Lykaon Etesian ⚙️

Immortals' Daughter, She/Her

"Born of the fury of lava and gentleness of sky, she could caress a pup with gentle breezes and make the oldest trees bow before her in equal measures. She fought with and defeated The Terrible Lykaon Swiftflame and took on the mantle Lykaon Etesian."

2nd Born of Elysian Dreams and Scoria Scuttle, only daughter. At the age of 1y 4.5m she ascended to the throne.

BIRTH: ( 492) .492 - 127/121/105/ 71/ 77
Lv 01: ( 555) .562 - 161/148/105/ 71/ 77
Lv 05: ( 583) .593 - 171/158/111/ 75/ 78
Lv 08: (————) .643 - 191/169/117/ 82/ 84 became Lykaon/Lead
Lv 10: ( 663) .685 - 201/184/124/ 85/ 91 (8/17/2021)
Lv 15: ( 793) .841 - 258/230/141/ 97/115 (8/20/2021)
Lv 20: ( 973) 1074 - 321/298/186/126/143 (8/26/2021) 1y 9m
FINAL: (————)

1100 @ 1y 10.5m (45 RO)
1200 @ 2y _3.5m (55 RO)
1274 @ 2y _6.0m (60 RO) Leaderboard #10!
1st Hetero Eyed on LB
1285 @ 2y _7.0m (62 RO) Leaderboard #9!
1300 @ 2y _7.5m (63 RO)
1305 @ 2y _7.5m (63 RO) Leaderboard #8!
1329 @ 2y _9.0m (66 RO) Leaderboard #7!
Post Month Hiatus
1342 @ 2y _9.5m (67 RO) No LB Status!
1400 @ 3y _2.5m (77 RO) Leaderboard #10!
1422 @ 3y _3.0m (78 RO) Leaderboard #9!
1500 @ 3y _7.0m (87 RO)
1504 @ 3y _7.0m (87 RO) Leaderboard #8!
1534 @ 3y _8.0m (89 RO) Leaderboard #7!
1600 @ 4y _1.0m (99 RO) LB #10 @ 1602

by the glorious 🕸Websteak🥩

In her youth, she loved all things mortal.
Etesian ⚙️ managed to come really close, studying the bird in fascination. Her stalking skills were improving, but the future prey was so pretty and interesting that Etesian ⚙️ completely forgot about chasing it.

[ Born Jacinthe, female ]

She was born in a litter of six, all brothers except her. Her parents showered them with love and gentle firmness, but most of all with aged wisdom. Etesian, like the rest of her siblings, was keenly aware that her parents were not like other wolves—few enough that they met to know the difference. Unlike them, her brothers seemed more like those other wolves, and Etesian seemed more like her parents.

Her father's mortal body had passed on before they were born, and her mother remained behind. Etesian could tell she longed to go back to the realm of immortals to join her father. Her father visited often in the form of a breeze so that their mother did not have to raise them alone.

The toll of raising six rambunctious pups did age their mother significantly. Her fur wasn't quite so fiery and red, and her dark eyes seemed more gray. Still, Etesian loved and cared for her mother and loved most of all hearing the stories of their time in the mortal realm.

One day, a story told only to Etesian with knowing, she learned the truth of who she was. "Etesian, my daughter, you have inherited the mortal spirits of sky and lava, and when my mortal body passes on, you shall be the wind spirit who walks upon the earth," Scoria told her. A new spirit, born in the mortal realm!

"My beloved daughter, it is our wish that you live among and love the wolves of this mortal realm, just as we had centuries ago."

And to Etesian, this meant retaking Red Ridge, the land of her ancestor long passed. "I will become Lykaon," Etesian responded, "and love the mortal wolves by setting them free of Swiftflame's reign."

Surprised, but assured her daughter would do well, Scoria glanced in the direction of the mountains, far in the distance, and she remembered the place from which she and Elysian had been banished by the wolf claiming to be the lava. "Yes, dear, please make known my good name and that I would never subjugate my good wolves."

"In the name of the lava and sky, I will."

—

Etesian saw her mother's mortal body decay and was still rather young to be on her own. She remembered her promise, but felt alone. Her brothers had left, certain of futures outside of Red Ridge, except the youngest who had died suddenly. When her mother was alive, she had said it was because Elysian, her father and the sky spirit, had called him home early.

Now Etesian wished she could be called home into the immortals' realm, to be with her mother and father. Alas, Etesian had much to do and to train her mortal body to fight Lykaon Swiftflame as she had promised. She trained with the prey in the forest and with wandering wolves. She fought with and waged war against nature, often feeling that her grandmother, the earth, was spiteful against her.

When Etesian became a yearling, an adult by wolf standards, she began making her way to Red Ridge's central seat of power, where her sister of lore long passed had settled to be close to the lava.

Etesian's journey through the Red Ridge territory was largely unchallenged, because the network of provinces was easy to traverse and laws decreed long ago by Lykaon Swiftflame promoted cooperation between those once decimated colonies turned provinces. Etesian was not without loud purpose, and so at each province, she announced, "Lykaon Swiftflame is a pretender! Lykaon Swiftflame is not the lava made into flesh!" By all accounts, this was blasphemy in the name of the Lykaon, but as Etesian walked on into province after province, bringing good weather and revealing to wolves things only their ancestors of long passed would know, the wolves of Red Ridge's territories began to listen and believe.

Wherever Etesian walked, the wind was at her heel and her black and white eyes unnerved others such that they would not look at her. Instead, they bowed in respect when Etesian promised to protect them in the name of the lava—not just using that name to conquer more territory.

When she finally arrived to central Red Ridge, Etesian had become well known and whispered about. A wolf whose pelt was like a nightly breeze, swift as air coursing over a mountain ridge, and eyes that could see into a wolf's deepest depths. Lykaon Swiftflame had been quietly furious, the long years slowly graying his once fiery pelt and making tired his strong body.

Lykaon Swiftflame feared no wolf and was largely regarded as the strongest wolf in and around Red Ridge's territory. He had ceased conquering lands many years ago, but his Spartan policies remained. No one dared defy him, and those that had once in the past were no longer alive to tell that tale. Swiftflame never allowed others to fight in his place and so had allowed Etesian to come to central Red Ridge, despite her blasphemy.

However, when Lykaon Swiftflame met her gaze, he felt the blood rush away from his face. One eye white like that of Elysian, his old advisor long thought to be dead… and one eye black like the darkest coal of that wolf whose pelt was like so many forests on fire—that wolf who smelled of cinder and choking smoke, Scoria… the wolf who once whispered to him that she was the lava. "Who are you? How dare you sully my name!"

"Etesian, daughter of Elysian and Scoria, Sky and Lava made flesh," she said loudly, her stance wide and proud. A plume of smoke from Red Ridge's highest peak roared from the mountain's maw, the first such plume since Lykaon Swiftflame's birth. The sky grew dark and the strong gusts from the East seemed to keep the smoke at bay for now. "I am Wind, first spirit born in mortal flesh of the love between those ancient gods whose name and legacy you've tarnished!" Her voice raised into a snarl.

Lykaon Swiftflame felt his throat become parched, and the rumbling of the earth made him unsteady. "So what? You wish to destroy my legacy? Red Ridge has never been more prosperous or peaceful!"

"At the costs of thousands of lives, hundreds of dead in the boglands whose spirits moan because they can never be called home because they have no names!" Their exchange had attracted the wolves of central Red Ridge who looked on, knowing Lykaon Swiftflame would not ask for their help.

Etesian rushed forward and seized Swiftflame, though he stood unflinching, his lips upturned into a snide smile. "I took care of the wolves who lived. They are healthy and strong! And know allegiance to their Lykaon!" Several such wolves approached and snarled in turn at Etesian. Swiftflame waved them away. "This wolf, this outsider, has no place here," he said as he ripped free from Etesian's grasp.

"I am the lava's daughter, these lands were made by his and the sky's paw for all wolves, not just the strong!" Etesian lunged and caught the Lykaon stumbling from the shaking earth. Lava was beginning to crest the ridge, turning the sky black and orange with fury. They continued to grapple as other wolves fled as the fast moving lava covered the valley foothills.

Old and exhausted, Swiftflame laid panting, looking up at Etesian, the lava behind him, hot breath burning his fur. "I may not have been the lava, but these wolves needed me and stood by me when I was young," Swiftflame admitted quietly.

"And where are they now?"

The lands all around them were covered in lava. Only the den of the Lykaon was untouched, splitting the lava around them.

Swiftflame bowed his head, knowing his time was over. "Gone."

—

News spread like wildfire all across the territory. Messengers arrived in each province, announcing the ascension of Lykaon Etesian. Central Red Ridge had been engulfed by lava the same night the mysterious outsider had defeated Lykaon Swiftflame in combat. All the wolves felt uneasy, even the ones who had seen Etesian in her journey into Red Ridge.

The winds were blowing hard from the North and the sky seemed a little bluer, but change was always uncertain.

—

The blackened crust of Red Ridge Proper was still visible as Etesian looked back, beyond the backs of the wolves she now led. They trusted her and called her their Lykaon, the true heir. Now she wasn't so sure to have meddled in the affairs of the mortals and thought perhaps that she have let the former Lykaon simply die as an old fool.

Only she knew that the former Lykaon had escaped into the magma catacombs after she drew a confession from his tired body. She left him because she knew he was dying. Likely he died alone.

Etesian stopped and the procession halted in their turn. The wind that had been guiding her paws had stopped and so she felt that, as the wind spirit, it must have meant something. Without her parents in mortal flesh, she had a harder time interpreting the spirits than she did when she was young.

"Until the mountain heals, we shall live here." Etesian declared.

The Red Ridge wolves looked to her and then around. All they could see was hard-picked sand. A slope to the East gave way to a deep gorge where water would have run if it had rained, but now it was dry as the air. A wolf coughed involuntarily.

No one seemed to question her decision. Red Ridge wolves were followers of the law that Swiftflame had established, and no wolf could remember a time when Swiftflame's mother had reigned. They were a hardy lot, but to stay in the desert?

Stepping forward, a wolf Etesian did not recognize (nor did any other wolf) spoke. "Lykaon, here there is no shelter for our weary paws," she said with deference. She lowered her body and laid back her ears. Her still tail betrayed her true feelings.

"The Spirits punish the wolves of Red Ridge for begetting slaughter and failure to call home their pups, so many dead, now cleansed of the land," Etesian said defiantly. She eyed the newcomer. She looked like fire and white hot burning magma crackling through a cooled crust.

Her eyes were slit like a demon's.

"The land needs to heal. Here the wolves of Red Ridge may regain humility before the world," Etesian concluded before leaving her wolves to create a shelter of some kind.

—

The wolves knew that the mountain and once-rich foothills were buried by rock and all the prey had fled. They quietly blamed Lykaon Etesian for their misfortunes. Where Lykaon Swiftflame had adoration for filling their bellies by keeping lean their families (now thought to be a blessing), Lykaon Etesian had their masked hatred. Of course none of them could stand before her—who could if they couldn't stand before Swiftflame?

In their quiet misery, the Red Ridge wolves dug.

—

"Who are you?" Etesian had approached the outsider who looked like magma peaking through chilled lava. That wolf smelled like a Red Ridge wolf, but felt wrong.

Laacher See kept her back turned to the Lykaon as she rested in the sand, staring up at the moon that casted its soft glow on the land. The last flowers were wilting from the cactus—they had just missed the yearly rains. "Wind Spirit," she addressed the Lykaon, grinning through her fangs. Laacher See eyed the Lykaon. Those slit eyes glowed almost like hot coals in the night.

Etesian leaned forward, locking eyes. She had never admitted to being The Wind Spirit to the wolves now under her care. How did this wolf know? Is that why she felt different?

"I am but a loyal wolf." Her eyes softened, and Etesian felt unease creep into her chest. Her heart quickened and her limbs went rigid, ready to fight. Laacher See's grin turned to a frown. "My Lykaon," she pleaded, "I only wish to serve."

"I asked you to identify yourself." Etesian had stiffened and looked at the strange wolf. She felt on edge.

"Laacher See," she finally relented. She tossed her head around her back and then settled her chin on her outstretched paws. Her body relaxed and when her gaze was no longer visible to Etesian, the Lykaon no longer felt danger. "No one's beloved daughter. I am just a wanderer."

Etesian paused before stepping forward. "In time's past, it was said that the Lykaon accepted all wanderers. Like those Lykaon, I now accept you to Red Ridge." Before the molten wolf could respond, Etesian turned away, heading back to where the encampment was under construction.

There, Etesian took a spot under a mighty cactus, watching the vast network of tunnels her wolves had already dug. Those winds had changed for the better.

—

Of course as a leader, Etesian assisted her wolves in the digging. Her paws, normally white, were stained with the brown of the clay they had unearthed. Whenever she moved, dust fell from her fur and grit scratched at her skin, embedded into her thick coat. She panted.

The wolves around her looked in equally sorry state, but were more lean and well-muscled than before. All the wolves had been on the edge of mutiny until one of them… Laacher See, discovered water down in a tunnel that broke into a cavern. Sunlight trickled in through a porous network far above them. Wind pushed through and stirred the surface of the otherwise pristine water.

The Red Ridge wolves loved Laacher See, entranced by her strange pelt, but they never looked her in the eye like Etesian would.

Here, in the desert, now with shelter like termites in a mound, now with water—Etesian felt comfortable with her decision, though she often stirred at night hoping that she hadn't been wrong. Until that very moment, she could only second guess herself. Where was the resolute pup from her younger days? Or was she simply emboldened by her immortal mother's spirit?

"To reward her service to the pack, Laacher See shall take the role of advisor to the Lykaon," Etesian announced to her small inner circle. Those were the wolves who knew loyalty only to the Lykaon, regardless of who that was.

And then there was Laacher See who bowed slightly and offered that unnerving grin of hers. Etesian and Laacher See's eyes met briefly before Etesian looked away—a gesture so subtle only the two engaged in the act realized what had happened.

Laacher See's smile grew longer. "May I always be of service to the Lykaon as your father was to your predecessor." An oath… or a threat?

The others shifted uncomfortably. Elysian, Etesian's father, was known as a traitor to his Lykaon. Now Etesian, the Lykaon, daughter of a traitor, but also of immortal gods lead them… the Red Ridge wolves didn't know how to react.

They decided it was best to accept Laacher See—perhaps as a newcomer she didn't know. They had all assumed she was from a far off tendril of the Red Ridge territories, uneducated by the inner turmoil at the capital.

"Laacher See, meet me at the central tunnel," Etesian stated rather than ordered.

—

Etesian had some time and eventually found her way to a private cavern that opened onto a ledge far above the Lake. From their she could see all of the wolves who came and went, and it was defensible. This would be her den.

Laacher See had followed her there, disregarding the earlier order to meet in the central tunnel. "My Lykaon," she bowed.

"Advisor." Etesian didn't turn to face her—it was a sign of her indifference. Etesian only hoped that Laacher See could not hear the pounding of her heart in her chest. She thought it was deafening.

Laacher See took a long stretch before laying down beside Etesian, staring down at the tiny wolves, almost the size of insects. From their proximity, Etesian tensed slightly, the strange scent rolling off the newcomer still… trying to spark a memory of recognition.

"You aren't a mortal wolf," Etesian stated bluntly, finally looking at the wolf.

"Correct. I am of the earth, but no daughter of hers," Laacher See responded, sounding bitter. For the first time, Laacher See hesitated and that hesitation caused her words to die in her throat. The molten wolf's eye softened suddenly, and Etesian flushed and was sure her racing heart would betray her confusion. Quickly, the Lykaon stood and looked at the wolves below going about their business. Faint laughter reached them.

Laacher See smiled slightly and stood to leave. "Spirits are drawn to one another, but what if I am not a spirit at all?" She left that question to linger in the air.

Etesian snorted, hating this feeling. But what had she meant by not a spirit? Spirits were born from immortals, and if she was of the earth as she claimed… what else was there? Etesian suddenly felt something like distrust of Laacher See and wondered if she had chosen her advisor poorly.

—

Etesian felt bitter. Her wolves blamed her and held in their hearts the former Lykaon and then Laacher See. Those same wolves could not see themselves prospering as Etesian could, and only saw their manual labor as a downgrade from the time they had lived in Red Ridge proper. Now many of those wolves felt like they belonged in a prison colony rather than a citizen of the capital.

Sitting alone in her den above the water, Etesian looked up into the sky that trickled in through a crack in the rocks. She could see stars and feel the light gust of wind of a desert slowly growing cold. She had felt this once before and now the feeling returned. She wanted to go back to her parents, hide in their warm fur.

Etesian smirked to herself. Now her memories of her family were tainted with the same bitterness she felt towards the wolves of Red Ridge. Why had she been born mortal and left alone to face this life?

You never should have had this turmoil, a voice whispered. It sounded like it came from the tunnel entrance. Etesian felt the fur on her back stand at attention. It was a voice that belonged to no wolf she knew.

It is not too late to become immortal, it continued.

Splashing water far below broke Etesian's concentration. Like that the voice was gone. When Etesian peered over the edge, through the darkness she recognized the molten pelt of Laacher See, who looked up at her. They were so far away from one another, Etesian could barely make out the expression on the latter's face. Laacher See's pelt clung to her and dripped back into the lake. Not long after the wolf shook the water from her body and left.

Strange.