Silverlight Terrace walkin' after midnight

Feb 29

If he tried, he could spy the edge of Moonspear against the blue-black of the sky. The clouds were rolling in as graphite smudges, blocking what little starlight, hiding the moon - but if he squinted and concentrated for a while, he'd see it. He'd look and he'd wonder about the family living there; someday he would return to them. Tonight, he would pass the time with a hunt.

The terrace was a slate-hewn expanse that he had to carefully pick his way across, and as that wasn't the style of movement his body was accustomed to, he was sluggish, awkward. It took effort to hike his way in the shadow of the mountain; but he was invested, following after the rich scent of a doe. Revui had not anticipated catching up to it. They were fleet of foot, and he was not; they knew the area, and he did not; however, this one made heavier steps and smelled oddly sweet.

As he climbed atop a narrow hill of stone and ice, he paused and looked down in to the valley. The white of melting snow betrayed the doe further: giving him a shadowed path to trail after. As he ducked in to a burdensome run, he caught a glimpse of something moving further ahead and grew impatient - but he could not bring a deer down alone, not even one as heavy-set as this soon-to-be mother.

hydra had come into season, and the perfumes that wreathed powerfully through moonspear set the little duck on edge. over twenty-four moons she had now; this was the number that her mother had said marked the beginning of the woman's ability to bear children at her husband's hearth.

despite the fact that kukutux had not wished to leave the comfort and protection of the vital mountain again till the spring melt, hydra's silent clarion call had sent her own skin into an uncomfortable flush that answered the great ruler in a different way.

the girl traveled down the slopes and out across an expanse of shale that was both sharp and cold beneath her small paws. over her slim shoulders she had tucked a wide scrap of beaver-skin, water-resistant should she have need of it. hydra would only give a true permission once she had procured a husband. the thought provoked a frown, and kukutux was pleased to have the hungering distraction of the pregnant doe cross her senses.

a man, running in a heavy step. the duck paused to watch him, ears quavering warily.

Focused on the task at hand, one might expect Revui to be single-minded (especially when potential meals were involved) but he was more keen than that, and slowed when he caught wind of another wolf. They held Hydra's mark, and when the young man turned a shrewd eye over his shoulder he took notice of the woman, plus the direction she had come from. No doubts - she was of Moonspear. He looks to where the doe's trail leads and back again, as if to deduce which he should pursue. Food often won in Revui's mind and so he hesitated a little longer, but turned back from the futile pursuit in favor of the pale woman. As he came to close the distance between them however, he is silent - appraising her.

she quailed as the man approached. he was the color of the sky before rain; his height cast a shadow over kuktutux and she felt pierced through by the cold light of his icewater stare.

this distance, the duck was confused to scent hydra upon him, for she had not seen this anmaak before. perhaps he was another of the great family. wilted, kukutux struggled for her voice. "i greet you."

He does not realize how intimidating he is. He carries the scent of Hydra due to their last meeting, but that is not enough to assuage all the fear within the woman as he approaches; he is a friend of the mountain but a stranger at the same time, and while it doesn't enter Revui's mind to be a little more sympathetic to his present company, he realizes a bit too late that she's shrinking from him and trying not to draw attention.

Her greeting is odd. But then, so is his entry to the scene - they were two awkward peas in a pod.

I... greet you? He mimics in return, and that's when the light goes off above Revui's head. Like the other wolves of the mountain he does not know, they have no knowledge of him. He is truly a stranger upon his home soil. So he clears his throat, lets his posture slacken a bit to hopefully ease any tension he has wrought, and says: I am Revui. Arcturus, Hydra... are family.

revui. he softened into something less sharp, less scrutinizing. while kukutux kept her posture deferent, now her springmint eyes rose as far as his cheekbone, wondering at the scar and at who he was. his gruff words confirmed what she had thought. the duck was somewhat dizzied anew by the reach of the family.

"i ... i was looking for places that plants might grow," she told him quietly. why was he not part of moonspear? was he deposed in some way? arcturus was also her leader, and jarilo highest-ranked. but revui was not in their number. the girl was curious, remembering herself late. "i am kukutux."

Her comment about plants brought to mind his mother Amekaze. She was not exactly an herbalist in life, but she had been better versed at it than himself. His heart was heavy - so he banished the remembrance from his mind promptly. In its stead he focused upon the woman's features; her good health, the springtime look in her gaze, and could not quite banish his mother in her entirety after all.

I am Kukutux, she introduces softly, and he nods - looking over her shoulder as if distracted, maybe considering that he could still leave this woman and go hunt down that doe. But he decides, in a rare moment of compassion, to help the woman instead of gorge himself on an easy feast.

Unsure of how to approach this new quest, he appears tongue-tied for a few moments, but blurts: I can show you, and lurches away from her a step and a half through the snow, towards the distant weald, and then slows down so she can keep up; over his shoulder he comments, What do you seek? A dumb question - but he wanted to be of use, especially to one loyal to his sister.

"i am not sure — yet," the duck answered lamely, tugging at the pelt across her shoulders as she hurried after revui. he seemed as though her company was not quite wished; she suspected she had interrupted something, and wished to make up for it. somehow.

but her tongue was tied. this frustrated kukutux; when the silence had extended too far, the girl drew a breath. "thank you," she murmured belatedly. "it has been a little while since i traveled out of moonspear." and she had gone far that time, an unnecessary distance.

Whatever she sought, he would do his best to aid her in finding it. Better that she be safe, he thought, than to allow any woman to tread the lowlands without a warrior present. Whatever dangers lurked in the area for his sister might have been levied against any of the other Moonspear women - and Revui was devoted to his task, eager to show off that he was a warrior of great value to the mountain. He did not fully understand that Hydra's heat did not affect the others; but he trusted his instinct, which drew him along with Kukutux in tow, and would be present if anything were to happen.

She caught up to him - even offered conversation, to which the young man could only turn an ear and grunt softly. He did not know what to say; words weren't valued the way action was, and as mild-mannered as he could be, a conversationalist was not numbered among his skills. He kept his head down, skirting the bits of grass that poked through the snow, sniffing and scuffling along, but finding little of interest.

revui was silent, and kukutux took the clear indication that no small discourse would be forthcoming. unsure if this relieved or frustrated her, the girl began to pick through the snow at the base of various shrubs and trees, noting their location in her mind.

the duck started when a sudden rush of activity glanced before her: a flock of quail taking to the air. she gasped, stumbled backwards, almost into the man who silently accompanied her. a swallow; eyes downcast. the waterbird collected herself and moved on, chiding her ability to make any situation worsen.

While she was busy looking through what scant greenery prevailed, Revui kept his wits about himself in case of danger. Inevitably he came to rest his attention upon Kukutux, watching as she moved, as she scoured the dirt and the snow, reminded vaguely of Speedy but also of the various herbalists loyal to the Nightwalkers; he did not know how he felt about these people with their minds so invested in plants and poisons. Was it safe to allow Kukutux a home upon Moonspear if she were - in a way - a witch? Hydra trusted her, or that's what Revui reasoned, so he would do his duty and keep her safe. A part of him was distrustful all the same.

One wrong move and his thoughts were broken, banished away, as a flurry of wings and feathers erupted from the foliage. He reacted mindlessly to the movement; a snap here, a lunge there, bristling all over and bludgeoning his way after the birds despite the surprise that accompanied their arrival. He reacted as a wild animal often did: he saw motion, so he sought motion with his teeth. Many misses later, the chaos died down and Revui paced beside Kukutux with a cluster of bloodied feathers between his teeth - but nothing more.

revui moved more quickly than his bulk implied. the gore of feathered scarlet that suddenly bunched around his jaws both horrified and intrigued kukutux, for his was the first show of feral masculine strength she had witnessed since living in the keep.

a quickening to her heartbeat then. "angunasukpok," she murmured, offering revui one of the quick, shy smiles that appeared more frequently upon her face these days.

in the next moment she drew aside her gaze and returned it to her search.

He held aloft a beard of feathers, some which fell loose from his grip as he hoisted them high, drifting around him. When the woman looked his way she was smiling - it was small, but it was something - and Revui felt proud of himself for earning that little reaction. It was better than nothing. She resumed the hunt for herbs and whatever else, and he p-too'd the feathers as soon as she was looking away from him. It took a few tries before they were all free of his teeth (as some were stuck to the fine hairs of his cheeks) but after, he rooted in the dirt beside her as if nothing had happened. He didn't know what to look for though, and gave up momentarily - taking to keeping watch while she roamed further.

he did not seem interested in her search, amusing her with his attempts to rid himself of the feathers. but kukutux privately enjoyed the dynamic. it was familar to her; men were aloof, even when out upon the ice with their women, focused upon the blood to come rather than the smaller details a wife might tend. 

wife. that stupid word. the duck, feeling slighted anew suddenly, through no fault of revui's, kicked aside a clump of snow more forcefully than she had meant, searching down beneath it for the soft green carpet of new growth.

He rebounded a few feet and began to inspect the patches that had drawn her eye, or her nose. Not because he doubted her searching, but because he was trying to discern what it was that drew her attention in the first place - a silent desire to learn. There was no prey here to occupy him now that the birds had fled, and he was not one to fill the void with idle conversation, so Revui trailed along and nosed through the green, flipping clods of dirt with his nose until he grew bored of this as well.

With a chuff he slid alongside where the woman stood. Not one for physical intimacy - except in the guise of combat - as he brushed too close to her he seemed to startle and withdraw. The flesh of his haunch twitched in the manner of a well-run thoroughbred after a race; he appeared antsy, distracted by the surroundings, but in truth was focusing on his protective role a bit too strongly in order to alleviate the warmth that flushed through his system after the brief mingling of their proximity.

kukutux' throat constricted in surprise as revui touched her, rebounding back to his own space as if he feared offense. hydra's brothers were careful around her in a way she had not expected, even this fierce guardian of the shared lands who did not live upon moonspear.

she wondered at it, at the quickening to her nerves' cadence. sentences surged forth, only to be quelled; kukutux wanted to know, somehow, if revui held more warmth for her than arcturus. and so she turned her lashed gaze toward him, raised her eyes briefly to his cheekbone and then away. "you are interested in plants?" the girl ventured, the beginnings of a smile returned to her mouth.

Her voice softly punctured the air, and he drew his attention to her immediately. A turn of the ears, the glance of his eyes, curious and borderline intense. Revui had more knowledge of plants than most would have imagined; he had been cut, scraped, bitten, broken, and put back together by enough women that he had picked up on little things. Plants did not interest him for the fact they were plants, but he did have an appreciation for some of their uses. In the end he nods briskly, once.

He thought of Speedy first, and dismissed her as readily; then Tzila and the dark woman Serem, both of whom had terrorized him in a pit while mending his leg. Reminded of that ordeal, he sank back a step, testing his weight on the limb while giving the pale woman more space - but then subtly intoned, Birch bark for pain. Moss to carry water. Poppies -- but sparingly.

like jarilo, this ostrega brother surprised kukutux; it shone in her eyes, followed by a scintillation of pleasure, approval. "men here are ... they are not what i expect men to be," the duck murmured in a sudden, bare revelation to this male she had only met. "where i am from, this is the work of women," she explained, gesturing to the cold expanse about them.

her shoulders trembled beneath the swathe of beaver pelt. "i think, sometimes, that is why i am afraid to leave moonspear. i do not know how to be a man." cowed by her own epiphany, embarassed that revui would suddenly think her a babbling, nonsensical brook, kukutux fell silently back to her search, still burned through by his eyes.

The gendering of her role was not so alien to him, as every healer he had ever encountered was a woman; but he had also grown up alongside the powerful warrior-sisters that comprised the Cerberus, so it was the pale woman's other comment that struck him. It made sense, too, in a way; he did not think she was babbling at all, and actually appreciated that when she did speak she spoke with forethought. Too often Revui had encountered a flurry of words when action would do—but with this woman from another world, she spoke carefully, infrequently except for when it mattered.

He nodded again, this time drawing his eyes down to the dirt, and stared off in to space for a moment as his thoughts gathered like storm clouds. You can learn. Moonspear favours strength, and what you lack can be taught. Hydra could do it. Ah, but she was a queen now, a mother, and perhaps there wasn't enough time in the day to have her also tutoring the masses. Or... I could. If you teach me what you know, too.

It sounded fair.

revui offered a barter, and kukutux brightened. so he was a trader. had this been the beach of her homeland, he would have been a man who did not live there, but visited ofter, bringing goods and word of the land beyond. trading for what he did not have. she looked upon revui with a new bafflement, a look that sharpened into a small, agreeable smile.

"i will trade with you, revui ostrega," kukutux said, voice rising with a small edge of confidence. "give me a question, and i will give you an answer. and then i will ask," she went on, warming further to the notion. "we will make it a game." springmint eyes grew thoughtful. "say, 'i trade for,' and then say what it is you want, first."

She brightened; even her expressions were subdued and careful, but he looked to her charming little smile and felt himself relax a little bit because of it. The calm of their surroundings did not require his immediate attention at the moment, so he basked in her company instead.

The structuring of their conversation was something he had never encountered before. Usually it was Revui who sat listening while his accomplice prattled on and on, but now he was invited to participate, and for someone with a limited vocabulary such as himself, he was not sure how to proceed.

Say, 'i trade for,' she instructed, and his expression turned a touch more severe; a little frown to rival her little smile, but not one born from anger, just concentration. He did not want to burden her with complications or make her wait, as he knew how it felt to be on the recieving end of men full of hot air.

What do you hope to find, with winter just barely gone?

kukutux listened. he did not bluster into his answer, nor boast, and it was about her goal here that he inquired. despite the fact it was she who had invited him to speak the proper words, the duck was still somewhat caught off-guard by his question. yet she thought only a moment, answering, "herbs to help in childbirth. i want to know their growing places before they arrive."

jarilo had not been reticent around the subject; she did not think revui would be uncomfortable either. a moment, in which she plucked the words in her mind, placing them into a cautious sentence. "i trade for the skin of your next kill. what will you take for it?" what did she have? but kukutux was focused now, enjoying the leveled nature of her discourse with revui.

OH LOL I meant to do the trade-for part of dialogue but got distracted, sorry omg.

She answered promptly. He did not fully understand childbirth or what it might entail - that was true women's work, and he was not equipped in any sense for it - but the knowledge was valued.

When she asked her question, phrasing it properly, he realized he'd failed to adhere to the rules as prescribed; but the momentary flicker of doubt in his gaze gave way to more storming, as he pondered slowly.

His deliberations amounted to a simple request: I take... A proper lesson from you, of your choosing. When the green has fully returned. That was an odd way to ask someone on a date but, whatever.

lmao no worries i love this thread

kukutux had not expected that, nor the wording in which he responded. it was proper. formal. kukutux appreciated such things. "i accept." she suspected he was good at his trade, which meant that he would bring her something worth the lesson.

it was, after all, the correct thing to assume of a good trader. and she had no reason to see why revui would not be that. a pause. the task of gathering the locales of native plants for which she had no name seemed bland now, juxtaposed against their game. and so she turned back. "i trade for an answer to a question i have. what will you take?"

Their accord had been finalized. It was much more proper than anything Revui had experienced in his life; he was a barbarian compared to most, but especially so when placed adjacent to this woman. There was a foreign quality to her as well, something a little more feral than any woman he had met thus far, but that meant they shared something. She was still more refined than he could ever hope to be.

Her question piqued his interest - but he had nothing that he wanted of her, and so he shrugged. Nothing. Ask. What could she possibly want of him? She must have sensed by now he wasn't the brightest of the Ostrega clan, more brawn than brains, and there was little he could imagine that would entertain her.