Verdigris Ravine the smoke between our fingers

The voice she hears is modulated by anger, but still unmistakable -- and there is a certain heartache that comes with it, because while she has seen Kusuma agitated before, it has never been so intense and directed at her.

She hardly parses the words. Her world elides further into unreality.

Those ears! As if the voice hadn't been enough, surely this was the woman who had come into her life and changed it irrevocably, as a planet -- even a minor one -- does to the trajectory of a comet.

Kusuma! The name tears itself out of her throat of it's own accord.

She takes another halting breath, and the arc of revelation strikes her once more: nursing-scent, cloying and nearly mawkish, seeps from the mouth of the cave.