Bearclaw Valley the new rogues

He hadn't left the hollow since his return, but he was not oblivious to the goings-on of the group. Conversations held between the adults found their way to his ears, either in passing or between patrols they held; sometimes when someone came to visit the hollow for treatment, Karst would sullenly attempt to help them.

He knew nothing; he could do little more than stare as they fetched from the available supplies and tended to themselves. The knowledge would come if he let it. The collection that Evien had made - mostly dried herbs, some flowers pressed and hidden away - was beginning to dwindle.

If Karst let it run dry there would be no reason for him to stay there, to hold the space as his own, and he could not let that happen. So, he ventured out - finally - only to stare in to the vast white abyss of winter.

had karst come to replace their nurse?

evien; a name astara would not even utter if she had the ability -- her senses still soured at the name and reminder of his ending.

another soul gone to the might of the bear -- did she love the bear for this?

she found the nurse-boy staring out into the white void. astara remembered her last interaction with him no more fondly than she remembered learning of evien's death. she came to sit a distance away, studying karst with a distant expression of loathing in her gaze.

Sorry for being so slow with Karst!!

There came a black mass slithering across the white. He thought it was a shadow at first and looked up to the sky, where the whiteness was a few shades darker than the snow, but saw nothing. A glint of light touched those dark eyes and he lowered his gaze again, and when he recognized it was not a shadow but a person, his chin lowered a little bit. There was malevolence in that stare — Karst instinctively covered his throat, and debated returning to the emptiness of the storehouse.

no apologies! i am slow also <3

astara lingered like an asp behind karst a moment, idly wondering what would happen if she struck the back of his head, his neck; ripped the long tendril of spine from his back, or exposed his throat to the sky --

all manner of scheming came to an end as karst recognized her, instinctively lowering his chin.

for a long moment astara stared at the boy, wishing his life might wither from his body under her stare. while her hatred for karst was cruel and entirely unfounded, she believed he the child of merrick -- and he the walking, constant reminder of her bear's infidelity.

yet he was blood; not her own, certainly, but aventus' and avicus'. astaras lower lip curled, but she was yet to move.

Rather than be spotlit by the woman's attention Karst tried to focus on the area surrounding the storehouse. He wanted to retreat in to it, always, but he was anticipating the arrival of Ashlar in the coming hours and further tutelage about the valley's greenery. The plan was to meet where they had met — where Karst frequented and felt the safest — so he lingered at the hollow now.

After every step he took he would try to focus his attention on the weeds probing from the earth, a pile of errant sticks netted in the undergrowth, or the curve of a fiddlehead trying to propagate nearby to the entrance. He kept his eyes averted from Astara; he could feel her there, her presence burning like a patch of winter frost holding on through the spring thaw. It was an unsettling sensation he could not ignore hard enough.

she was being ignored.

which was worse -- his full attention, or his total inattention? astara felt a prickling of something akin to annoyance.

rather than plead for his attention, the raven quit his presence. let him mosey along his stores like a little mouse, devout and uninspiring -- astara would be the lioness she knew she was elsewhere.