A dark vastness laid over the land like a kind of blanket, hugging the Earth with its eternal blackness, fighting away the ever growing threat of sunlight and warmth. Spring time and its ever wonderful bask of sweltering heat that baked the land was closer and closer; soon the misty cover of night would fade away and leave nothing but the sun. And Nantale hated the sun. Her ebony fur absorbed its rays as if they were starving. Which was absolutely ridiculous, considering her fur were neither alive nor needed nutrients. Instead, the warrior attempted to steer clear of the daylight, sticking to the shadows of the forest whenever she could.

Today, unfortunately, she was not so lucky. Rather than sulk as she normally would, now she was out in the open, slowly ambling along a sandy front as water crushed casually along the shoreline. Ocean wasn’t something she was unfamiliar with; in fact, her previous life had some ocean here or there. The sand trickled its way in between her dusky toes as her slow, awkward gait dragged along without a care or reason. If she had to be out in the open, exposed, she’d be doing it on her own terms, and those terms were slow and lazy.

For a brief moment a pain ached in her back leg; the mangled, heap of a leg that was barely functional throbbed with a dull pain, reminding her of her unfortunate past. She paused until the pain subsided, standing weirdly on the beach front, silvery eyes peering outward into the vast blueness as the sun slowly rose in the east. It was still mostly dark, but the warmness was already creeping forward and Nantale sighed, wondering just how hot it would get today, and if she could somehow avoid it.

She guessed, however, that she couldn’t.

Nantale knew that her time alone would not last forever. In fact, with the lands drench in the scent of life, she was surprised she spent this much time without being bothered. It was nice, she admitted – after all, she had spent her life as a loner for as long as could remember. She almost preferred the solitude and ability to be as free as possible. The ebony warrior knew, however, that her time alone would soon come to an end, and she’d be forced to partake in the awkward social interaction that dictated their lives. She hoped, though, that it would be later rather than sooner.

But alas, as she starred out into the deep blueness that masked the water front, a stranger came swimming along. From the distance she could not make out much of him, or where he came from, but he neared closer and closer, and before she knew it, he was too close for her liking, speaking with his friendly tongue and smiling – oh, how she hated smiling. A smile upon her lips would be like poison upon a baby. Nobody liked it, and certainly, nobody wanted to see it.

The blackened female took a small step backwards as he bellowed his friendly greeting. She emitted a sound as she moved, a somewhat combination of a gruff grunt and a small winch, as her leg continued to throw. Perhaps it was the water that made her ache.

“Friend?” She repeated back to him after he finished speaking his long winded tongue. Her tone was brash and confused. The amount he uttered almost sounded like a speech to the female. She left it at that, purposely ignoring the rest of his statements.

The blackened female was, at least, intrigued by the strangers suddenly quietness, and his random choice to go and wade in the shallow ocean water. Nantale stood and starred at him as he moved away from the female and into the shoreline, allow the crashing, soft waves to overcome him and drench him in the salty water. Her eyebrows cocked in confusion as he invited her to join him into the water. Instead, she shook her head and declined. Wading with a stranger just seemed like a bad idea.

She did, however, take a few steps towards the fellow. Thoughts of ambushing the male as he laid in the water poured into her twisted mind, but she ignored them with the best of her ability. Even if she had the upper hand in the situation, and really, he wouldn’t knew what hit him – she declined to indulge in her demons and instead opted to make casual conversation. “Nantale,” she uttered, in a matter-of-fact statement of her name. “You?” Questioning back at him, her silvery eyes watched as each small wave crashed into the male, and how really, he seemed to rather enjoy it.