brother in sin and abasement

for papa @Vengeance, other tags are for reference though welcome to join in!

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It was raining, again. The inclement weather didn't mean much to Tempest in truth, though he found it a fascinating thing. The sounds of the woodland that he could hear at the den mouth were intriguing too—the way fat raindrops hit leaves still clinging to trees, the way it sounded as it hit the cool earth; even the autumnal pelage of the world was eye-catching. It was peaceful, though he couldn't have claimed the noises behind and beyond him were exactly that.

Though he had the urge to snake slither a little more into the open, he knew that @Morag was watching. His mother had a keen eye and a barbed tongue, but he had no qualms in believing that she had sharper teeth. Somewhere he was quite certain that he heard @Lilith carrying on, going through a phase of echolalia; he could heard the growling and ruckus of his brothers still in the midst of play-fighting that he had not wanted any more of. He didn't bother trying to decide if it was @Goliath or @Leviathan still going at it, or if @Piglet had laid siege.

And for all he knew, it could have been his sister. Truth be told, he didn't really pay much attention either. As the wind picked up, more leaves broke loose of their nimble branches, rocketing down to the earth with the renewed gusto of rain to chase them. The sun, though hidden behind heavy clouds, was already rushing towards evening and in that waning light the forest seemed far darker and drearier than it normally was. And somewhere, out there, he did not realize that a shade lurked.
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Through the faint mist, a figure began to conjure and come into focus. Tempest did not take stock of him immediately; it was the parting of the ferns and wilting grasses that grabbed his attention, framing the figure of the wolf he would perhaps come to know as father. The wolfish figure was on the prowl and having been sequestered away with sight or sound of others so little, the boy felt his fur prickle along his nape and spine instinctively. Yet he did not recoil in fear or rise to meet the approach of such a darkened, almost too goliath figure—a curious expression overtook him instead, his little nose working the air only to be met with a cutting, acrid scent with the shift of the breeze. Nary a sound left him, for he was yet too young to know to raise the alarm about relative strangers creeping in, nor could he take his still baby blue-eyed gaze away.
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It was not a cry that left him when he was scooped up from the earth—it was a throaty snarl. His muzzle wrinkled, hackles prickling as he bristled and bared his teeth. But his simmering rage at this disruption and this unfamiliar figure would do little; such things were just as unaffective with his mother.

Tempest learned that it mattered naught, amd he was held tightly for what was an eternity for a child. The ground found its way beneath him again, uneven and unforgiving in the struggle that followed to right himself. And he did with sound and fury—muzzle wrinkling again—only to find his captor was abandoning him. The dark figure was aught more than a ragged tail, swallowed up by overgrowth that rose impossibly tall. An enticed huff left him, only then feeling the thundering of his heart coupled with emotion he did not rightly know the name of.

But how dare!

The boy stumbled into the mist and growth, after the goliath figurine, intent to catch up and sink his teeth into that wisp of a tail. A fruitless endeavor, given the time he would invest, but the dark-haired boy was imbued with determination he scarcely knew he possessed.
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Ahead of him where the grasses parted, the mist seemed to coil and crawl along the damp earth. He went haphazardly through a puddle, though the mud did little to tarnish his speckled coat. He came to a stop at one point, his nose working the air in a fervor that turned up nothing, and his anger had already begun to wane as reality set in.

Whoever the stranger was, it was uncertain that he would catch up to him. Not now anyway. He was far too young, too small still to have that sort of stamina for such a task… and perhaps most importantly the attention span for it. Reality was setting in—this was a completely new place altogether. Further than he had ever been from the den and yet, without knowing it, not at all that far off from it either.

But between the rain and the ever present haze in their neck of the woods, the world had become a vastly different place. Tempest observed these things, panning his gaze skyward and squinting at the shift in light, and carried on. He had no reason to fear much, lest his mother realize he was absent, and assuming she would care. As for the shadowy figure? His temper would find the better of him once again when he found him.

If he found him. He hadn't caught his scent again yet.
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Something shuffled—he knew the noise, that impatient shift of limbs. Only he knew it not to be his father, rather he associated that noise with his mother, oft right before she'd come to snatch them from whatever mayhem they were making. He had been on the sharp end of that result a time or two before and it hadn't taken him long to know that sound was something to be ready for. Yet in this instance, it was distant enough that he did not fear some rebuttal in the form of a pearly maw reaching out for him.

So logically, he believed someone else was on the receiving end.

It delighted him only because he took enjoyment early in the protesting squeals of his siblings. Life was lay out like a twisted game, rogue-like in its existence where every day was not the same as the one before it. Fortunately for Tempest, perhaps, he had not gathered the experience to know that his own existence in the world was one and done. He'd never learn all the steps without caution, assuming he kept the opportunity to do so. The sound would be enough to lure him in, pulling him along as a growl bubbled up in his chest. Another tangle of weathered terrain, of their grasses and tiny pitfalls not enough to devour him whole.

The mist parted as he course corrected and the cutting figure of his father, the stranger he was, began to take shape. The hackles along his spine rose and with it continued the gurgling rumble that could belong to no other than a child. With a furrowing brow to set his expression, the boy had a decision to make. Did he try and charge him? Or it would it be better to keep his distance? More importantly, why hadn't anyone else come to run this hulking menace off?
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