Whitebark Stream rotten apples

On a night so shadowed, the girl was not alone.

This stream was unforgiving - a writhing snake of shivering depths and harsh stone, and yet, full of life. He was a master of the waterways, this smoky traveller, and as he dipped a leathery nose toward the surface, his tongue pooled out of his jaws to lap up the palpitating liquid. He felt it dribble down his throat, sear like the burn of ice, but he savoured it. He would never tire of the water, nor its winter sting.

What he would tire of, though, was others. He could sense her presence, as the wind carried her scent toward him, and eyes of emerald traced the meanders of the stream until his vision was locked onto a patch of luminiferious moonlight. There, in the pool of white, lay a figure - draped beside the water like a cloud, fallen too close to the ground. Initially, the wanderer sighed inwardly to himself, reminding himself he craved the solitude of his lonesome days, but something about her lured him closer. Bewitching. Perhaps it was the inevitable loneliness sinking beneath his skin - something he'd never admit to himself - perhaps the lingering memories of Ruenna, but whatever it was, paws dipped in stark white dragged him closer, and closer still, until he was within speaking distance, breath misting into the air like puffs of smoke from a dragon's nostrils.

"Have you ever thought about all you must miss while you sleep?" he murmured, eyes still soaking in the the soft glow of light drizzled around the wispy stranger, ears twisting to accompany the rushes of flowing water.