like me.." because people like her were wildfire, and she had promised Hyperion she would not hurt anyone.

The only way she could keep that promise was by leaving, because hurting people was in her blood.

"If you take me back to Saboro, I'll do what that Volcano couldn't do. I'll finish the job," her fangs are now bared in a manner that is unmistakably hostile. Her ears are back, her eyes hold a warning that carried in her words. "I'll kill them all, Yana. I'll kill you, too." Bold words, but then again, Jezebel had always been a bold girl. The healing scars across the fur above her eyes was a reminder of that. For them both.

[Oriana]

---

Perhaps not ever a blood daughter, but a daughter still— Oriana was not stupid to mistake the grin of a wolf for the sincerity of a smile. Wolves had teeth and they used it well; just as many had arrows to aim for backs of those who least expect it. Her red-rimmed eyes could see the arrow upon Jezebel’s back, one that still smelled like her anger, her spite. But that arrow didn’t have Jezebel’s name on it, and yet… there it was.

The blatant reminder of a mistake, one wrong choice, one that the Sabora wondered if she’d be able to assist her daughter in removing; or would it just dig deeper into her lost child’s shoulder blades?

"No more hurt than when I'd left,"

She took that with face value, with truth; she assumed better things were found for her daughter outside of Saboro. Jezebel might not have known it yet, but her mother would too. But at what cost?

"Mother, I was never meant to be Saboro's queen, was I?”

The words etched a line in her heard as she could nearly imagine the same scenario happening between herself and Sol Katti. Oriana wanted to tell her betrayed daughter that her own mother who attempted to constant exude strength and power might not have been fit for the crown either. Or perhaps her crown was not a good fit for Saboro; she had yet to decipher the puzzling whirlwind of all that had happened. It was clear Jezebel found her strength elsewhere; Oriana would be wise to do the same.

With a parted maw, Oriana hesitated too long to coo sweet reassurance into her daughter’s ears. Jezebel didn't need it anymore, did she?

"That's alright. I've found my purpose out here. Keanu found me on the border, Hirc- ...Mm, Keanu escorted me to a place for people like.. her, people.. like you.. but it wasn't.. for people.. like me.."

With a strong gaze the battered, confused Queen still managed to stand her ground, a shaky ground as she kept snake eyes on her volatile daughter, sensing something beyond just a simple talk. There was never any certainty in anything or anyone now, Oriana found herself trusting less and seeing more. She wondered if her daughter would give her an opening for those red-laced doe eyes to scrawl her daughter’s truths into pages.

There was so much they could’ve learned from one another. “What is your purpose?” Tell me what you’ve found.

"If you take me back to Saboro, I'll do what that Volcano couldn't do. I'll finish the job,"

The Queen was able to see just enough. The fangs were bared and aimed beyond her to something bigger, something stronger. Oriana would be lucky to not receive the same misfired anger and flames she’d bestowed upon her bold, little girl. Her dove, her ambitious child who she banished to nothing— but was it really nothing? Perhaps Oriana did her a favour. Perhaps it would be just as bold for Oriana to ask Jezebel to thank her for what she did. The golden Queen held her tongue.

"I'll kill them all, Yana. I'll kill you, too."

“Then, do it.” A near-instant response, invoking her daughter, rising her to the challenge. Learn to bite with your bark, child, or the world will chew you up and spit you out. “I won’t take you back, your destiny was never there, was it?” She’d pause, not flinching but still watching, always watching.

“Will you kill me as a mother or as a Saboran?” Two titles she used to hold onto so desperately, so foolishly. “One of those is already dead, my dear.”

---