Overture Downs Feel quite clean in this new skin that we have grown.

The quiet croon slowly ebbed until she was quiet again, but it did not last. The stillness broke to the sound of a startling call from below her position — a voice she did not know. In the heat of the moment she felt absolutely mortified that someone had found her and overheard her; her heart thundered inside of her body and her breath hitched for just a moment as Ibis scoured the hillside for the origin of that voice. At first she overlooked the young man because he was so close in composition to the soil and appeared to fit in well with the earth, but then she saw his eyes. He was looking right at her — and had she the capability, she would've turned bright red.

Her singing wasn't a secret. Ibis was known to hum as she worked in her garden, and on more than one occasion Gannet had caught her singing too, but there was something different about being set beneath a spotlight so abruptly; the fact he was a stranger to her did him no favors, albeit there was something vaguely familiar about him. Ibis didn't want to stare for too long and looked away coyly.

It's rude to sneak up on a lady, you know. She commented in protest, and swallowed the lump that formed in her throat. Her attention drifted back to the sky and the rolling clouds, and she pretended to be fixated on them so that she didn't fall back in to staring at his face. And its not so nice to order them around, either. It was a pity — if he'd remained hidden and silent, maybe she'd have continued singing. Now she felt too self-concious.