Ouroboros Spine vii. for each others' warmth

think i got my timelines mixed up buttt run it lol

The birdcaller felt warmth blossom not unlike the unfurling petals of a primrose set in each cheek. It was not that her skills were appreciated that had made her wary of the man's intentions. Lótë truly couldn't word what exactly about the pantherine woodsman disturbed her so. It was a sense of something withheld, some ulterior motives that the deerstalker couldn't quite puzzle out. A sense that in every time she had spoken to the man with the shadowskin, she had never truly glimpsed his identity in the least -- that perhaps no one had. The yearling had felt what it was to be judged and measured for usefulness, to be used for such and disregarded as an individual entirely. Raimo reminded her entirely too much of the wolf who had inflicted such upon her. 

"It is not that he would seek to make me his brother-in-arms that bothers me," she clarified. "I believe...he would mean to use me against you. I'm not sure; I try to stay clear of such things. But I am no fool. I have seen the conflict that brews and I know what it means that he seeks me out, a woman he has mainly disregarded until now," the girl tried to explain, tones dropping as if afraid someone might overhear. But she was adamant in that she would not be used as a weapon or for anything else, ever again. That was the reason the vagabond had fled to these lands in the first place.

"He was...unkind, when we first met," she admitted. "But I have avoided him for the most part.."