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THE BOUQUET ESTATE - MORNING
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Tarbin wanders down the hallway, guided by one of the Bouquet's servants, but unaided by his cane. Indeed, his limp is almost completely gone, with just mild itching pain when he's been still for too long. He's used the last couple days of rest to concentrate on removing that reliance, and indeed still needed such time to nudge his own body to heal. He's on his way now to visit Teis at her room, the servant stopping them outside one door and knocking softly. Tarbin smiles in the servant's general direction, though of course has no idea how they might be looking at him in return. In his better, pain-relieved mood, he tries to not picture an exceptionally proper leopard wearing a silly hat and brightly coloured petticoat on Teis's orders.
Narrator: It's been a few days since 'the incident', after which Teis had slept for over 24 hours. Since then, she's been bedridden and confined to her room. "Come in." Teis' soft voice replies. She's currently in bed, eating breakfast on a tray kindly provided by the servants. Also, not that Tarbin can see it, but Teis is in adorable soft lilac pajamas. Tarbin would also be able to sense that she hasn't fully recovered. "Ah, Tarbin."
Tarbin enters after the door is opened, nodding in Teis's direction as he slowly approaches the bed. He hears a chair thump softly beside him, though he doesn't take a seat immediately. With a slight bow to Teis, he smiles. "Good morning miss Teis. Feeling a little bit better, I would hope?"
Teis: "I feel fine. But Della won't let me leave until I convince her that I'm fine. She's barely even looked at me, let alone even spoken to me. . ." Teis sighs deeply. It clearly weighs heavily on her mind.
Tarbin sighs, smile slipping slightly. "I am sorry if you have been in trouble for helping me. I do not mean to cause problems for you. I also do not mean for you to put your health in danger."
Teis: "Look, it's. . .My decision. I'm just. . ." Teis stares at her food, sighing again. "She's usually the first by my side after something happens to me. But she wasn't this time. Instead she just sent the servants. I. . .I think I really messed up, Tarbin. . ."
Tarbin steps a little closer to the bed, shaking his head slightly. "She... Might be upset, yes. You are trying to do something very kind, I appreciate it. I would agree with her in asking you to be more careful though, miss Teis. If I had known the extent you were going to go in the garden, I would have objected and asked you to rethink."
Teis sits in silence for a moment, unmoving, tearing up slowly in the meantime. Eventually, she prods at her food and eats a small amount of it, if only to slightly distract her emotions with physical action. It doesn't really work. ". . .What do I do, Tarbin?" She meekly asks.
Tarbin lets out a light sigh, hearing the tone of her voice. He hesitates in answering, looking aside a bit as he thinks. "I would think talk to Della. Make sure everything is alright and if it isn't, make it so. She is too important to you to hurt her. If that means we don't move on my curse, that is as it is. I wait, have for this long."
Teis: "Given how she's been avoiding me, I don't even know if she wants to talk to me. . ." Teis sighs. Again. It's the sighing summit up in Teis' room. "I just. . .Everything I'm doing is important, in their own ways. I wish I could articulate that to her. I don't want to be hurting her. . ."
Tarbin chuckles quietly, looking toward Teis. "Well, Della is supposed to be conducting business, yes? If you become a good curse breaker, could sell the skill."
Teis: "Truthfully, I'd already considered that, and tried to tell Della that. I don't think she sees it as marketable? I mean, not that it excites me to monetize helping people anyway. . ."
Tarbin smiles slightly, nodding. "That is a good thing, to be truthful. I honestly have no strong advice for you on this, Teis. You know Della far better than I, you will have to follow what your heart says. I can only think she is less upset by your efforts not being good for money, and more than you got hurt by them."
Teis: "Yeah. . .Yeah I know. . .I just. . .I'm lost. But I guess that's my issue to deal with." Teis takes a deep breath in, sighing it out and trying to relax, picking at her food some more. "So. . .What about you? Admittedly, I don't know how effective my efforts were the other day. Could you. . .Tell me about it?"
Tarbin: "Well, you could use the good news." He grins, swishing his tails slightly with the slightly dramatic pause. "I can feel it. I can touch it through the floors. Before your efforts, being in most buildings was like wearing a blindfold, but now the flow just beyond tile and board is in my grasp." He tilts his head slightly, chuckling. "You were successful in the chip."
Teis smiles. Good news indeed. "Good. . .Good." She tries to perk her tone up, though the hurt underneath is still clear. She does her best not to continue focusing on the sadness though. "That's excellent to hear. There's another benefit to chipping away it at like this. That is to say, when I feel I am ready to transfer it to myself. . .It will hinder me less as well. Additionally, I can now start researching the energies I siphoned off, which should further prove useful. Well, I will, when I'm allowed to go back to my lab." Teis pauses. "You are curious as to why I took such risk to myself? This is why. The positives in this move far outweighed the negatives to me in the short term."
Tarbin sighs, nodding after listening to Teis's explanation, though not convinced that the risk is actually worth it. "I will take you at your word for that. I will still ask again that you act a little more carefully if we continue... And certainly be careful with whatever you've captured in those crystals."
Teis: "Worry not, Tarbin. I intend to treat those crystals with every bit of caution that they're deserving of." Teis nods. "And, with better research opportunities, I hopefully won't have to brute force the curse again to make progress, if that puts you at ease?"
Tarbin chuckles, visibly relaxing. "Yes, it does. I do not wish to sacrifice another to remove the curse. Thank you, Teis."
Narrator: Out of noteworthy things to talk about, Teis turns her attention back to her food. Of course, she still offers Tarbin idle chit-chat and company.
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SOMEWHERE - AFTERNOON
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Cavro tosses his happy little fire stone idly as they pair of them make their way around the edge of a large clearing. The ground seems to be steadily rising, a sizable hill ahead of them. Cavro nods, holding tight to the two stones as he steps over a fallen tree. "I I I can't believe it rained all night. We're going to have a a a bit of a task getting dry firewood for tonight." He had slept very well the night before, though he feels a bit guilty for feeling a bit lighter in mood since their conversation.
Erika is likewise in a chipper mood as she scouts their way: "It's the season for a lot of wet, yeah. But we should be fine." She gives Cavro a smile before turning back to look where they are going. They've been lucky with a lack of predators so far but that's no reason to get careless.
Cavro nods, giving Erika a smile in return, turning to look into the trees as they move along. Despite their improved moods, he's still a bit on edge about being lost in the first place, but with a clearer mind and fire in his hands, the badger is managing to focus that wariness more positively. "Is it... Raining at home? I I I mean, it's the right time of year for it, you're right. Might be a good sign."
Erika looks around, frowning: "I... guess so? Not sure since obviously we're not home but maybe?" She kneels down to inspect a flower, frowning as she doesn't recognize it. "Still seeing a lot of unfamiliar plants though."
Cavro tilts his head, giving the flower a bit of a glare. "Please don't don't don't eat any unfamiliar flowers while we we we're out here..." He straightens, looking to Erika. "It it it is too bad we don't have anything to carry some samples back with, though."
Erika turns to look at Cavro with a smile, notably without touching the flower in question. She gets up: "Course I won't. We're not that desperate, and I can still find plenty of things I know are safe to eat." She frowns slightly, giving a lopsided smile: "...though I know you're craving for meat, I can't really hunt for you."
Cavro looks a bit aside, shrugging. "I am am am okay with foraging. Somehow, killing and cleaning something out here just doesn't seem appealing to to to me." He blinks, chuckling as he turns back to her. "Besides, I I I just have that one extra thing to look forward to when we we we get back."
Erika chuckle softly: "Fair enough. Not my worry anyway..." She trails off, going quiet for a moment. After some steps in silence, she glances at Cavro: "I would've missed losing your company altogether."
Cavro nods, looking ahead of them as he answers. "I would have missed you you you too, of course. At least, for the two or three hours I I I would have survived." He chuckles, thinking back. "I um... I ate some of of of those berries you told me not to." Cavro gives her a playful glance, chuckling quietly. "Only a few, but it it it was certainly out of spite."
Erika blanches and looks aside: "I uh... I just m-meant not b-being friends with you. I'm s-sorry I ever said I'd desert you here."
Cavro blinks, looking forward for a moment before shaking his head. "I I I know you wouldn't have. I mean... In that moment I I I certainly felt it."
Erika sighs, looking down as she stops walking: "S-still, I'm sorry."
Cavro pauses a step after Erika does, turning to look at her. "We... I said things that I I I don't think I really should have, but... I think we we we needed to. When I I I said it was lonely out here... I think in that dropped the pin for for for me. If we were in in in love, truly, being together should have have have been all I needed." He looks aside, rubbing his arm. "I'm sorry too, Erika..."
Erika takes a deep breath as she closes her eyes as her ears flicker at Cavro's words, then slowly lets the breath out. She steels herself, then opens her eyes and offers her hand to Cavro: "...I may not love you as a life partner, but I still care for you deeply as my oldest friend. We can do this."
Cavro sets his jaw, nodding as he reaches out for her hand. "Yes, we can."
Erika takes Cavro's hand in a firm grip for a moment before finding her smile again. She lets his hand go and starts looking around again.
Cavro gives her hand a squeeze before they let go, turning to look up the hill again. They're most of the way... As long as the treeline ahead isn't hiding more incline. "More North, or are you getting a a a feeling for a change?"
Erika hums for a moment: "...I don't know." She tilts her head, squinting about but not really getting much of a clue. She points to a direction totally not picked at semi-random: "...that way? Maybe?"
Cavro looks where she's pointing, humming. "I'll follow your lead, if if if you think that's right."
Erika shrugs and gives a half-smile: "I really don't know, but we're at least still heading mostly Northward... well, if where we ended up was a right assumption." She mutters to herself: "Should really know more of Aephix..."
Cavro catches the mutter, chuckling as he begins in the direction Erika had indicated. "We're already living in in in a frontier town. But hey, at least we can share our our our experience with others, right?"
Erika laughs softly as she begins walking as well: "That we can.... that we can. Although I think we got to make the story more exciting if we tell it several times."
Cavro laughs as he crests a birm, seeming to slip and stumble, dropping to his stomach which cuts his laugh short. He lets out a low hiss from the tall grass, though the plants mostly obscure whatever gesture he's trying to make.
Erika yelps slightly at Cavro's stumble: "Ack! Are you okay?!"
Cavro lets out a hushing hiss as he rolls over, sliding down the hill a bit towards Erika. "B-b-bear... Black bear..." He has indeed spotted a young black bear over the top of the hill, though anyone with any knowledge of them would know that these smaller bears are easy to spook and not terribly aggressive to begin with.
Erika quickly drops down next to Cavro before taking a look. "A b-bear?" Leaning down next to Cavro, she swallows and takes a peek. "O-oh."
Cavro shudders, turning to Erika. "You you you had to say we we we needed more excitement, hmm? ...What do you mean 'oh'?"
Erika shakes her head head slightly, whispering: "I-it's only a black bear. It... it probably won't attack unless we give it a reason. Let's just round the hill and odds are it won't bother giving chase." She tries really hard to erase the images of Garwin chasing her all those months back.
Cavro looks at Erika with a bit of awe, crawling reluctantly up the hill to peek at the bear again. "Oh... Oh okay, that sounds like a a a good idea. I am all for not not not upsetting the bear."
Erika nods, then starts making her way back downhill and finding a circuitous route around: "We're already lost, a little reroute won't change that. Come on."
Cavro slips down the hill a bit, getting up to trot after Erika, clenching his fingers around the fire starting stones along the way. "Right... Lost. Helpful to be that, for once."
Erika lets out a quiet laugh as she glances over to the hill's peak, making sure the bear isn't interested or didn't hear them. "Well, perhaps a bit questionable, but in our current situation... take what we can."
Cavro chuckles nervously, looking ahead of them as they re-enter the forest. It was nice being out of the constant shade for a while, though with the cloud cover it wasn't really much warmer out in the clearing than in the woods. "Who knows... Maybe the the the bear is a sign that we've moved far enough to to to the North and need to change direction anyways... Or I I I could be reading into it too much."
Erika nods, musing on this: "...if we are coming from South, we should really hit the dryer, non-forested patches first."
Cavro shudders a bit at the word. "If is is is a bit scary sometimes, hm? But I I I don't know... I suppose that Froge fellow said he lived in a a a swamp South of the desert, didn't he?"
Erika nods, thinking: "Y-yeah... it's hard to say how far we are. Stars are good for direction but less so for distance when walking in forest."
Cavro nods, thinking for a moment. "And we we we can't really use them during the day to to to make sure we're not going in circles... And can't walk the the the forest at night because that's too dangerous."
Erika sighs, nodding as they circle far enough on the hill to be out of sight and scent for the bear: "Pretty much... doing my best, but if we survive this I'm going to take an extra reading on wayfinding..."
Cavro: "When we get back, you can can can write a manuscript on it. We we we can start working on the foreword now. 'This all started when I had sex with a badger and and and woke up in the middle of a a a forest'."
Erika lets out a rather unladylike snort-giggle at that, nearly stumbling in her steps: "C-cavro!"
Cavro chuckles, but continues. "And 'I don't think the the the two are connected, but just to to to be safe, don't ruffle the badgers'."
Erika laughs, waving her hand at Cavro: "I can think of one badger I'm tempted to ruffle some."
Cavro blushes, pausing in his teasing, and looking ahead of them again. "S-sorry, I I I'm being a bit too silly."
Erika sticks her tongue at him, smiling: "Maybe a bit. Let's just focus on getting home."
Cavro nods, smiling at Erika and moving to follow her lead again as they continue hopefully making progress toward home. Or maybe not? Who is to know?