Barrow Fields this distance's never felt quite right

Looking for Rusalka or Drageda ig!
Setting Few days before DRG v. AS (backtracked), but after this & other stuff I'll link soon
Summary The trek from Stavanger Bay to Dragoncrest has begun to take a toll on the little Brana, she takes a moment for a much-needed  cry  respite, despite being in need of hugs quite exposed.

In the winter gloaming, her frosty figure gleaming in the late sun, Aure began to understand what it felt like to begin to implode on oneself; like a star that had burned for more than its scheduled death throe allotted, her mind was burdened to the point of straining. Her heart ached with the fatigued misery; her soul thrashed, in great, unbidden lunar flares.

"Ce mai pot face?" The she-wolf murmured, almost a whimper, as evening strung the earliest of its constellations out to last. Her spirit wanted to grasp onto anything, set upon anyone, and hoist them for her current rumination. Yet, she did not want it.

Perched amongst eroded boulders and crags within the frosted winter Barrows, the snowy Brana glowered at the ivory reflection of herself. Frigid breath stirred the not-yet iced-over waters of the creek shoving its way through the brisk earth; to eventually drop away over the side of the nearby cliffs. She longed for Dennan's scars to be whisked away with it, more often than not.

It should have been the lion-of-the-mountain that worried at her warbling thoughts, or her various encounters along the way since; or the flesh-eater, who she knew deep within her she was still who he hunted for ... even the salt-throned male at Stavanger, whoever he must be, should have netted her concerns more fiercely.

Instead, it was what the brine-lord had said: a life, 'unfulfilled', in the search for her brother where she could do nothing for being pledged to Drageda; how she had, quite frankly, relinquished all efforts if that was in fact the case. How it was her will to be forgotten, but that contradicted how she'd forever remain.

Impetuously, a hot haze made her argent eyes become bleary. Once upon a time, she would have torn open this very world to be reunited with her hanar once more; would have commanded it with all her star-stuff, would that she could, and strike into its very heart. 

And yet ... with those in the sound, - (and her lack of knowledge thereof) - and some harrowing kismet lingering on where the sky met the sea ... and how distraught this Drageda had become ... and her own ruin, only an ivory shadow of how hateful she had once been, if only to find Vonnaruil. And her fear: if was truly alive, did he even want to be found?

All of this first, true week came billowing up and out of her, something raspy and laborious; caught between her hiccuping lungs and hermetic throat in a desolate peal:

"What more can I do?!"

She didn't need to turn her bleary, dolorous eyes to the stars to know that they held no answer.

The weight she'd gained back over the warmer months was slowly melting away as Moorhen continued her search. She'd hardly eaten and she rarely slept, and all the hours of her day were spent wandering, nose twitching, ranging endlessly back and forth across the coast. It seemed unfathomable that Thresher would leave her only landmark behind, but Moorhen had decided that, if she did not find the girl today, she would begin venturing inland. Where else could the girl have gone?

She should have been single-minded in this quest - and she usually was - but the sound of distant anguish had her ears flickering uncertainly, she she wavered from her course to investigate. There in the field was a snow-white wolf, and Moorhen thought fleetingly of her long-lost uncle before pushing him out of her mind and starting forward. It was none of her business, really, but if someone was going to make such noise about their feelings, Moorhen assumed they would be ready to be discovered.

Besides, the Cairn couldn't help but identify with the other female, strangers though they may be. What more could she do? What if she never found Thresher? Would she be allowed to return to the island without her? Did she even want to?

Tail fluttering uncertainly, she approached the other woman, not quite sure what to say. When she'd closed the distance to only a few yards, she hesitated and let out a low chuff of greeting, her face a mask of discomfort even despite her friendly body language.

At her most raw and graceless at the moment, Aure couldn’t give un rahat as to who found her. Only giving the newcomer a distraught glance over a thin shoulder, she anguished wanly, “Did you lose a brother, too? Da? Bine. May we lament together.” A flourish of a feathery tail heralded the warm, earthy female before she promptly turned and plunked her chin upon her paws.

Just as she hoped this newcomer didn’t see the faint tracks of tears, Aure herself didn’t notice the marks that recalled those of the shore-king. Instead, she lay where she was, sprawled in body and disharmony in mind. “There are times when I wonder if he even wishes to be found. From the moment we were born, we never parted. If we did, it was never more than some whiles away—but not this. Not ever this.”

Usually, she was a mediator—nothing but something distant and a bit hollow to fill with sorrows through the ear. Nevermind that she was lamenting to someone who could freely strike at her prone spine; instead, she snarled to the heavens with a chilling click of fangs while the pale fur flushed to life along her spine.

Moorhen blinked at the woman, ears flickering rapidly as she tried to take in all the words - but they came too fast and they were put together in complicated ways that Coelacanth certainly never used, and Moorhen was left with the odd feeling that the stranger had an accent - which was new. Usually, Moorhen was the one whose accent made things difficult. She could already tell that this was going to be a tiring encounter, but something in the stranger's speech kept her tethered there.

"You have... lost someone?" she asked, hoping dearly that this was the case, if only so that she didn't make a fool of herself.

---

Tacking an ending on this and closing up with Ellie's permission

The woman introduced herself and explained her sorrows over her brother. Moorhen clumsily shared that she was looking for someoen as well, but did not say who it was. They parted ways.