Neverwinter Forest Lost

For @Solharr 

The forest was quiet. A haunting familiarity which chilled her to the bone. A beautiful forest and yet... she meant to move, to keep going on her lone travels. Yet tired and weary, she found herself only standing before the timbers, standing sentinel as they guarded the secrets hidden deep and dark within. Ghosts. Shadows. Haunted. 

A lump in her throat. Anoana had never before felt so lost. While many miles stretched between her and her home, the forest in front of her tugged at the still fresh wounds in her memory. Home. It looked like home. 

The huntress sucked in a shaken breath and with watered eyes, finally turned and began moving away.

you do not belong here.

the words rumbled low from behind her, a shadow in the trees, vast and carved like the bones of the land itself. solharr stood between the pines, where bark was stripped by years of claw and tooth—his kingdom worn and wild, like him.

he had watched her hesitate. he had seen the ghosts clinging to her back like frost. there was no threat in her step, no bloodlust. only sorrow, and something older—something homesick.

he did not move closer, only watched, heavy gaze fixed on her.

you are far from what made you, he said next, voice gentler, though gravel still kissed its edge. why did you come?

The voice stirred from behind her. Deep and bellowing. She felt a quiver in her bones. Doe-long legs trembled by both the winds and suddenness of his voice. 

She turns slow to face the man connected to the voice. He lingers among the treeline, at the gateway of the forest. He is its guardian, she is certain. Yet not a spirit, she could tell. Very much alive, his warmth of auburn thick pelt radiating off of him. A great bear of a man, who looked to have lost an eye by perhaps fighting a bear, even. 

You are correct. She nods, her flaxen gaze fluttering around them. The weavers of destiny have taken me far... She takes in a deep breath, chilled air filling her lungs. And now they grow silent when I am lost. A soft chuckle. One at her own expense, really. Where did she go from here? Now that all she had known and loved was gone? 

The north made me. The rock, the ice, the pine... She turns back to him now. He looked nothing less the the men she had been used to back home. Large, worn, rugged and a gaze hardened by war and grief. I fear I've no where to go, particularly. She wanted to be among those who were like her. Ones who grew up with the same customs, the worship of the same gods. Her people now were dead and gone, as so by the will of fate, yet there were others out there, surely, even so far from all which she had ever known. 

She would find a place, a people, to call her own again. This she was certain.

the wind moved around him, pulling at the edges of his thick fur. snow clung to the ridges of his shoulders, unmelted by time or warmth. his breath billowed, quiet and steady, like smoke from a long-doused fire.

her words hung between them. the weavers. the silence. the loss. he understood all of it.

too well.

the north does not keep what it cannot harden, he said finally, voice low, carried like stone across the frostbitten air.

his eye—his only eye—watched her, slow and unblinking. not with suspicion. but with knowing. a kind of recognition.

you’re still standing.

he let the weight of that settle. not a compliment. a fact.

and then—he moved. not fast. not loud. but each step was sure, carved by years spent surviving what others could not. until he stood just beyond her reach, the full height and breadth of him framed by pine and sky.

this place has taken much, he said. but it will give, too. if you earn it.

a pause. his gaze lingered on her—drawn, not swayed.

there are still people like you. like us. old blood. stone-born.
his muzzle tipped toward the quarry behind him, faint trails marking where his wolves had gone before.

if you’ve the will to stand among them… come.

and with that, sólhárr turned—expecting her to follow. not because he demanded it.

but because she belonged.

We can have another more up to date with their new move!

Though he only carries half the vision he once held, there is no less depth within his gaze. He is a man who had lost loved ones, too, she could tell and lost not all that long ago either. He carries the loss with fresh wounds. The weight heavy on his back like the snow. 

As are you. She spoke back, offering a further understanding. They did not know one another, yet their sharing of pain was enough. 

This forest had taken from him. Had taken much, but he still speaks of what it may have left to offer. Something more then ghosts and heartbreaking memories, perhaps? 

Yet his muzzle tips and it looks outward. To a path leading away from the forest. Maybe they were leaving the life they once lived behind too, as she had. It seemed Anoana had come at the right time. 

I will follow. Her breath hushed. She is already moving along at his side. The Fates had still found favor in her and after all these miles, she had found others like her and just as much needing of hope.