Swiftcurrent Creek Indigo

@Akavir <3

How strange this earth is, where vast canopies of green hides the evening sky and the air of late spring tangles with a thousand voices. The trees shake themselves thickly in the wind as woodfowl dart through their overlapping branches. Without clear vistas and the sun to scorch her back, she no longer felt the gods watching from above. It causes the hebsut to tread cautiously. Perhaps that is a secret of this place.

There were three days between herself and Akashingo. It was only after the miles fell away beneath her feet that Eset contemplated the wisdom of her choice. No matter how she endeavored to ease her mind, thoughts inevitably returned to searing guilt. It pained her to leave, to abandon her post, to withdraw in shame from the thing other women waited the epoch of their youth for.

Normal women; wolf women. Her heart was a knife’s twist.

She moves implacably ahead, pursuing the eastern trails once told to her by @Moss. When the air smells of petrichor and the land tightens with trees, her pace eases. The presence of a claim nearby reminds her she is not alone in this wood and must conduct herself carefully. She slinks along the perimeter of the river, wide ears scanning for sounds of wolf-kind. In the morning she would greet them, but tonight all Eset wanted to contemplate was a bath.

Swiftly she stoops at the banks for a drink. The brook is ice against her teeth but she welcomes the shock of its waters and watches as the current pulls sand from her tired ankles.

The past few weeks had been wrought with trespassers and defense. Wrung out in so many ways—particularly the realization of just where the silver wolf who kept the key to his soul had run to. Leaden limbs trailed the length of his creek—an ebony ear swiveling to the faintest sound of the fresh spring peepers as the sun begun to nestle away for the night.

His sixth year listening to them—each year had always been in a different place, or varying presences in his life… the majority of them having come and gone.

But the ambience was one he looked forward to—the soothing symphony of chirps signifying the new life that could be—a cadence that was calming. It was these little moments in life he lived for.

The splash of cold water from the bank edges dampen his fur along his dark limbs. His pale eyes gleaming as they cast ahead—and while the silhouette of night falls, distinctly, there’s another figure there, and he feels the weight of the world press down upon him once more—

—was this yet another wolf to defend his home or family from?

Stoical—he utters a low croon to demand the lissome creature’s attention—as he glides closer, noting the embers of the she-wolf’s gaze as she laps at the water. Distinctly, something about her stills him—unease, perhaps.

The faintest recalling of the hot sun and burning sands of the lands that had terrified the woman who had crushed him.

Amid the birdsong, his voice drops from the sky, striking the tops of her ears with its firm command. She wrenches her chin from the creek, hackles bristling in the subsequent reactions of shock and alarm. Her wide gaze catches first on a sable-black silhouette before drawing north towards his eyes, reflective and startlingly lambent in the settling dusk. He approaches slowly, in a manner which exudes dominance over this place.

He is intimidating. She stiffens.

Unable to intuit his movements, Eset stands wary of him. Would he sense the years of servitude upon her, in the way she casts her eyes low? She would not pass for an aristocrat to avoid the brunt of a cruel regime, but perhaps a lady, if her mannerisms were dignified.

The hebsut brings in a slow breath and bridles taller, dressing in an imitation of elegance. She replies with a low croon of her own, in his own language, but sharper. Edged where it should have been smooth. Not the pretty song of a wolf, but the dithering voice of a coyote.

Despite the attempt at a subtle call she seems spooked by his sudden appearance—perhaps, so engrossed with the creek waters she had not heard him nor scented him prior. Her own voice mingles with the peepers—the draw of her slender frame and the widening of her eyes—did he intimidate her?

Given their recent breeches and battles it wouldn’t be the worst impression left to another. There was something in the way she held herself that contradicted that thought for him—a bird ready to take flight, was what she reminded him of.

And for some reason he wasn’t ready to watch her fly away just yet.

Instead, he slowly reclined to his haunches—the shift of the wind teasing at his nose—he could swear the hint of the desert….

But they did not come to their valley. And so further—he stretched down closer to the creek, a paw dangling closer to the edge of the waters, the shock of the cold reminding him that it was but only spring, still.

“I’m not here to disturb your refreshments,” he offered her, pale eyes drifting from her reluctantly, to study the rushing waters.

Her pulse quickens with something that is not entirely fear as his stark form draws towards her. When their eyes meet something in his gaze protests her turning away. She looks deeply, trying to figure out what it might be, what it is she recognizes in him.

“Nor I your’s,” she rejoins, but does not bend for the waters again.

If she were a passerine he was a shadowed feline, reclining cooly in his claim. As tired as she is, her senses fill with the chill of the air against her face, with the trill of the river under her paws and the wild scent he brought with him. She hears her own breathing and feels the quiet power of his attention.

When his focus turns for the water, Eset mirrors his calm.

“You would not chase me from your river?” She asks, her intentions with it two-fold.

Fire burns in her eyes—perhaps as hot as the sun from the deserts she hailed from. Cloying—Toula’s people clung to her—distinct in their claim and scent—and yet faded just enough that it left doubt in his mind. Even so—the stance of her—the echoing serenity that seems to descend upon her when he poses no threat… or so she imitates.

An ear flickers idly at her words, the ghost of a smirk pressing to the corner of his lips as he considers her words. If she did come from the dark palace, he could only imagine her thoughts in this moment—no great army of guards to flock upon the visitor with great demands.

She was only met with a scarred wolf—physically, yet more so emotionally.

He shifts his weight like a feline—shoulder sliding back as he brushes his cheek across the soft dew of the grass. The peepers continued their peaceful croon—but a cheeky grin became more wicked with amusement. “Did you want me to chase you, sùilean teine?”

He paused—pale eyes intent upon her—the jest fading from his gaze. “Imagine trying to tame rapid waters that are different each time you touch them. We don’t chase others past our claim… Unless they pose a threat.”

Sùilean teine. A shiver runs down her back. It is so strange, the way he vocalizes. Words sound pulled and stretched the way he speaks them. She will not guess at their meaning. They are far more intimate than they should have felt.

A ripple runs over his mouth. He frees a smile, and her own lips curve by effect. When was the last time someone had joked with her?

Eset does not answer him right away. She watches for a moment, eyes holding on some inner debate. He looks drawn, the scars over his snout deep. But even at this distance, he has a face made to be looked at. Finespun. She has a feeling he is wild, that if she steps closer she will be pulled into his uncertain tides. She decides he is dangerous.

“And do I pose a threat, Maahes?” She counters. She knows she is giving him a daring look. Her own words sound like contraband in her ears. But she liked it. In this strange place she wanted to pretend she was a copper witch, with no past at all.

The curl of his grin widens—a brief glimpse of her with a spoken word he did not recognize. His gaze roves over her lazily still—the continued setting of the sun glinting off the rich cinnamon of her fur, highlighting a slim waist and mischievous glint.

“It depends on your reasoning for being near my home,” he admits—not simply because of her assumed ties, but for the scars that do reign over his body and his brethren—the consistent threats that loomed.

“But maybe I need a closer look,” he dares, tongue snaking over a tooth and a brow lifting, wondering if he was about to scare the little bird back to her nest of well kept polished walls.

Or did she look for a safe haven from the politics and the darkness that likely lingered in the veiled rooms of such a palace?

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His voice makes her pulse race. She knows she should look away. Her senses fill with the trickle of the creek, the chime of songbirds. Her awareness shifts, her body is lively. Her paws suddenly ache to devour mile-long stretches of forest, to give him a chase.

If he got close, would she like what she saw in his eyes? Would he like what he saw in her’s?

Or would he smell the scorch of desert on her skin? Would he see she was a whore? Would he smell the real reason she was here?

It was Eset who was the danger.

“I am here for a drink,” she lies.

‘I’m here for a drink,’ she smoothly offers—no more, no less. His smirk grows—though with this information, he rolls himself back to his paws, a fluid motion that has the shadow runner standing closer to the edge of the water, his gaze lingering on her before stealing back to its depths for a moment.

“Then I can leave you to it,” he offers—was she nervous of him? She remained rooted to the spot—a shift in her frame and the way she held herself—a display for him, perhaps in hope to keep him at bay?

He was curious of her, but he wasn’t one to push his presence on another. “Nice meeting you….?” He trails off, wondering, at the very least, if he will get her name. Anything that might substantiate his suspicions she was part of the court.

His words caught her off guard. She had expected him to advance, as she would have expected from a desert-bred wolf who would see the class disparity and choose to exploit it. She may not have even fought it, it was simply the way things were.

But all the latent power of him- it was used only to find his own footing.

He does not move with unearthly desert grace, but strong and stoic, like the rapids of his river. Tension in her shoulder wanes, her neck softens. Within her chest blooms a modest amount of trust, and for the first time she is attuned to the nameless man not as a consequence of her season, but with a sense of something genuine.

Slipping from the creek, the coywolf pads her paws upon a velvety growth of moss before lowering her hips into a seat. Closer, now- close enough to see that his mind is working behind those leonine eyes, and she has the distinct feeling of being studied. She offers him the same look right back- brows gentle, lips curved, a pooling curiosity flaring through the blue dusk amid them.

“Eset,” her eyes skip between his, “what is your name?”

Lissome, the lowering of her hips to settle and the faintest scent cloys at him upon the evening breeze. If she gave nothing away for her reasons for trailing so far from the desert—this certainly spoke volumes to the man who was unfortunately privy to the darker aspects of palace living.

A tick in his jaw—the grip of claw, but he remains settled—firm. Eset, she tells him, and he finds himself giving a gentle nod—an ear swiveling to the night peepers—as if allowing them to ground him for the moment, that this was forest, vale and river. Not the dry sands of the desert.

There is no herb-encrusted or marinated meat—flourishes of plants and color added to  every meal. Embellishments of fur and feather upon shoulders and skin—there is only this.

Nature, in her element.

“Akavir,” he offers, his gaze sweeping to her face, struck for a moment by the soft beauty there. “This is a safe space, Eset… If you need it to be so.”

The air empties of voice to the ambient chorus of peepers. Eset looks ahead and then away, absorbing his words. There is recognition in them. She understands it is for the condition of her heat, and nothing more. If there was an occasion for worshippers of the sun to brush with valley dwellers, it could only be rare.

She is dizzy, going from the harsh desert heat to the coolness of this creekside, contending with a fickle will she knew would only get more polarizing as the days persist. But the moment is savored, despite its strangeness. She turns, tipping her chin up, allowing her eyes to share their gratitude with- Akavir.

The edge of her mouth curls. In her jack-lit stare, something coy is stirring. At her side lies a primitive, palm-leaf pouch. Eset reaches a paw in then unfurls it in front of the creek man. A sweet, effervescent red berry appears in the center of her palm.

“Would you join me, Akavir?”

His gaze stayed on the waters for the longest time—knowing if he looked back to her to study her, he would wish to devour the space between them more. Resistance was far easier when it came when he was not caught off guard—and far easier when he wasn’t caught in the allure of mystery.

Her invitation drew his gaze back—a sweep of a lovely paw, the reveal of a berry stirred an arch of his brow. If there had been any doubt prior to the lands she hailed from, it was eradicated now.

Only then did he note the pouch—and his own lips hinted to a smirk.

“Why not,” he noted, his own limbs stalking closer before he slid to lay down—respecting her—respecting her space. “But only if you tell me what that berry might be, Eset.”

“Fun.”

Her smile is dark, baiting. The regal man would have no reason to trust an unknown woman offering unknown delights. She senses his temper is restrained; tamed, but through it are traces, something mirrored. The tip of her tongue flexes against her teeth before softening. No more is said as she recovers several berries from the pouch, laying a glistening collection on the lea in between them. He’s settled a considerable distance away when her eyes pass his again, and she allows herself to repose in kind, tilting her hips against the shale, loosening the strain from her forearms.

“Play a game with me,” the request evokes playfully, a light tease. “I will pose a statement of something I have never done, and if you have done it, you must take a berry. Then you will pose the same.” Sweetness from the wine braids with the pine in the air.

“I will go first: I have never had a surname.” Quiet, composed, yet the hebsut's amber eyes flash their knowing fire.

The allure of her smile caught him off guard a moment—the collected facade from before giving way to an invitation for play. A rumble of amusement escapes the man—his eyes drifting over the berries as she reveals more—and idly, he can’t help but wonder if somehow, with his visit to Toula and Akashingo, he had placed himself on a radar he should not be part of.

… If Germanicus’s lengthy absence came with a form of revenge from the man who had been affiliated to the desert palace.

A paw lifts to cross over the other—attention rapt upon her—a smile growing as she not only laid out the expectations of this little game, but went for a very obvious statement: though he had to wonder at her lack of surname.

“I’ve never had a surname, either,” he responds lazily, stretching out a paw now to idly graze a berry. “I have two. My folks were keen on legacies,” he offered with a cheshire grin. “But maybe that’s cheating.”

He waits for a berry to be extended—the judgement of the matter left to her.

“I have never… indulged in anything other than fermented fruits,” he offered—a far cry from the true questions he wished to delve in to.

Akavir speaks of his lineage- of not one, but two parents, both who wished to give a sigil of legacy to their son. It was an idea that warmed her. Eset found herself imagining the refined sounds of these family names, something that would suit a man with a prince’s look but a rogue’s eye.

She would not accept his refusal to drink- her brows narrowing to play at ire. “Go on,” she spurs, immune to the founded skepticisms by virtue of her insulated existence.

Reaching, she edges a berry towards his wrist with her paw and takes one for herself. It’s set upon her tongue to dissipate, prickling her lips. The familiar heated feeling, when it comes, is delicious- a kind of easy sweetness flowering deep in her belly.

“Peyote," she elaborates, “just once.” She skims her leg, one over the other, but holds no shame. Instead her brow bends, considering.

“I’ve never tried to kill a man,” she whispers next, half to placate him, though also because Eset is competitive, and Akavir hadn’t gotten that lengthwise scar from a pissy badger.