Dragoncrest Cliffs Caught in the undertow.

Seaflower Respite
Afternoon
Overcast
AW!

Indra sat in the middle of a field of flowers, waiting. It wasn't the same field that she'd come upon after the tanglewood but it was close, and she didn't rightly know what she waited for.
There was a patch of flowers pulled out as deep as the root, and tossed to one side, leaving a bare patch of dirt about the width of her head. She'd begun to compress the soil with her paws when she'd become distracted by an errant thought - maybe a bird winging by in her periphery, she couldn't remember exactly; it felt like her head was empty. More than that, she felt hollow.
She felt this way most days.
Indra could see where the flowers tapered in to the tree line from here. Behind her was the river; due east was the lake; little by little she'd memorized parts of Sapphique so that she could access the necessities without too many eyes upon her. It was comforting to have that knowledge. More importantly, she could keep tabs on the adults; the roja den was not far from here, and that was the most lively of places.
She turned her attention away from her surroundings and focused again on the barren patch, moving to grasp at another cluster. The ripping of the stems was incredibly satisfying. The newest bouquet was tossed aside just like the first, and she began to tamper down the loose soil again.
One more.
Nobody would notice a few bald spots if she was careful.
The altar was almost ready.

there were so many family members now that mireille could almost be forgiven for overlooking the one that was not.
almost.
she devoted herself to babysitting for both her little siblings and meerkat alike, but today she found herself glibly free. the girl swept down to the water, remembered indra, and raced back up to tear a bouquet of sea-daisies into her mouth as a greeting present.
but as she came across the respite, the brilliant red of indra standing out against the earth, she saw that the girl was ripping up the petaled growths herself.
mireille dropped her burden and came closer with a wave of her tail. "nice not to be the only scarlet one around," she joked, though her eyes scanned the other for acceptance.

Two of the patches were smoothed over and Indra intended to tear a third free from the flowers, arrayed in the same triumvirate design as the altar in the pit. She was reaching for the next cluster of stems when a voice crept from over her shoulder and as soon as she heard it, the black of her gums was hidden; she was bolting upright and licking her lips as nonchalantly as possible.
This was waylaid by the whale-eyed expansion of her eyes.
The other girl could've been a mirror image to Indra. She was a little taller (maybe because she stood with confidence while Indra hunched), and at her feet was a small bouquet of flowers.
oh... The girl murmured, looking at the mess of flowers she'd left discarded in so many piles; she moved as if to tidy them, but was really hoping to hide those bald spots.
Indra felt an uncomfortable heat rise to her cheeks.
I can go -- somewhere else...

if it occurred to mireille that indra was arranging the flowers in any sort of way, this was lost to her curiosity about the girl herself. she still did not know the circumstances of how or why the other had come to be in sapphique, only that she was strange and scared and in the company of a brother whom mireille did not yet know.
did that make her family?
mireille stared at the barren stalks and discarded petals, then looked back to indra. "oh, no! i don't want you to go. i mean, wow, unless you want to go." very smooth. "but if you want to stay, then stay," she finished lamely, offering a little half smile. "i, uh, brought these flowers for you. but it looks like you found a lot."

Of the gifts Indra could remember receiving within her life, each had a purpose. Most of what she had been given was food, some of it was knowledge. Nobody had ever given her flowers before. In her experience everything came at a cost; she did not know how to accept what the girl said or did, but neither did she know how to refuse openly, so Indra was trapped.
For a few seconds Indra stared blankly at the other girl, at the bouquet too, and then to the wreckage of torn and tattered things around her own feet.
Flowers are stupid.
Indra announced this with an emphatic kick to one of her own piles, which happened to then crowed across the flattened earth she had been clearing for her altar.

"oh," was all mireille managed to mumble. her ears folded as the petals tore from their stems, puffing into the air and skidding across the ground where they had been cleared.
for a long moment she said nothing. it was clear something was going on with indra, but the seagirl didn't have the clearance for therapist to a former cult member.
she cleared her throat and began to shuffle the bits of color into individual piles. "well, what do you be likin'?" mireille asked, at last glancing back toward indra.

The other girl had a strange way of speaking. Indra picked up on that a bit late, as she was flustered from having company at all. She felt a heat to her cheeks; Mireille sounded defeated and in that moment Indra felt good about her petulance.
But the other girl recovered quickly, posing a question Indra had no way to answer even if she'd wanted to. It takes her by surprise. She's at once flustered, frustrated, spot-lit; all of which translates to a spark of queer rage that does not fit the moment.
I—! Just—leave me alone!
The fur along her spine lifts in a fiery wave and with a lash of her puffing tail fur, Indra suddenly launches in to a hasty stride, ploughing through the piles of plucked flowers and debris in a frenzied exit before the rage bubbles up to overtake her sense.

mireille's eyes widened but she only stared after indra as she charged off. that was enough for her, the seagirl decided. but she was fiercely curious, and yet even this she would keep to herself.
distinctly unused to being rebuffed, she would wander around the little beachfront alone, until she went off to find @Sobo and tell him about indra's pointed weirdness.