The waves swept up onto the shore with water that sparkled in whatever light managed to squint through the clouds, a peaceful silence aside from the suck and release of the sea that provided the Renoda with background noise in which to think. Any who knew her would also know that her favoured times were ones where she could simply sit and gaze out into the expanse of blue, observing the way the water moved and the taste of salt upon her tongue.
Faeryn had little on her mind truly, but the small thoughts came to her nonetheless. It was a relatively calm life, the one she led on this island, and if she was honest she enjoyed it. Part of her would enjoy a little action, but she was a peaceful one at heart and the quietude Undersea provided her was enough.
She wouldn't mind some company, though.
Living a life surrounded by water, in which home worked as an intersection between seas, it was hard not to become infatuated with the life of a mariner. Droman had always had an affinity for the natural world, so his interest in the water came as no surprise. Over time, however, that interest had managed to become more of an obsession.
As as he grew older, Droman became more fond of solitude. The dependence that he’d had on Hemlock was beginning to fade, and although he did still occasionally seek out Reed and Ani, he was content on his own.
Nonetheless, Droman wasn’t completely opposed to company. ’lo!
he called, I’m bored, y’know?
Faeryn briefly pondered how different her life had become - first she was a traveller, continiously switching between homes, now she was settled on the edge of an island embracing the peace of this new home. This one, however, was one she intended to keep. Before, she did not stop; she was never allowed to. Whether by fault of her own or simply the nature of wolves, her homes had never lasted. But here, with the gentle slosh of the waves, she was content.
The silence was interrupted (though not unwelcomingly) by a somewhat familiar voice. She'd run into Droman a couple of times now, and his company was certainly not a bothersome one. "Hey there." The wolfess smiled, tail gently thumping against the sand. "You're bored? Hmmm... how about we tell stories? Or jokes? I'm not sure." Truthfully, she still wasn't the best at conversations.
Both stories and jokes sounded wonderful, but Droman had found himself with an affinity for the former. When he was alone, he would come up with fantasical tales about the world around him; once, while left to his own devices, the young chronicler had been able to construct a tale about why the birds sang that involved an extravagent adventure through the tretches of the deep blue. Stories!
he exclaimed excitedly, tail wagging at a steady (yet clearly excited) pace behind him.
I wanna hear a real-life story, y'know? I don't have a lot but I bet you do. Can you tell me one?
The youth perked up with the idea of stories, tail beating excitedly - Faeryn grinned, cerulean gaze glittering in the light. Stories... he wanted a real life story. Truly, she had no spectacular tales of surviving in the wilderness alone as a child, or defeating a great beast, for she remembered nothing of her childhood and her life had not been so thrilling. But there was one tale she could recount with relative ease. The storm.
"Hmmm, I think i've got one." The gem took a moment to collect the memories in the front of her mind, before settling down to tell the tale. "Have you ever seen a great storm? They can be small, but also very big. Sometimes big bolts of white come down and smack the ground - they can set trees on fire and are very deadly, but also incredibly beautiful. They roar and growl so deeply, and the clouds go as dark as stone - storms are very loud, sometimes it feels like they're shaking the land!" So... a beast of kinds, she supposed. "When storms come, the waves can get huge, definitely big enough to swallow a wolf with ease." She gestured to the ocean before them, turning back to him with a soft smile. "But if you've ever managed to watch one, they're spectacular."
Faeryn awaited a response, deciding to allow him to answer before she told her tale.
Droman had seen storms before and he'd heard about others, but never had one been recounted so fantasically! Such descriptive words pulled imaginative sighs from the juvenile's maw as he thought about what a storm of such power might be like. It was as though he had never been in a real storm before and going out to search for one was all that his heart desired.
Nonetheless, Droman sat silently with a dopey look of amazement as he waited for Faeryn to continue.
She smiled at his look of amazement, closing her eyes to allow the memory to return with ease. "I got caught up in one once." Faeryn thought back to her previous 'homes', the packs that had never truly... stuck. Undersea was, by far, the home she had been searching for, the home she had needed without realising she needed it. "I've been part of many packs, but at the time, the one i'd been part of had just disbanded. I don't remember entirely why, but as a result I started wandering. I found my way to the coast, i'm not sure how - but I did." What she did remember, however, was being utterly entranced by the sea. She'd never seen it before that moment, and she'd been dumbstruck. "At some point while I was walking, the clouds grew dark and the rain started hammering down onto me - I love the rain, but I'd never felt rain so heavy, or wind so strong." Then with a sheepish grin, she added, "I'll be honest with you, I was terrified."
"I tried to find shelter once the waves started roaring, and I managed to scramble underneath a tree but looking back, it was a pretty foolish idea. After that moment, I don't remember much of what happened. I have little memories of flashes of darkness, I remember feeling like the air had been sucked out of me, and I remember being dragged under the water." This wasn't too scary, right? The Renoda had never attempted to recount a story before; she'd never been asked. At least it had a happy ending, which stories were supposed to have, weren't they?
The story was long and eventful, but it didn't have quite the ending that Droman was hoping for. Are you still scared?
When something scared him, he knew that it took a while before he was back to normal, so for Faeryn to have gone through something like that, she must have been terrified.
I'm so so sorry about the wait on this!
She gave the boy a small smile, the edges of her lips curling up slightly. "No, I'm not scared anymore. In fact, i'm rather grateful." Funny, wasn't it? How life could throw hell at you but in the end, everything could turn out okay? Sure, maybe that wasn't always the case, but this time Faeryn had got lucky. "If I didn't get washed up onto the shore here, I never would have found where I belong." Her tail swayed gently at her hind, eyes glimmering as the light reflected off the water.