The gift of a thistle.

Quicksilver and the frostchild travelled through night, and when the morning sun rose it burned away the fog that blanketed the land. He veered toward Vanderfell's Western border where he hoped to cross the path of a pack-mate on patrol, and by luck found @Hieronymous to whom he vowed to return as soon as he could. From there, he and Haruki passed through the evergreen forest that separated the mountain region from tundra, and snow began to flurry as the druid set his sights on proud Tsukiishi where his snowflower made her home.

“Right there,” he told the boy as he gestured toward the frozen spires up ahead, who was likely exhausted, “not far now. You doing okay?” His paws, damp from melted snow, felt as though they might freeze. He continued on, however, so eager he was to see the look on Reiko's face when she realised who shared his company.


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Their pause was a brief one, just long enough to catch their breaths. Quicksilver blinked up through the soft snow flurry and toward Reiko's frozen mountains, wondering if she or her guards had noticed their approach by now. “Good,” he said gently, content to hear that his young ward was still doing fine, and canted a silver lobe in his direction at his unexpected comment regarding... repaying him? The druid looked over a shoulder at the boy, and smiled shyly; “no need for repayment. Your mother is... a dear friend of mine. I know she missed you, and she never stopped looking for you.”

No need to burden the youth with a bombshell of his uncertain involvement with the pallid Empress, considering how Quicksilver himself still did not know what to make of it. He thought long and hard about what she meant to him and how he wished to belong at her side, but he could not quite shake the trauma of all that'd occurred to bring them to where they were now. Treading carefully would be his best course of action, he felt, and so he would continue to do so until some higher power showed him the way.

“Let's get moving again,” was the silverwhite's encouragement to Haruki, and he canted his muzzle to send forth an excited summons for @Reiko before he pressed on through the snow toward her domain.


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“It does,” the druid chirped at the yearling's innocent query, feeling as though he could relate to his anxiety, “Shiroshika - it belongs to your mother. She is Empress here, and you -” he canted his narrow muzzle to eye his pale ward with a smile, “need not worry.”

Movement up ahead drew his powder blue stare forward once more, and his sterling ears pricked forward in recognition of the snowflower they sought. His feathered tail lashed the chill air at his rear and he veered aside to fully reveal her long-lost son.

Before anyone could say anything, Reiko was tearing across the snow to meet them. She whimpered and whined and launched herself for the boy, grasping for him with her paws to lick and nudge and nose as though he were still a child. Quicksilver could do nothing but stand back and observe, figuring that no matter Haruki's age he would always be Reiko's baby


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To linger felt wrong - as though he were intruding on a reunion meant only for Reiko and Haruki. Quicksilver hovered, uncertain, and considered slipping away unseen and seek a safe place to rest within the Everfrost. There he could rest for a few hours before beginning his trip back to Vanderfell and leave them in peace, yet something rooted him there. He supposed to try sneak off would be foolish considering how open the territory was there, but... he was part of this, somehow. He had found the boy and returned him to his mother, a she-wolf who'd have scoured the continent in search of him

His she-wolf. At least, the one he wanted to make his own.

The snowflower turned her head to seek him, and Quicksilver straightened a little. His own tail wagged softly behind him and he smiled, warmth and encouragement in his pale eyes, and an ear pricked at her gratitude. Quicksilver said nothing in response of it and merely dipped his muzzle in acknowledgement though her invitation of hospitality had him lift his head. Shiroshika was an ally to Vanderfell, after all - it would not be so wrong to settle among them for a time, would it?

So he trailed the Empress and her Prince quietly, keen to follow them to wherever they would lead him.


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