Verdant Basin even in the darkness he's grasping for it

the daylight shined through broken clouds.

clouds that looked like they threatened rain. which meant they'd get even muddier and cold if it kept up too long. somehow the thought still did not dampen his mood.

instead he set out to touring around the basin. the lagoon seemed clear, better than the plateau had been. the hillsides dotted with trees that seemed content to fall in line with autumn. he wondered about the logistics of a garden, if it might be worth scattering seeds now to see if they cropped up in spring.

and with that thought came one of the the man.

His woman was not here! The stupid bitch had probably fled further in to these wilds, and for what? The chance to be free of her commitments? Women! Neizan doubled back along the way he had come, intent on finding the trail of his wife or some other clue.

There was a woman's scent among the ferns here. If nothing else, Neizan figured he could find this woman and maybe have a nice roll in the hay, to take the edge off. Maybe not, but, he thought himself a charmer.

The scent led him deep among the trees, then shifted. There was someone out there — pale-bodied, like someone of the north, and small enough it could've been the woman. He called out: AY! CHIKA!

veran, of course, halted.

who was yelling like that? magda had never thrown such words around and the voice certainly was not one he had encountered before.

a quick squinted look across the land didn't tell him much. someone bigger and darker, but still definitely not magda. and it most certainly was not the man he had been thinking of.

uhhh— should he just...yell back?

no chika here, sorry!

The voice that called back was husky, thick. Not one of a woman - unless that woman was somehow confused.

Neizan was in the middle of his approach (his strut, right) and slowed down, pacing a few more steps as he came upon where the pale body had been situated. They had a dark head, and a ruddy complexion to their ears. Definitely not his wife — definitely not a woman, either!

Maldito. You aren't who I thought. Perdón!

Still, the man sized-up his competition. That's all other people amounted to: women were for one thing, men another. This was a boy at the very best, and so Neizan shoved him in to a particular category.

I thought maybe you were someone else — my wife, or her friend! Have you seen her? A woman. He did not give specifics on purpose; and he spoke quickly, letting his high energy overwhelm where it could. That always got the best responses.

the man was quickly vocal back. words he didn't know jammed between words he did know. he felt a bit...stunned. dizzied from the sudden energy of the stranger.

a wife or a friend? a friend of the wife's? which was he asking about?

sorry. he said as he blinked his owlish look away. magda would probably be better to converse with this man but as it stood...he was the only one around right now.

probably not? what's this, um, friend and wife look like?

should he call magda?

My wife is like me. Smaller, with a lighter coat. We're from down south. That wasn't much to go on and Neizan knew that. He also figured his wife wasn't around anywhere by now; he'd spent weeks in this muddy hole of a place, and she would have run as far and as fast as she could.

She is brown and white. Closer to your colors I think than mine — it has been a long time since I have seen her. Díos mio, so long! The man made a great show of his sorrow, letting himself contort his face to a frown and letting a theatrical quality enter his behavior. Her friends — there are many, so many. Light ones, dark ones, I am not sure which might have gone with her.

He looked the boy over — he was thin, but not sickly. He looked to be well cared for. A little messy, muddy, but, this was a disgusting place. We lost our daughter some time ago and have been looking endlessly for her; but one morning I woke and my wife, my wife had gone! I worry for her.

information overload served to confuse further, but it did plant the seed of sympathy in his heart.

i-i'm sorry. his features sagged with it too. far too much of a bleeding heart for his own good. honestly there's not a whole lot around here. unless you like bogs and frogs. oops! he had come a bit too accustomed to saying that the last day.

this man had said something about south, that much he remembered.

why don't you walk with me? maybe you'll find something.

he thought about finding something for the man to relax.

he recalled the poppies and the way the ghost had melted into the earth with them. then he imagined he was likely breaking plenty of moral codes if he offered this man poppies.

yet...

Ah, I will! I will. Been a while since I've had a good man for company too, Neizan went on to admit. The boy would be good to have around even for a little bit. He seemed amicable, and young enough to accept the power of an older man; Neizan thought himself fitting in to a niche already.

Sympathetic overload was his favorite tactic for ingratiating himself to people. It worked best with his subservient wife around, but he could adapt; that was what made him so damn effective when he wanted things. And he wanted many things, right now.

Have you been in the area long? It feels as though my days to the south are years away. This place — it is so wet, and so dark. I fear it has made my wife miserable beyond anything! This is why she left. This, or, she found our daughter - or maybe something worse, but I refuse to think that badly. Any number of things could have split them up — and Neizan knew his wife well enough, and himself enough, to know she was being petulant, and nothing more.

Her name is Zaira. He spoke this as they walked, in the manner of a worried old man, which he posed as now.

the man seemed frazzled.

veran absorbed his sadness with each line. as if he himself had lost a wife! and a daughter! yet he had never had either and so all he could feel was a deep sense of neutral dread. uncertain how the man really felt.

this...this place isn't all bad, you know. he started with slowly as their path cut through the hills of the basin. he remembered there being a river before the mountain with poppies.

some of the plants do true wonders for those traveling through. maybe your wife is just fine, wherever she is. peaceful and relaxed...

he walked a horribly fine line.

Relaxed? HAH! The riverside came up and Neizan's voice echoed across the calm surface to the trees, and scattered there.

Zaira has always been a handful! Southern women are like that. You are a boy, you do not know. You will know! Relaxed, he jokes! A cacophony of snickers overwhelmed him then, each bit carrying a dark undercurrent that Neizan couldn't quite purge. He then sighed, and looked skyward.

Dios Mio, she is out there somewhere, probably out of her little mind! What if some creature has her? What if she has found our girl, but something has happened? Silly woman, going off without her man! Zaira, come home! He preached this as he walked, as if spiraling.

the man became a volcano.

erupting and sputtering things.

i'll know...? he mumbled softly, words practically lost to the symphony of the man's ruckus. who called out loudly for his wife. if anything had been around for hunting, it was surely gone now. frogs or otherwise.

i can show you a place. he started with, allowing himself to teeter down a dark path mentally. it has flowers. maybe they're there. women like that right?

asked as if he truly needed guidance on the matter, but veran already had them on a course towards there.

He was pushing things too far. Time to reign in his emotions.

Hm, maybe. A good thinking man! He chuckled in a belly-laugh way, although it blunted at the end.

There was ample doubt within Neizan that he'd see his wife wherever this boy led, but it was a fun game and he would let the boy think he had something of an upper hand; it was not true, of course. Neizan was smart enough and experienced enough to see a trick before it could play out.

You have many flowers in this patch of woods? Been here weeks now, but all I've seen is tree-mosses and grass. Been so busy keeping fed, and looking out for Zaira. . . hoo, I hope she's there.

it's just knowing where to look... he offered soft, tentative. some string of fear now that the man would become a volcano again.

the path became easier the further they departed from the basin. magda wouldn't have to deal with this man. his yelling and screaming, scaring away all the frogs and birds.

this was a good deed.

sometimes good deeds just looked bad, right?

i bet you could cross the mountains before winter, if she's not around this part. it's less...boggy over there.

and he'd show him the way, as far away from here as he could convince him to be.