Totoka River i'm on my tip toes

hello.

dark, velveteen ears cup forth as the sound of her voice finds him in the closing distance between them. wintersbane's steps slow another pace. leisurely, now. his chuff was an announcement meant simply to keep from startling her. it could have been vaguely acknowledged by a look, a twitch of ear; instead she spoke and while it's not necessarily an invitation for conversation, he knows. but she doesn't pass him by. she's pretty, he thinks absently, with a light pelage tinted in blue hues not unlike his own, shadowed palette and ignores the stabbing guilt as his thoughts flicker briefly to the dark priestess. he stamps them down. not because he doesn't enjoy thinking of relmyna ( he does ) but if he lets guilt govern him he'll never go through with the ideas forming in his mind ...and he's ready to pursue his own ambitions.

hey. he replies in turn, tilting his head downwards a smidge to observe her. she is smaller than him, marginally so, but size has never had much bearing upon the tundrian. of course, his bulk affects him and he considers it in a fight but he knows from astara that small more oft than not tends to mean feisty.

so what now?

wintersbane's always hated small-talk. pleasantries often worked hand in hand with deception to him and, ironically considering his snitch title among the dark brotherhood, he's never been tolerant of deception. unless he's the one doing the deceiving ...which he's had no real cause for recently. should he ask if she's lost? if she's from around here? he settles for, d'you know if there's a place along the river that the meltwater thins enough to cross ...relatively safely? instead.