[mature] tell that devil to take you back; ryatah

[atrox]

hangman hooded, softly swinging; don't close the coffin yet, I'm alive

Atrox doesn’t expect Ryatah to spend all of her time in Hyaline.

Hell, he certainly doesn’t.

But he is surprised when her absence stretches longer and longer. It scratches at the back of his mind—an itch he can’t reach, something weighing there constantly as he goes about his day. He finds himself with yellow eyes moving to the horizon, confusion flickering across his face before shrugging and moving on. He enjoyed her company, appreciated having someone else to share the land with, but he wasn’t her guardian and she wasn’t his ward. If she wanted to leave and do something else, he wouldn’t stop her.

Still, he feels something rattle in his empty chest when he catches sight of the white glow of her down by the lake. Annoyed that he does, he jumps from the tree where he had been resting and begins to make his way down the mountainside, his panther paws adept at navigating the tough terrain. When he reaches the bottom, he leaps forward and shakes the dust from his velvet coat before walking toward her, shifting in mid-stride so that he arrives by her as himself, yellow eyes passive, mouth pressed tight.

“Felt like coming home finally?” he says with a smirk, leaning down to dip his nose into the water, quenching his thirst to avoid the annoyance that spreads in his veins. When he pulls back up, water drips off the endless black of his nose, his lips peeling back slightly to reveal the feline teeth below.

“What an honor to be graced with your presence again.”

It was easier, he thinks, to fall back into this pattern of apathy than acknowledge that he had actually missed someone—easier to just glance once her way before looking out onto the glass of the lake.

Easier to pretend he was still living his years alone up in the mountains.

Everything had gotten so complicated since he had returned.

ATROX | THE PANTHER KING