{Liz & Kat} Non-muddy forest explorations! {Hydra & Measle}

Hydra sat crying long into the night, soon having cried herself to sleep. Several times she woke up missing Measle beside her and would again cry herself to sleep. Four days ago she'd have not thought twice about being alone, in fact she'd have been quite happy. Now, it pained her to even think of being on her own again. Some time close to dawn, when the colors just barely started to change with the rising of the sun, Hydra decided to go back whether Jackdaww liked the idea or not. It just wasn't possible for her to be without him. She started off walking, then ended up sprinting, only to slow to a walk when she could see them. She couldn't help but smile as she edged into camp.

She eased over to Jackdaww and gently nudged his cheek with her snout. 'I suppose, when they're asleep, humans are more difficult to stay angry at.' She backed away quickly, fearing making him too cold, and looked around for her precious Measle. Upon seeing his silhouette she lay down in front of him and shut her eyes, waiting for him to wake up. This wouldn't happen again, she thought, she wouldn't be able to live an entire day without him around at this rate.

That night felt like the longest of Measle’s entire life. He could barely stay asleep for an hour before waking up – every little sound in the woods made him think that Hydra had come back, and every time he realised it wasn’t true, it broke his heart just a little bit more.

When he heard the rustling in the undergrowth at the edge of the clearing, he almost took it as just another normal sound, and remained as he was: eyes clamped shut, and breathing deeply to pretend he was asleep. However, as always, there came a point where he had to peek. He couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw the blue, shimmering scales in front of him. “Hydra?” he whispered in disbelief, blinking hard to convince himself he was really awake. “You’re back!” His voice never rose above a whisper as he didn’t want to wake Jackdaww, but he couldn’t help inching a little bit closer to Hydra and laying his head beside hers, finally feeling whole again.

She couldn't help but smile. "Yes, I'm back and I'm not leaving you again." Quietly she moved over next to him and shut her eyes. "Haven't actually slept but for an hour or two at the most. Don't suppose we'll be going anywhere today anyway so we can sleep in. Sound good to you?" She felt too tired to move any more than she already had and the sun was climbing up over the horizon quite quickly. Jackdaww would soon wake up and it would be better if he saw her asleep instead of awake after what had happened the day before.

“Sleeping in sounds wonderful. Hearing your voice again is even better. I missed you.” Measle whispered, not wanting Jack to wake up and ruin that moment. The night before had been bitter enough, so letting Jack sleep through seemed far preferable to seeing his reaction to Hydra’s return. Measle’s nerves could finally rest now that Hydra was beck by his side, and he felt his eyelids droop almost instantly, the warm, fuzzy feeling inside him settling back into place. Shuffling a little closer to Hydra, so that he could feel her familiar chill against his scales, he fell asleep quickly, letting the sun rise regardless. The dawn was of little importance when compared to everything that had happened in the last uncomfortable hours.

Hydra opened her eyes a little while later and yawned. "Ugh. . ." she groaned as she stood up. She promptly sat back down and cuddled up to Measle. "Where did the day go I wonder. . ." she muttered sarcastically. Upon resting her head against his shoulder she shut her eyes again, but couldn't get back to sleep. There were constant sounds around her and they were overall preventing her from getting any more shuteye. Finally she got up and stretched her legs a bit before going back to lay down. She hadn't a clue as to when, or if, Jackdaww was awake at that point.

Jackdaww slept in unusually late that morning. He usually rose with the sun, but that night his dreams had been plagued with guilt, and he hadn’t slept well. About an hour and a half after dawn, he sat up, yawning, and rubbed his eyes, before looking around camp. The act that Hydra was back leapt out at him immediately, but her eyes were closed, so he presumed he was safe. Hopefully Measle had talked some sense into her, and he was no longer at risk of being torn apart by her. However, it did seem like he owed her some sort of apology. He was no longer afraid of her, so as to say, but he was a little nervous. He had no idea how either of the dragons would react to him that morning, so he just waited patiently for one of them to wake up, listening to the gentle sound of Measle snoring.

Hydra cracked an eye open and stood once more. "Ah, seems you're awake finally." After giving herself a few minutes to get fully awake she wandered a little ways off from Measle and sat by Jack. "I hope you understand that it really doesn't matter who does it, anyone who hurts him incurs my wrath. I really care for him, Jackdaww, losing him at this point isn't something I can handle. I lashed out yesterday because you of all the humans in the world were the cause of his pain. Perhaps when you find a female that you won't be able to stand losing you'll understand better."

Jackdaww was a little nervous as Hydra approached, but as he realised her anger had died down, he calmed almost immediately. However, he couldn’t hide that her last few words hurt – they cut a fair bit deeper than he had ever realised they would.

“I know, I understand. I’m sorry – you must know that I never meant any harm. He’s been my only friend in the world for, what, thirteen years? I couldn’t bear to loose him any more than you could.” He said, his voice soft and brittle from his restless night. He had always known that Hydra was just angry with him – why else would he have stopped himself attacking back? Why else would he have run? It went against everything the knight’s code had taught him, but he had gone along with it anyway.

Jackdaww was about to open his mouth to speak again when Measle’s snoring stopped, and he stirred, before waking slowly. He looked over at the two of them, and woke up sharply, cautious of them being so close together after last night. However, they looked fairly safe, and that was a great relief. Now things could maybe return to normal, whatever that was.

With a soft whine she cuddled up to Jack. "I'm sorry too. I was a real monster to you." She realized a bit too late that her skin was too cold for her to really be of any comfort and tried to move away a smidgen. "I'm worried I'll freeze you to the bone if I get too close; you being so small and whatnot with little body fat to insulate you." She sat within arm's reach of him anyway and looked at him. "You're very different from most humans I must say." She contemplated going to sit by her companion, but opted against it for the moment to let him wake up a bit more.

“You weren’t acting like a monster – you were acting out of love. Any fool could see that. You are forgiven, but you were never in the wrong here.” Jackdaww replied in a slightly glum tone, before blinking hard and shaking himself into a more positive mindset. It was time to forgive and forget, and for Jackdaww that meant

“And I know I’m kinda different– Measle keeps telling me that. He reckons I must have hit my head when I was a kid.” Jackdaww said jovially, putting any dislike he had of Hydra from the night before well out of his mind. It looked like Measle would want her around for some time, so he had to at least try to get on with her properly.

“And the cold is fine - from here at least I can hardly feel it. I’ve been living outdoors for the last thirteen winters, so I’m more than used to icy temperatures.” He grinned. However, he was glad of her concern – it was comforting to know that she bore him no ill will.

By then, Measle was quite awake, and made his way slowly (and painfully) over to Jackdaww and Hydra. His ribs ached after running to split up the fight the previous night, but he didn’t think it would set back their healing too long. If only he had been a tear dragon or the likes – he would have been able to heal himself fairly easily, wouldn’t he? It would have been so… convenient.

"Measle stop moving about so much you'll make it worse!" she fussed. "Jack talk some sense into him please! Tell him he's not supposed to be up and moving about like that." Oh he was impossible to keep still if the last 24 hours was any testament to how correct that statement was. She snorted a puff of icy smoke and tried to get him to sit down. She finally quit and pouted as she lay back down. She looked at her companion and sighed. "If you won't sit still for your ribs' sake then sit still for our sake at least? For me and Jack?"

Measle was all ready to refuse to stay put (he wasn’t fond of sitting still anyway) when Hydra pulled the ‘do it for us’ card. He rolled his eyes, but sat down obediently, quite close to them by then. “Oh alright, I’ll stay still.” He said, a little sourly, but as he settled down on the ground again, he could feel that just having something solid under his ribs was a great improvement. He almost felt like he wanted them bound, just to take off some of the pain, but it would do him no good. If his years of looking after Jack had taught him anything, it was that you never bind cracked ribs. Now he could see why Jack had always found it so annoying.

“It’s nice to see you two getting along again.” He smiled, looking gratefully at them sitting by each other. He had always used Jackdaww’s various habits as a method of measuring normality, but now he was starting to think that this – this calm, quiet acceptance between everyone – was a far better thing to gauge by.

Last edited by ElizaFlame13 on Thu Mar 08, 2012 3:46 pm; edited 1 time in total

She was a bit surprised that he had listened, but the sour tone stung a little bit. When he smiled she felt a little bit better, but it didn't go away completely. "It was a mutual understanding." She moved away from them a bit and stretched her legs. "Jack you up for hunting or shall I go find something?" She felt like she wanted to go hunt, but with another dragon and a human and both not liking their food half frozen it was a bit difficult. She was perfectly at home with going out and finding food, but if it was Jack and Measle eating it Jack'd have to kill it if she found it.

“Yeah, I’m up for it. Are you coming?” Jackdaww asked, smiling openly now that any threat had passed. He ignore Measles mild frumpiness – years around the little dragon had taught him that mornings weren’t Measle’s best time, and he knew better than to take anything he said before breakfast to heart. He understood why he needed to make the kill – after all, it was easier to freeze meat than thaw it, and he prided himself in being quite tidy in his killing too. He had a hunting knife in his boot, which ought to be balanced enough to work as a throwing knife (which he had been taught to use as a boy before his father would trust him with a sword), and he had been hunting long enough to know how to limit the time it took to take down something like a deer.

Measle just nodded along with things – he wasn’t thinking straight yet, since it was too early, and was in half a mind to just go back to sleep for a while if Jack was going hunting. However, he didn’t really want Hydra to leave again – he was still frightened that he was dreaming, and that if he lost sight of her, she might not really be there.

"Jack...If I can point you in the right direction of some game could you go hunting on your own? I think I should stay here and look after Measle." She pointed off toward the path ahead and gave a sort of grin. "Badgers up that way with a set and a wolverine I think. I'm not quite sure what else comes out in the twilight of the morning though." She shook her head at the human in spite of the task. "You just worry about finding something for yourself and Measle, I will hunt when I need to." She stretched her legs and yawned again. "When I was coming back I saw a few animals here and there, no rabbits though."

“Alright, I’ll be back within the hour. You two take care.” Jackdaww grinned, before sticking his hands into his pockets and swaggering out into the woods. He looked like he could have been off to anything but hunt, but Measle knew he’d have no trouble bringing them back a meal. He always had, since their very first night out here. It must have been all the knife practise he’d gotten off his father, he presumed. Either way, it kept them both from starving, which was what mattered.

“Thanks for staying, Hydra.” Measle said after a while, shaking off a little of his morning grumpiness. “I can’t even begin to say how god it is to have you back.” The night had been cruel to him, but now that dawn had arrived, he was starting to feel more like himself again.

With a snort she sat down and looked at the sky. "I can wait a while longer to hunt." In the wild she ate perhaps twice a week or so and that was good enough for her. "That and someone needs to watch you till you're better, otherwise you might make your injury worse." Which in layman's terms was just an excuse to stick around and talk to him while Jack went off hunting. It made sense to her that it was her responsibility to look after him until he was better, since it was partly her fault he got hurt at all. She wondered about something and looked at Measle. "Why do you suppose humans kill dragons?"

“I don’t know.” Measle said slowly, deciding that there was no way he could defend Jackdaww’s race any further. “I suppose some of them are just mean. Some dragons like scaring humans, and attacking villages, so maybe it’s just the same thing?” He couldn’t imagine a human doing such a thing – he had met so many nice ones that he was almost blind to their mean streaks, but he knew that Hydra knew all too well that they weren’t all as harmless as Jack.

“You should come to a little town with us some time,” he said after a moment, “just to meet some nice humans. They’re not all bad.” He was certain that it was just a matter of showing Hydra the best of humanity before she could get used to them, but even he knew that he was being a little too hopeful. Jack’s race were violent, brutal even, and from a distance it was difficult to see anything good about them, as much as it pained Measle to admit it.

After thinking it over she looked at him defeated. "Alright, I'll go into town with you and Jack, but if someone steps on me I'm waiting outside the city gates." She didn't plan on leaving them any time soon, not after all of this and what had just happened. "I don't plan on leaving you and Jack for some time, if ever." When Hydra decided on something there was no turning back, usually. There were occasions where she just plain couldn't do something she'd set out to do. This was a new situation for her, this "love" business, and it was truly a learning experience.

“Oh, I , err, I mean, I was just thinking – you don’t have to if you don’t want to. We won’t need to stop son anyway.” Measle said quickly, suddenly realising that he hadn’t thought it all through. However, when he caught the end of Hydra’s sentence, he relaxed. “And I don’t want you to leave us either.” He smiled, settling down again and resting his head briefly on one of Hydra’s shoulders. It was nice to know that she really did intend to stay – he had probably always known, but hearing her say it gave him the most wonderful feeling.

Meanwhile, Jackdaww had managed to find something to hunt. There was a clear track belonging to some sort of wolf-like creature, which he figured would be enough to feed them. He was just following the trail when a noise caught his attention. A twig snapped, and there was a little squeaky noise, followed by some snuffling. Jackdaww turned slowly, and saw something brown and fluffy sitting in the undergrowth beside the path. Hydra may not have seen any rabbits, but he’d managed to walk right past a burrow. He reached quietly into his pocket, and found a large piece of cloth there, that had presumably made up a pack for food at one point. He smiled to himself, and looked towards the rabbit, making a quick decision and deciding that it would give them all a good laugh if he could bring one back.

She felt her heart skip a beat when he said he didn't want her to leave. It wasn't something she felt like hiding and she turned pink in the face. "It means that much to you that I stick around?" It made her feel loved to know that he didn't want her to leave. She had no idea what Jack could be doing but it made sense that he'd spend a long time looking for something to hunt. On a whim she licked Measle's cheek and blinked at him. "You have a habit of getting dusty you know that? I swear every time something moves in the general vicinity it kicks up dust and it gets onto you."

“It means everything to me.” Measle said softly, feeling his scales flush as she licked his cheek. He knew Jack would laugh if he heard him say anything that soppy, but it was the truth. However, he couldn’t help but laugh when Hydra mentioned the dust.

“Well, since my scales are so dark, it just shows up more I guess. I must admit, though, I do need a good wash. I’ll sort myself out later on.” He chuckled a little, looking over his shoulder to see the thin film of dust that had settled over the ridge of his back, giving his scales a matt appearance. He shook his head, smiling, and looked back to Hydra. He didn’;t think Jackdaww would take much longer, but he was hoping that their time alone would last a bit longer.

Jackdaww, meanwhile, had struck gold. He had seen some movement a little way off, and had a steady trail after a wolverine, but better yet he had a little, twitching sack slung over one shoulder. His knees were scraped from falling over himself, but he’d caught the rabbit. It had bitten him a few times, mind, and he was covered in scratches from the bushes nearby, but he still had it. If Measle had really never seen one, and Hydra liked them, it seemed like it would lessen the tedium of sitting around all the time, waiting for Measle to get better.

He dug in his boot for his hunting knife, and listened for the wolverine. It was nearby, and he should be able to take it down easily enough. He’d be back to camp in no time.

"I smell a rabbit. . .I think. . ." she mumbled shaking her head. She cleaned some of the dust off Measle's shoulder and back to keep herself busy and sighed to herself. She curled up and folded her wings back out of boredom. If it was going to be like this for weeks on end she was in for a case of cabin fever for sure. "When Jack gets back I'm off to hunt for something to eat." Being stationary for so long had made her a bit lethargic. With a great yawn she looked around and lay down again. She was getting paranoid again.

As if on cue, Jackdaww emerged into the camp again, with two shapes slung over his back – one on each shoulder. One was a young wolverine, with a good amount of meat on it, but the other was a small, squirming sack. Measle took one look at him and raised an eyebrow. “Jack, what on earth is that?” he asked, nodding as the sack. Jackdaww grinned impishly, and Measle could tell he was excited about something. He dropped the wolverine a little way off, ready to skin, and brought the bag over to the dragons.

“I thought you two would be interested in this.” He said softly, clearly trying not to spook whatever was in the bag. Then, holding the shape inside carefully so it didn’t get away, he pulled something small and furry out of the bag. Measle’s eyes widened, taking in this creature that he had never once seen before, before turning to Jackdaww questioningly.

“It’s a rabbit, Measle. You were talking about them earlier.” He said, as gently as he could manage. The rabbit twitched its nose, looking more than a little spooked, but made no move to free itself from Jackdaww’s grasp. Measle was astonished – it looked so unlike anything else he’d ever seen before, with it’s long ears and brown fur. He couldn’t take his eyes off it.

"It's a wonder you managed to catch one." Hydra said her tail flicking back and forth. "They're super warm and fluffy and fun to cuddle so long as you can keep them still." She couldn't resist a smile as she watched the little creature in fascination. "It's been a while since I saw one this close." This little rabbit brought back many fond memories of the snow hares she saw back home and how often she tried to catch them and failed. She sat back a little and lay her head down. "Go ahead and investigate it but I must warn you they "can" bite and it hurts if they get a hold of you."

» [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child
» The Forest of Tarz (Exxor x Eldarwen)
» Measle {Miniture but Mighty}
» :: Mystery of the Godless Forest :: -{Aero, Nen, Spirit, Rogue}-
» Hydra :: A Place In This World