Firestone Hot Springs I got what I got all despite you

Perhaps, if Jinx had brought something charged with her— a stone, or something dear to her—the pools would have shown her the way. It was clear in these recent days that Jinx had been down on her luck since Bon Dye's dissolution. Her Gods had not acknowledged her efforts to appease Them and call out to Them. Their silence had at first been acceptable, but now it was unnerving. She knew nothing of the doubts Lethe harboured as a result of her foolhardy claim that the Gods had abandoned her—if They had abandoned anybody, it surely was Jinx—but had she known, she might've found kinship there.

So focused was she on the bubbling pool that she didn't notice Ariston nearby. The steam was intrusive in her nose, dulling her sense of smell and simultaneously stuffing it up... But she took abrupt notice of him when he spoke. Ears panned out to the sides of her face as her head lifted and she caught him in the cold stare of her eyes... Eyes which softened marginally when she realized he wasn't descending upon her to take advantage of her vulnerability.

She moved to shuffle onto her side, but felt strange and uncomfortable when she did, so she readjusted herself to maintain her previous position whilst turned somewhat to regard him; he was simple, cream-furred and unremarkable, and yet there was something about him that made him comforting to look upon. As of yet, his affiliation was unknown. It reminded him of home, he said, with the assumption that she too liked it... An assumption Jinx would not refute. "It is warm as Brightfish Cove in the summer," she agreed, unaware he might not know where that place was. She missed it, dearly, when he brought up home... But she could never go back. She could never return to those wolves and say the Gods had led her astray for their own amusement.