He'd not exactly stormed off after the meeting, though his head spun with the potential crisis that would potentially plague them. Foxglove didn't feel confident in the thought of Fable going off alone to seek answers. Even if she was right - because he couldn't deny the Rise had some sort of something to it - it did not mean that it was a good idea for him to just let her go off without anyone else to keep watch. Fable had grown considerably in her last year on four feet. She'd found strength and commanded it all her own, and he respected that. He did. What felt too complex was the fact that he worried about something happening to her with all of the unknowns, and what would it mean if she never came back to them?

How could he look at the kids and see the spaces made of Fable - brows that she'd lovingly kissed before bed, fur that she'd groomed herself, the little glimmer of mischief he saw in their eyes from time to time before they took off to play whatever childhood games they made up. He missed such simplicity in his own life, and he had to stop thinking about everything he lost and how heavy that made him feel. Fable had her family returned when she was in need of them, maybe this would bring some of his family to him.

He doubted it, at his core he did not expect such a thing for himself. Foxglove kicked a rock out of his pathway where he'd slowly curved his way along aine's whisper, expecting to find the Matriarch planning for her departure. He wondered if he'd made her uncomfortable - if he'd done something stupid and went too far for her comfort level. Sure, the world might be ending but surely Fable was merely trying to escape the crushing awkward feeling since he'd kissed her forehead. A totally benign thing, a friendly gesture, certainly nothing more!

Except Foxglove lifted his head and sang the tule kotiin - but this was different. It was not his, it was something vastly different in feeling. It was purely for Fable, to call her, and if she answered now perhaps she'd answer when he called for her again each night until she came home to Avon.