Sawtooth Spire zweiter teil

it was only fair she humor him as he waxed folkloric, as he humored her whimspun imagination in the not-so-distant past. she rolled her eyes good-naturedly at his wink, laughing, "dann dürfen wir sie nicht wecken." 

presently taken by a spell of admiration for the woodbine honeysuckle blooming in peaches-and-cream and climbing a natural arbor of half-collapsed trees, she stared up at the flowers, half-hearing her father's reassurance. 

she pinned him with an impish look. a mousebear! well, she was a tempest in a teacup. there was no denying that. "so ein vielfraß!" she riposted, laughing with him, for phaedra could think of no other animal with the ferocity to be named such. 

she took it with pride -- there was no higher form of compliment, of that there was a certainty.   

mahler barged ahead with a swiftness she had never seen in her old man, and the girl whooped him on, dropping from the gables to follow at a slower run. once he stopped, phaedra jogged up behind him, vibrant with exhilaration; shaking free from her fur sweetgum fruit that had clung thereon. 

with the choices set before her being pull ahead or stop and smell the roses, so to speak, she did not hesitate to fling herself to loll on the greensward. in no doubt, splendid youth did not go as far as the crag-carven resilience of her father; just from that short run, her keel burned with heavy breaths. 

the fire churning in her legs did little to abate the charm of her childhood home, though she admittedly knew not where to go next. getting back to her feet, phaedra deferred to her father's lead, but she couldn't quite help the draw of her gaze towards a spate of color down the way. 

she blinked, abrupt with surprise at the memory purling the edge of her consciousness. before she thought to say a word, already she was walking towards the quaint garden she once doted on and thought ever so large.