Dragoncrest Cliffs lucrurile astea

Bonding for @Rose!!
Setting The lake, nighttime. Post-war, post-excursion.
Time 12/30, the day she returned with Tux.

Recently shuffled into the kru, eyes heavenward and lying lax at the shores of Hougeda’s lake, Aure remembered how she’d still hadn’t told anyone her birth name. Not that it was treason or such to not day her true calling—it really was just a few extra letters. But with how there seemed to be a great abundance of too-long names as of late, it further proved her self-reasoning to simply not reveal it. Odd, she supposed, that it wasn’t for something such as being incognito.

It was only in moments like these, when she wasn’t ridden with her own fury, that she was able to reflect on trivial, personal matters of the sort. Like her name—like the spiced poultices that now adorned the raw, new hurts of her—or the fact that Easy liked to star-sleep, and so Aure had taken that old habit in stride.

With an airy sigh, chin tucked to chest, the specter of a female stretched languorously out on the boulder she claimed; eased the muscles in her neck and hips and thighs while her eyes lazily traced the hushful stars. Tonight, she wasn’t the only one who’d quieted from the norm, it seems.

But then a soft, especially rare murmur of laughter eddied from her ivory throat, origins unknown, as a whisper of ”Aurëwen” flits up to the glimmering Celestium. Uncaring of who or what hears; it's not as if her true name could be used against her. For all anyone knew, they might take her word as just some constellation. It was definitely in lulled lapses like these, where she could forget all thoughts strained and harrowing.

Perhaps it was the poppy.

 

It was not hard to miss the pale paragon as she sat seraph-like atop her boulder, nightfall enveloping her as she whispered a lost name into the dusky void. She truly was beautiful. Not just in a physical sense but in the way she spoke and carried herself as well. It was angelic, hypnotic and terribly intimidating.

Just one glimpse of her made the russet opkepa feel insecure about everything there was to feel insecure about and yet she couldn't help but steal a few more glances, entranced by the siren who's very presence made her heart flutter.

"Hey" she finally let out as she slipped from the cover of shadows, tail brushing gently against her hocks as she moved to lap at the water's edge. She had never gotten the chance to thank Aure for her help during that stormy night and as she waited for any response from kru, Rose let her mind race with how to word her gratitude.

Her eyes had shuttered closed, but the herbalists' presence hadn't gone unnoticed. It was that diligent energy in which she'd become so familiar with over the past several days or so; the she-wolf that smelled like earth's own seasonings, and poultice and potions, forever to be vined by her concoctions. A simmering druid--what Vonnaruil might have called her.

Now, at the greeting, her eyes flickered open, and she merely listened to the opkepa's paw-falls as she made her way to drink from the lake's edge. Starlit gaze momentarily lost to the stars, she replied softly, "Good evening." Had she known Rose was rallying her gratitude, she might've halted in doing the same, but, "You've been exquisite, tending to ze other kru. I expect they'll be feeling revived by ze end of ze week." She gnawed on her lower lip, soft, silent chuckle leaving her as she thought of cheka, unbidden and simply charmed from her. Had she known, too, how many Rose had begun to feel for her, Aure might've reigned in her daydreaming a bit.

As far as understanding affections, she was oblivious, and utterly so. There was no helping her, in that matter. Instead, she gave a faint shake of her head, before rolling onto her side and propping herself on an elbow in one languid, lean movement. She studied the opkepa quietly, and then let her gaze roam the waters.