#featherbound

How did they meet? (Was it intentional? Accidental? A misunderstanding?) + First impressions vs. current feelings: (Did they like each other at first? Did that change? How?)

Eden was running away from home and stumbled into the woods Elias’ flock lives in. He finds a small raven fledgling stuck in a bird trap left by hunters (cage, glue, something like that) and works to free it. Once the bird is free, he shares a bit of his granola bar with it while it works its way back up to flying. After a bit, the raven flies off. Still not quite sure where he’s headed and not quite set on a decision yet, Eden keeps wandering around the area. The raven fledgling reports back to the village, calling out that there was a human in the area. It specifies that the human didn’t seem malicious or ill-intentioned, but Elias is still deep in his “kill any humans within range” era. The village is curious about Eden and wants to talk to him. Elias obviously wants Eden dead and voices this. The village collectively tells him to chill the fuck out and that he isn’t the voice of the village alone. 

They send the fledgling back out to find Eden, who hasn’t left. The fledgling finds Eden, and pulls at his sweatshirt, trying to lead him in the direction of the village. Eden, curious as he is, follows the fledgling’s lead. He also loves that the fledgling seems so willing to interact with him because park birds, city birds, and city birds usually fly away when he gets too close. The fledgling guides Eden back to the village, where he’s met with all the avian demihumans (most of which are ravens) gathered in the village center, avidly waiting to meet Eden. Eden is scared upon seeing them, but doesn’t run away. He knows he’s in too deep to back out now. Essentially, a “fuck it, might as well go” mindset. He scans their faces, many of which seemed curious, until he saw Elias sulking in the back of the crowd. When they locked eyes, Elias growled at him, then dived off into the canopy above. Eden was unsure of what to think of the flock at first, but despite the language barrier, the provided him with food and shelter. He decides that staying with them for a bit couldn’t hurt too much, even with the looming threat of Elias continuously haunting.

Eden is nervous around Elias, and he has every right to be. For the first month or so that Eden stayed with the flock, Elias was actively planning how to '“dispose” of the human (he would have killed him in broad daylight if the village weren’t so invested and curious about the human). As much as Eden tried to make himself helpful and less threatening, Elias saw his presence alone as an active threat. In a determined attempt to appease Elias and win him over, Eden started leaving small trinkets and gifts at Elias’ treehouse (small piles of berries, shiny things, fuzzy things, cool looking feathers, etc). Elias didn’t think anything of it at first. He didn’t even know it was Eden at first. He just thought it was a coincidence that tiny gifts started showing up. 

His suspicions weren’t raised until he was idly lounging in a nearby tree one day and saw Eden quietly stalking up to the treehouse. He’s really protective of his treehouse, so this naturally put him on high alert. He watched like a hawk (no bird pun intended) from the other tree as Eden scaled the rope ladder with a tiny basket of something clenched between his teeth. Eden didn’t even hoist himself all the way onto the treehouse deck, just dumping the contents of the basket onto the floor in a small pile. He descended the ladder and quietly scuttled away, basket in hand. Elias flew over to the treehouse to check what mischief the human was up to by dumping stuff on his treehouse. He only found a small pile of freshly washed raspberries, a tattered gold locket with a broken chain, and two small gray feathers tipped with black and white. He’s confused by this. Trying to wrangle why the human would be leaving him gifts, he decides that either he’s a hunter trying to catch him while his guard is down by getting close to him, or he’s just a really shitty hunter. Elias is still convinced that Eden is a hunter. He can’t fathom any reason a human would stay with their flock without malicious intent. 

Elias continues to watch Eden from the shadows, keeping a close bird’s-eye view while Eden helps harvest and hunt, babysit nestlings and fledglings, tend to injuries, care for creatures that live in the village, learn the language, and overall assimilate himself into the community. Elias is still trying to convince himself that Eden is just a really sneaky hunter, but bit by bit, he’s failing to convince even himself. To try and compensate for his diminishing hatred towards Eden, he starts being really really vocal and forward about how much he hates Eden, and how much they are mortal enemies, especially to Eden’s face. Eden isn’t great at social cues, but it was just really obvious how in denial Elias was about all this.

Despite Elias’ proclamation of hatred and rivalry, Eden is encouraged to double down and try even harder to win Elias over. First and foremost, he ups his trinket/gift leaving game. The whole basket of berries. Keys, buttons, gears, interesting looking shiny metal bits. Mushrooms (he checks to make sure they’re edible dw :) ). Whole meals. Brightly colored feathers of all varieties and sizes. Fuzzy blankets. Dry pasta (it sounds funny but Elias loves the crunch and loves nibbling on them). (Note: by this point in the story, Eden has picked up scraps of the avian’s language, just enough for him to get around and help out. The avians have also started to pick up some English words. The younger birds only know very simple and common words, while the ones that the adults remember best are the swear words. Eden tries to make a point not to cuss around them, but it’s a bad habit of his. He swears like a sailor. He avoids cussing around the fledglings, though.) The village notices Eden’s determined efforts to get Elias to not hate him, and they help him out in trying to win him over. They share an extra serving of food/berries with Eden just so he can leave them at the top of Elias’ rope ladder. They share cool feathers and knickknacks with him, too. 

Elias notices the extra effort. The determined spirit of hard work Eden carries with him. The light-hearted way he plays and cares for the nestlings and fledglings. (Note: I think how Eden keeps getting the baskets back is that when Elias is done with the food/found a spot for whatever trinkets were gifted, he tosses the basket out the window so it lands on the ground outside the treehouse. He tells himself that he does it because he doesn’t care about Eden and can’t be bothered to keep the baskets the gifts come in. The underlying reason is so that Eden can come back and collect the basket from the ground to use again and again. He has 3-4 baskets in circulation.) 

One day, Elias decides to leave a small token of gratitude. A light blanket with black cats printed all over. He folds it up and ties it with twine and a short teal ribbon, leaving it at the top of the ladder before Eden came with his daily peace offering. Elias hid inside the treehouse, peeking out the window to watch Eden approach the treehouse with his gifts. Eden scaled the ladder, carrying the basket handle in his teeth. He looked ready to leave the whole basket and sneak away as usual, but before he could dash off, he saw the neatly tied up blanket on the edge of the deck. After reaching out to touch the blanket, he noticed Elias peeking through the window with wary, unblinking eyes. When they made eye contact, Elias pushed the window open, hopping out onto the deck rail. Elias carefully watched as Eden silently pushed the basket towards him as if he were silently saying “please eat these and not me”. Looking in, the basket held two mangoes, the sides sliced off with a simple diamond-like pattern sliced into them. Still perched on the rail, he carefully picks the basket up by the handle. Eden watches as Elias examines the basket, still standing on the rope ladder, elbows leaning on the deck. Elias’ eyes flick back and forth from Eden to the blanket. Eden picks up the subtle hint that Elias wants him to take the blanket, but he’s very slow to take it in his arms, just in case he moves too fast and spooks Elias or if Elias changes his mind. Eden waves a silent goodbye to Elias and descends the rope ladder once again, now carrying the blanket in his mouth by the twine. 

Elias watches Eden leave, noting the way he happily skips out of view once he hits the ground. Elias hops back inside the treehouse with the basket in hand. He starts eating the mangoes chunk by chunk (it’s very yummy and soft and sweet :) ) while he rearranges all the gifts he’s received from Eden inside the treehouse. Fluffy things like blankets, fuzz, and feathers, Elias incorporates into his nest. He sorts trinkets into various shelves and boxes around the treehouse according to size, material, shininess, and type of trinket. He keeps his favorites + his sentimental ones in his room close to his nest. 

After the mangoes were gifted and they had their first ever interaction where Elias wasn’t dissing or planning to kill Eden, Elias lurks much closer to Eden. And it’s less of lurking, more of hanging around like a shadow. The funny bit is that before they met each other, Elias was usually loud and rambunctious and playful and Eden was shy and reserved. When Eden starts to become one with the community, he becomes much more talkative and vocal, even though they don’t understand English. As Elias starts to warm up to Eden at this point, he’s quieter. Not because he’s shy or doesn’t have much to say, but because he’s watching. He’s learning more about Eden, noting his habits, mannerisms, stims, things he likes and doesn’t like. He’s observing. He doesn’t think Eden is a hunter anymore, but keeps up the act of being mortal enemies in front of flock-mates anyways. 

On one of Eden’ routine trips to leave gifts at Elias’ treehouse, he finds another gift for him waiting at the top, sitting innocently in the open doorway of the treehouse. It was fake black bird crudely shaped from black fuzz and yellow beads for eyes. It was lopsided, but made with a clear amount of effort put in. The fuzzy bird in the doorway was too far out of reach for Eden to grab from the ladder, so he cautiously pulled himself onto the deck and picked up the little bird. He briefly examined it before looking up into the treehouse. He didn’t want to pry into Elias’ personal space, but he saw Elias peering at him from an adjacent room, watching him hold the little bird in his hands. Eden gestured his thanks and turned to leave. Before he could drop back onto the ladder, he felt something hit him in the back of his head. It was a stray crumpled paper ball. 

He looked back to see Elias still peering at him from the other room. Eden assumes that Elias is trying to get him to leave faster, and asks him as such, gesturing to the ground below. Elias disappears for a moment, then returns to his same spot with a blanket wrapped around himself, a small stuffed animal, and a pillow. He tosses the pillow towards Eden, close enough that Eden knows it’s meant for him and not to attack him, but far away enough that Eden has to come into the treehouse to pick it up. Elias leans out from the wall he was hiding behind. Wide teal eyes and rigid wings, flat to his back. He wanted to get closer to Eden, he wanted to be friends, but wasn’t exactly sure how to go about it. He hadn’t forged any meaningful deep friendships since he was a fledgling. Curiously determined, but still scared shitless about getting emotionally attached to someone again. Eden got the sense the Elias was trying to lure him into his nest room for a sleepover of sorts. 

Once he realizes, he asks Elias to wait a bit while he runs back to the village center. Eden informs the adults that he’s sleeping over with Elias for the night (he’d been sharing a room with some other avians close to the village center) and not to worry about him mysteriously disappearing. He retrieves the black cat patterned blanket from his room along with a small canvas bag with some of his belongings and rushes back to the treehouse with the blanket and bag in tow. He reenters the treehouse to find Elias bored and hanging upside-down out of one of the windows. Eden picks up the pillow that Elias tossed to him earlier and waits on Elias. After a minute or so more, Elias swings himself back into the treehouse and notices Eden standing patiently. Elias walks into his nest room, glancing back at Eden to make sure he’s following. Elias’ nest is in the far corner of the room, close to the window with shelves filled with trinkets lining to room. There’s a wall of blankets on the floor, splitting the room down the middle. Elias steps over the blanket wall and settles into his nest. He looks at Eden and points at something behind him. Behind Eden, there is a smaller nest (despite the fact that Eden is several inches taller than Elias) lined with moss and tall grasses. Eden settles into the nest and curls up to sleep, cuddling the blanket and pillow. It’s their own little version of parallel play. Parallel sleep, if you will. 

Ever since then, Eden has slept in the treehouse with Elias. Day by day, Elias starts shifting Eden’s nest closer to his own in small increments. Eden doesn’t notice until it’s far away enough from the wall that he can’t grab his bag from the spot he usually keeps it in. Eden doesn’t mention it, just letting Elias scoot the nest closer every night. After a couple weeks, Elias takes down part of the blanket wall so he can keep scooting the nest closer. One day, Eden decides to move his nest himself, setting it up right next to Elias’. When Elias returns to the nest room, he notices the change immediately, he doesn’t make any comment. They spend the night sleeping with their fingers intertwined, softly holding each other’s hands. 

Elias starts opening back up, readopting his chatty and rambunctious personality. Eden, happy with the arrangement they have, stops bombarding Elias with gifts and food. Elias doesn’t mind the change because they start sharing their food and trinkets with each other on the regular. They share their sensory icks and stims and listen attentively while the other yaps and infodumps for hours on end. By this point, Eden has learned his fair share of the avian language. It’s broken and choppy and his grammar is questionable at best, but he can hold and follow conversations with the villagers. The villagers aren’t a fan of the English language in all it’s funky rules, spellings, and pronunciations, but they’re slowly getting better. When the two started getting closer, Elias dove headfirst into trying to learn English. He rounds up a small collection of picture books in English, and with his arsenal of children’s books and listening to Eden, he learns English much faster than the rest of the villagers. He does pronounce some things funny on account of Eden being his only source of spoken English, and he also picks up Eden’s unfortunate habit of cussing at every minor inconvenience. 

Veering off of the domestic whimsy of this idea, I’d like to note that when Eden first stumbled into the forest was about a week after hunting season ended, so Elias was still well on high alert. This is part of the reason behind Elias’ intense animosity towards Eden in the beginning. That’s not to say that he would have liked Eden any more had he arrived at a different time of year, but he was still in the swing of killing humans and getting rid of threats, which influenced where their relationship started. 

Back on the idea of the domestic whimsy between these two, they start trusting each other more and more. Elias no longer thinks Eden as a hunter (Elias find out that Eden doesn’t have good enough aim to be a hunter anyway lol) and fully resigns all plans for killing/disposing of Eden. Despite this, he maintains his act of bitter enemies in front of the flock. Eden knows it’s an act, the village knows it’s an act, even Elias acknowledges that it’s an act, but he doesn’t want the village to know that of all creatures, it was a human that caught his heart. His act consists entirely of mean sounding words with no real bite behind them and “attacks” on Eden that are more play-fighting than anything.