The Call of the Raven [Goliath]

[attr="class","pltxt"]There were many strange occurrences in this world, many of which that slipped past Crow's notice. His existence teetered between two vastly different planes, leaving him in a constant state of clouded mind. It was why he was so skeptical of any beings that approached him at the water's edge. Mara had been an exception to the rule, for he had known her face in youth, and any manifestations of his mind never bore the form of a familiar face. No, they were all faceless strangers, beckoning him to find the one who matched the description. Bidding him to sacrifice them towards his own redemption. Yet one commonality was that the apparitions never spoke to him. It was rare he heard a single word from his victims until he was upon them, exacting the judgment of the gods on them until the last breath left their tattered bodies. It was for this reason that the approach of the giant male had not phased him in a traditional way. His lazy eyes had drifted toward the broken male's form, taking in the scars and trauma he had clearly taken over the years. It would not take him long to find a target that matched this one; the gods were not usually so kind as to paint such a vivid picture of who they wanted for him.

But that thought was also laced with fear and uncertainty. It seemed to him that this male was one who was going to be a far more difficult mark than his others, and that thought left him with a hollow pit in his stomach. It was rare for him to see any wolves that even remotely rivaled him in size, and yet here stood a hulking figure, taunting him with his very presence. The gods were testing him that day, and it would be best for him not to show any signs of weakness or defiance. He had already been ripped away from his errant desire to look after his sister, and now he had been called back to his duty once more.

And then.... then he spoke.

The words following from the beast's mouth were nothing short of accusatory towards the young male, and Crow found a sudden influx of curiosity drawing him to the male, his gaze once more drifting back to the brute, but this time to lock gaze with the male's piercing, pale blue eyes. It seemed that they had a sick sense of humor today, pulling him into the presence of what could very well be his maker. Perhaps he had displeased them in one way or another, and this was the penance he would pay for his failure to listen. This was what happened when he defied the will of the raven; he would stare the harbinger of death in the face. And yet, this time, he was not the harbinger.

The brute's mouth grew dry in that instant as Crow suffered a flashback to the vicious gaze of his father in that moment. The day he had been cast aside. The day Harlot had been brutalized and murdered before him with absolutely no recourse. In that moment, this other male's scars faded away, and in place of those pale blue eyes, Crow was met with the dual-colored stare of his father. Leviathan had come back for him at last. Perhaps he had pleased the brute, but Crow knew this could not be the case. "Father?" he inquired with a start, unable to stop the words that had slipped from his maw.

But he knew it wasn't right.

As soon as the words were spoken and caught on the wind, again the scars and age reappeared on the male's face. The golden bled from the brute's eyes, running down his cheeks and leaving little more than the piercing pale orbs that had been there before. It was not his father, and he had done little more than look like a fool. Perhaps the gods were in a joking mood that day, seeking to scare him into submission.

"Strong..."

The word was little more than a hiss reverberating in his brain. The male's eyes narrowed, his lip curling back in distaste at the thought. The crow seemed pleased by most of his current company as of late, and he was tired of its twisted games. Why had he been brought here? "What would you like for me to say?" he inquired of the older male before his eyes passively drifted back to the water, the gold that had streamed down the male's face once again manifesting in the piercing eyes of the raven staring back at him. Why did it seek to taunt him now? It had given him an inch, and yet he had taken a mile.

"You, too, wear the face of a stranger, and yet not in the way I might have expected," he responded cryptically to the older male. He knew now that his original association of his father with the brute had been incorrect, and yet there was still something that pulled him to cast his gaze upon the elder brute. There was an uncanny likeness to his own father, and that unnerved him. He knew nothing of his family beyond Leviathan and Harlot; he supposed there could be others out there, but he would never know of them. Was this some convoluted attempt to reconnect him with "appropriate" familial connections by the apparition? The crow screeched in protest to the thoughts, and Crow once again stared back at the male, his skewed face an uncomfortable sight for the young male. But not for the reasons one might have thought; he saw a likeness of what he would become. This brute was the embodiment of Crow's future before him.