@jordanparrishound
Liam had fully intended on bringing Chris out to the preserve initially, where he and Talia had left the wendigo chained up. Of course, that had been derailed by his temper which was unfortunately close to the surface after everything he’d been dealing with lately. Knowing it had been left for way too long, Liam headed out to the preserve alone today. There had to be some way of dealing with it - or at least checking to make sure it was still secure before he really did bring the hunter out here. Or someone else if he had to.
Sometimes he cursed the sense of responsibility he’d come to feel, duty. It was all too much when he was still so young. Maybe it was all too much for anyone. Smelling soot when he got closer, he wondered for a brief moment if someone else had found out about the wendigo and decided to kill it. That caused a twinge of guilt inside him but it was nothing compared to what was revealed to him when he made it close enough.
The hound.
He flashed back briefly on the encounter with the hound that saw Hayden lifted from his arms and his stomach jerked so violently he worried he was actually sick. The wendigo looked - well it looked like it had tried to eat itself when no prey had presented itself as a meal. It was twisted, shrunken - like it had starved. Even if it was a wendigo, a creature that perhaps could not be saved from it’s hunger, his failure ate at him. He hadn’t found a solution that would save it and them. It was dead because he hadn’t acted fast enough and the hound was here to hide his misdeeds.
Vaguely aware that his eyes were burning bright, he stepped back when he realised he didn’t know what colour they were anymore. Horror filled him at the thought; Winter had asked if his eyes would change and he couldn’t answer the question. All he knew was that he’d killed this wendigo, intentionally or not. He wanted to run, to tear through the preserve and howl all while wishing he could transform into a wolf and hide away from what he’d done. Whether he should or not, he felt guilty.
Yet, through that horror it was the awful heavy weight of duty that threatened to crush him sometimes which drove him to follow the hound to the Nemeton. He watched in silence, a ritual he wasn’t sure that anyone had ever been privy to before. Maybe he owed it that much. It wasn’t until it seemed to be done that he ventured out to face the hound; to face Parrish. A cop. His stomach churned uncomfortably again.
“I’m sorry.”