Swiftcurrent Creek The shade

The flirting is familiar, but only tangentially, in that they knew bounties of others had flirted to try and escape what was coming for them. It sends a flurry through their chest, a swoop through their stomach that pings something in the back of their head that makes them genuinely concerned for a moment that it means their lunch is coming back up. But there is no acid rise in their throat, so they shove the sensation back. Their surprise at the flirting is, however, painfully obvious on their normally stoic face, the wolfdog looking like someone who had been hit by a chair. Gobsmacked, Simran swallows, then lets their face lapse back into its stoic mask. He’s a warrior, they’re a warrior. Camaraderie breeds strangeness.

Trained for it for all of my life. As any good Mando'ad. I was the pride of my clan. Maybe it was arrogant, maybe it was too much, but Simran had the right to be proud of who they had become under their buir, under the tutelage of their aliit.

You are a warrior too, no?