#franzka

Housin: General - 50. “I didn’t know where else to go.”

The forest tells Bloom that Housin is coming. It's taken him some time to settle back into it since his return, but it had tuned itself to him easily, if slowly. More easily than he would have expected after being away from the land so long. But it drinks him in like the rains that so rarely fall here among the dry pines, and he does his best to mold himself to it in return. The small, everyday rhythms of the wild life here, hidden to unknowning eyes, is a quiet hum in the back of his mind, and any disruption to it is called to his attention immediately.

Housin isn't a disruption, doesn't clang through his druidic awareness like a gang of poachers or a crackling wildfire. But the forest treats her like one of the great predators that prowl within it. Which is the right way to look at her, in Bloom's estimation. And that means that he knows when she draws near.

Rising from his campfire, taking his staff in hand, he awaits her. She has come to him before with trouble on her heels, or trouble she wants to bring him too. Rarely does she come to him for no reason but to share his solitude. He hopes for that, though. He always does.

When she arrives in the clearing where he'd made his camp, there's a child in her arms. Bloom tenses, as any man might when a woman whom he's slept with arrives before him with a child, but even the quickest glance banishes that thought. The child has neither horns nor scales, neither slitted snake-eyes nor a curling tail. Human--no, half-elven, by the points on her ears and the greenish tint to her hair, in any case and a handful of years too old to have been a product of any of their couplings.

Bloom smiles at them, Housin and the child both, because the girl looks frightened and uncertain, and while Housin is expressionless, there's a tension in her stance that suggests she feels the same. He knows that being able to see that in her is in itself a sign of trust, that she would hide even that from a stranger, but he still doesn't like to see her made uncomfortable. Leaning his staff against a tree, he walks around the fire. Each step is slow and smooth to keep from scaring the child.

"What brings you to my forest?" he asks, because he does have a reputation to maintain in front of the girl.

Housin shifts the girl in her arms, holding her up and forward, almost as if she's presenting her to Bloom. "I didn't know where else to bring her."

"Is she hurt?" Bloom reaches out reflexively to take the girl, but she whimpers softly, and Housin pulls her back against her chest. He raises his hands and takes a step back. "I'm not going to hurt you, little one."

"She is, but it doesn't need treating," Housin says. Then she adds, less shortly, "It could use some magic, but it can wait until she trusts you. I took her from parents who shouldn't have had her."

The outlines of the story appear at once in rough before him. Housin has been callous before about children in peril or pain, but that doesn't mean she likes to see it. She'd become more willing to take risks on their behalf with Bloom and Fifth Red Petal beside her--doing it anyway, as she'd once criticized them in her expressionless way--and he wouldn't be surprised in the least if she's continued that willingness alone. Or perhaps the kidnapping of this child didn't involve what she would consider risk. An unguarded moment in the market, or a night when the parents weren't home….

Or the parents' death, if she thought the offense bad enough. There's no blood on her, but Housin is very good at assassinations, and would be wise enough not to take the child in such a state. Nor to let her witness it in the first place.

Bloom nods, then crouches down a bit--he is quite tall, and alongside the horns and the red of his skin, the child has plenty of reason to be afraid of him--and smiles again at the girl. "Are you hungry?"

She peers at him with wide eyes. They're dark in this darkness, the firelight casting shadows across her face, but there's a thin rim of a lighter shade around the pupils that suggests they won't be in the sunlight. Her hand goes to her mouth, and he hears the softest, shiest "'s."

"Do you like stew? I have stew." Bloom doesn't wait for an answer, only turns back to the campfire and starts ladling the stew he'd been cooking into a bowl. He had meant it to simmer and cook down overnight, so it's quite watery, but he picks out big chunks of meat and tuber for her.

When he turns back with the bowl, he doesn't have to rise; Housin has set the girl down beside him. She takes the bowl and then retreats backwards, unsteadily, to the base of one of the trees. Standing there, she alternates between fishing chunks of tuber out of the bowl with her fingers and glancing at him with wide, wary eyes.

Even if she tries to run away from them, he'll know wherever she goes. Bloom lets her stand alone for the moment and looks up at Housin instead. She's looking between him and the girl, her face unreadable, but he thinks she's less tense.

"What's the tale with her?" he asks in a low voice, judging that the child isn't likely to hear from so far away, even with her half-elven ears.

Housin sinks down onto her own knees beside him to whisper regardless. "Her parents shouldn't have had her," she repeats. "But they were important enough that she'll be searched for. I couldn't take her to any of the places I usually do. They're all too close and too obvious. But I know your circle needs more initiates."

"That's true."

Bloom doesn't bother to tell Housin that they don't typically acquire their initiates by kidnapping. She knows the tale of his own path here too well to believe that they're beyond leveraging unfortunate circumstances to their advantage. And they are, indeed, desperate for new initiates. Those who think they want to be druids tend to seek out green places, places where their life and the power of the land is obvious to even the cityborn. Too many people think of this land as a waste, and too few are drawn to the subtle power and buried life within.

"Then you'll care for her."

It's not as if she's left him with a choice. Return the child to either of the nearby cities, and Housin is likely to end up in trouble for her deeds. Bloom trusts her judgement--if she thinks these parents deserved to lose their child, or possibly even die, then he doubts that she was wrong--but no guard or judge will do the same. He wouldn't do that to her even if the welfare of the child wasn't in question. Had there been a better recourse wherever the girl had come from, Housin would have taken it. Probably. He can't avoid the thought that this might have been done as much for him as for the girl.

"I will, but only if she wants to stay with me," Bloom warns her. "I know other circles that can convey her out of reach of anyone who might endanger her, and if she isn't suited for this land or doesn't come to trust me, I'll contact them and send her on."

"Good. She should have choices." Housin is leaning towards the fire, very slightly. It's not cold yet by Bloom's standards, but it is early autumn, and she's always chilled easily.

He puts an arm around her shoulders. There was a time when it had been a daring gesture, but now it feels natural. The only thing wrong about it is that Fifth Red Petal is missing on his, or her, other side.

She leans into him, her head coming to rest against his shoulder. Neither of them speak. Bloom watches the child out of the corner of his eye, and is sure Housin is doing the same, though she seems to be staring into the flames.

Eventually the girl finishes her stew and creeps over to them, setting the bowl down beside the fire and then scurrying around it to burrow into Housin's side. Housin puts an arm around her, careful and deliberate, in the same way that Bloom had put an arm around her. She looks up at Bloom, eyebrows rising with the same kind of deliberateness, and he nods, the affirmation she was looking for that that's the right move.

He wonders what had happened, exactly, that the girl so easily trusts this strange snake-scaled woman who had taken her away from home and kin. He wonders what harms he'll discover once she's willing to let him look at her more closely and pour healing magic into her skin. He wonders what other harms may not be clear on her skin at all, any more than most of Housin's own are.

There's time enough to find out, without pressing or frightening her. For now he flicks his cloak over both of them and wraps himself even more tightly around Housin and her small charge, feeling them both relax in the heat of his body and the fire. The food and the fire will lull the girl to sleep, and he'll follow after, and Housin, no doubt, will stay awake and alert half the night until he stirs to take over the watch, even though she knows that the forest itself will keep watch for them both. She's learned paranoia to deeply to trust what she herself can't see or hear or touch.

But she trusts him. With watch, with this child, with herself, still and almost relaxed beside him. Bloom is content to accept the honor of that.

***

Franzka: Fluff - 38. “You owe me.” “Fine, whatever you like.”

"The brazier," Isidor says, setting a tripod-bottomed brass bowl down on the table in front of them. "You were able to find the other supplies, I hope?"

"Charcoal, incense, herbs," Franzka declares, setting a jar of each atop the table with a trio of thuds. "Is there a special way I gotta mix 'em up, or do I just throw 'em all in?"

"There is an order to it. I'll show you how."

Isidor's huge blue hands are remarkably deft despite their size. He lights the charcoal with a snap of his fingers, then shows her how to sprinkle the incense and grind the dried herbs in her fingers before sprinkling them over the charcoal, too. Franzka follows his instructions about what to say and how to move with painstaking care. She gets a crick in her neck watching him, even standing on the chair, but she doesn't care.

The ritual takes an hour and change, and her voice is hoarse at the end of it. But in the last few seconds, as the flame dancing above the remains of the charcoal flickers and dies, as the smoke finishes dissipating, another form takes shape where the smoke had been. A tiny owl, round and brown, face and stomach dusted with white, barely larger than even Franzka's tiny gnomish fist.

"Hey, Firble," Franzka says. She knows the grin spreading across her face probably looks foolish, but she doesn't care. When she holds out her arm, the little saw-whet owl flutters in to land upon it.

It's been years, the tiny voice chirps in her head, loud out of proportion to her size even if it's only ringing inside Franzka's skull, and utterly indignant. You called me, I agreed to be yours, and then you didn't call me again for years!

"Sorry, Firble." Franzka pats the fluffy little head, and gets a nip for her pains, too small and delicate to really hurt. "We couldn't find one of those books again in a hurry, so I had to wait and learn how to call you like a wizard does. Thank Isidor, he's been showing me the ropes."

The owl turns a haughty gaze upon the stick-like figure of the Vedalken. No wonder it took so long. His kind have no sense of urgency.

"She says thank you," Franzka lies, and is rewarded by an accusatory chirp from the owl and a chuckle from Isidor. "Or she would if she had any manners. Sorry about that."

"I can hardly expect her to have Lelouch's dignity, when he has so much more room to fit that in," Isidor says graciously, echoed by a deep hoot from the great horned owl on his shoulder. Firble chirps again, even more angrily.

This is intolerable. You owe me for this indignity. A hundred years of scritching and mice. The finest mice you can buy, not those terrible mucky creatures from the sewers!

"Fine," Franzka says, laughing and patting Firble again. This time the owl bristles but endures it. "Whatever you want. I'm just glad to see you again."

Firble nestles down onto her arm, all her feathers fluffing up, and glares out through the puff of them around her round yellow eyes. I suppose being in your company again is tolerable.

***

Sudryal: Fluff - 24. “This reminded me of you.”

The pup is just old enough that he won't die outright without his mother's milk, though it will be touch-and-go. Sudryal gnaws on the tough meat of yesterday's dinner until it's soft enough to spit into the little wolf's mouth, then strokes his throat when he's slow to swallow. He's been hungry for so long, bereft of his parents and kin. It might be too late to save him at all.

Sudryal isn't going to give up, though. And neither, it seems, is the pup. More meat, a bit of water from his waterskin, as much healing magic as the little lupine body will absorb, and soon the wolf pup is wriggling in his arms, looking around in interest in between bouts of licking at Sudryal's face. Sudryal feeds him all the way to the rendevous.

"Oh!" Josephine exclaims as soon as she sees him. "A puppy!"

Perhaps it isn't a good idea to let her pet him--he shouldn't become a tame wolf, Sudryal's god whispers in the back of his head--but Sudryal would like a break from attending to him for one moment. So he hands the pup over and lets Josephine cuddle him while he helps Grai with the remaining tasks of setting up camp. The two of them had gotten here before for him, and there's not much left to take care of, but he fusses with the fire and adds a few herbs he'd gathered to the pot.

"So that's what your god sent you to do," Grai says, watching Josephine play with the pup. He's getting wriggly again, and when he wriggles out of Josephine's arms one last time, Grai picks up a stick from the pile of kindling for the fire and tosses it. The pup watches it arch over his head in incomprehension of the game, but he pounces on the stick once it lands and begins to wrestle with it, giving forth squeaky little growls.

He isn't supposed to speak of his god to an orc, but he's also not supposed to be traveling with an orc in the first place, so Sudryal nods. Grai won't pry beyond what he tells her. "Hunters killed his parents and either didn't realize the mother was with milk, or didn't care. They left the cubs to starve. The rest hadn't made it, but he's strong."

"He is strong," Grai agrees. The pup has dragged the stick over to Sudryal, still wrestling with it; Grai picks up the far end and begins a game of tug-of-war. "He'll survive."

"He will." Sudryal watches for a moment as the two of them wrestle, while Josephine settles down beside Grai and smiles at the play. Then he adds, because he hasn't been able to resist the silent comparisons, "He reminds me of you."

Grai glances over at him. She doesn't look curious, just faintly resigned. And it's true, that's one of the comparisons Sudryal had made in his head--the stubborn half-dead survivor who'd outlived the brutal death of kin. But there's another, sparked by Josphine's smile.

Sudryal lets the side of his mouth quirk up, just a little, as he nods towards the tiefling watching raptly as Grai and the wolf pup play. "He fell in fast with her."