damned if i don't

Try as he might, Bastien could not delay this any longer. The door was closing on life as he knew it, and Nicharion had made a suggestion—really two—that he'd readily agreed to without considering the consequences. Namely: How he was going to convince his diligent daughter to abandon school mid-semester in favor of a spontaneous getaway with him and the boyfriend she didn't even know existed. He'd worried his teeth clean through his bottom lip once the realization came that they'd finally meet, should Vela agree.

With that came another dilemma. Bastien would have to find a way to gently tell her about his impending enlistment, which was more than he'd ever have told her about his life before. She knew very little about him; he'd been careful to keep it that way. It was in her best interest to be as oblivious about the man who'd taken over guardianship of her as possible, but it was becoming all the more difficult to evade her questions.

There was one benefit to his mind being so consumed by troubled thoughts, and that was that Bastien failed to recall that he looked drastically different from the wolf that left. It was only upon seeing the horror in her face that he remembered. "Errr, what?" Sweeping his muzzle over his shoulder, as if trying to discern what had snared her interest, he made a pitiful attempt at playing dumb. "Someone behind me?"

plucked a feather off a crow

so i could fly

code // art