Silvertip Mountain holy holy

Skipping Dalia with permission!

“Fearghal…?”

There was recognition in the way the woman said that name, and it overwhelmed the snowdrop to a point that she didn’t quite catch the trepidation that lurked behind it. She nodded mutely, barely registering the woman’s name — Olive — but observing keenly the look that was shot to Dalia. “My papa,” she choked, low and urgent. “Did you know my papa? Did — do you — have you seen him? My papa…” There was no rancor in her tone. Arturo would not have spoken ill of Olive to his children — he would not have spoken of her at all. Olive and Dakarai had been banished from Teaghlaigh before Eirlys had ever been born, and Lotte and Hemlock had only mentioned them to Sirius — and always with an appropriate amount of decorum and diplomacy.

Oh, she sounded really stupid now.

It felt like something was rising up to choke her — like something was gripping her guts and twisting hard — and Eirlys began to breathe heavily, her glacial eyes going wide and embarrassed as she gasped for breath. Utterly embarrassed, she began to back away. “S-Sorry,” she wheezed out, “have to go.” Though they were likely more concerned than anything, her anxiety transmuted the faces of her audience to derisive, gawking stares — and without another word, she whipped around and bounded down the mountainside, back to Ceallach and Hemlock, running for her life.