Nothin' Doing

[Carhilwen]

Zephyr held his ears still, bringing the thin, delicate chains to a halt, the few pendants still swinging noiselessly. His pale blue tongue flickered out between his thin lips, hesitated, then retreated back into his mouth. Even his tail stopped swaying behind him, the light colored tuft resting just above the cold ground. His blind eyes moved slowly about, roving over the forest he couldn't see but knew was there, then stopped, focusing on a deer a couple meters away.

The creature's dainty hooves moved about the dead leaves almost silently, but Zephyr's sharpened ears could pick up the slightest movement, breath and heartbeat of the deer. The Alyce took another half step forward, extending his web of energy another meter or so outwards. A soft, exerted sigh escaped between his lips as he felt his own energy dissipate At the noise, the deer, he now recognized the scent as that of a doe, froze in place, the muscles in her legs bunching as she prepared to bolt. Her tail flickered against her white fur, her black eyes still wide as she dipped her head back down to continue eating.

Zephyr crouched even lower. He was hungry, but he knew that he wouldn't be able to kill the doe, especially not after having sat and watched her for the past hour. He shook his head slightly, fighting down the animalistic urges that his Alyce form still held. The bloodlust he had inherited from his parents still haunted him, even n his human form.

[fayden]

Arelia smirked as she glanced about, breathing in the slightly cleaner air around her; she was going to go visit the forest! Her eyes flickered around happily, and she nodded as a squirrel danced around a tree in spiraling circles. "Good, good!", she exclaimed after a few moments of examining from afar the general state of the forest. There seemed to be a few dead trees on the closest side to the city, but otherwise the vegetation was verdant, as it should be. A bit of light was filtering through the canopy of green above her; the forest may as well have been in an endless night for all the things she could see, or lack of thereof. Her breathing echoed slightly in the silence, and in the corner of her eye she could see something moving... but what?

[Carhilwen]

At the hints of another being in the forest, the doe ran, tucking her thin legs under her plump body with each bounding leap in her flight of escape. Zephyr frowned and stood upright, looking over his shoulder while he took the strings of energy he had extended back close to his form. As far as his sense of smell told him, the girl (he could tell that much) was far off, just near the edge of the woods while he was nearly halfway in.

His frown darkened, his eyebrows dipping even lower. He knew that in colder weather scents were compressed, meaning the source could be considerably closer then what he thought. Zephyr shook his head, some of his white bangs spilling out over one of his long ears as he carefully set out a series of spikes of energy around his form.

If someone was there, he would be ready.

[fayden]

Arelia frolicked about happily, nearly coughing in the sharp, bitter, and completely clean air, and only stopped when she felt some sort of ominous disturbance in the air. "What the-", she started, before sending out a quick, weak impulse of (what were they called again, arcatrons? Something of the sort...) magical energy, or whatever it was termed, from her slight form; whatever sort of abjuration or ritual had happened to her to make her this way, she could both sense and shape magic to her own will. True, she reasoned, it couldn't possibly be an outer malicious force, or even an outer benevolent force, because then Fay and her would most likely be dead, but... the rest held true, apparently.

But she digressed.

Fifteen seconds later she had inched a few feet closer to the thing irradiating the disturbance, which she had concluded was just some sort of energy, but was still highly wary of it. Finally taking a chance, she parted her lips and whispered, "Would the person in the forest please come forward?" It was a great risk she was taking, indeed, she mused, and she possibly might not come out alive. Yet she was willing to take it; had she gone insane since she had met him? Probably.

Why was she thinking of him even now?

Quietly she muttered something about foolish people and walked up a few steps.

[Carhilwen]

Zephyr's expression lightened at the sound of a female voice; she didn't sound malicious, she sounded genuinely curious, and cautious. He rose slowly, letting his energy ebb away to the usual 6-foot sphere around him. The Alyce would rather figure out what the girl's intentions were before doing anything else, especially anything that could invoke an attack since he was in no mood to fight.

"Who's there?" He called back softly, moving out from around the tree he had been leaning against. His ears were perked, twitching with each slight sound from the other's movements. His tail moved slightly, his entire form loosened, but still ready in case of... Anything, really.

"I'm not going to harm you," The dark haired male smiled slightly, moving towards where he could sense the others magic presence.

[fayden]

Arelia jumped at the sound of someone's voice, reverberating slightly through the dank woods, and at hearing footsteps coming steadily closer emitted out a sharp yelp and took off in a direction unfortunately going directly through the other one's path. Her completely horror-striken face reflected the panic attack she was having; the whole situation might have been comical, but it was not. She, surprisingly, registered the retraction of the energy apparently emanating from the one who had answered, but she took it as an insurer of the supposed fact that he (she had deduced that it was a male who had answered) was out to kill her; she was to either run or die. Of course, she could also try to fight back, but that would most likely end in the latter anyway. Then it hit Arelia.

No one's out to get you! Why are you being so paranoid?!

True, this was a forest, but whatever had flashed in her head had somehow multiplied her (already-low) self-esteem by 0.2. On the other hand it seemed to have boosted her supposed 'bravery' by quite a bit; she quickly resolved to 'attempt a bit of suicide', as Fayden would have put it succinctly.

That idiot. He would have probably killed her if she had tried to ad-lib things for him.

Mid-stride she span on her heel and started to amble towards the area accounting for the speaking; if the male had moved away, so much the better for her. If he was still there, she would probably try to make peace or something just as cheesy and predictable of her, and if anti-belligerence policies didn't work out...

There were always spells to lean on, right?

[Carhilwen]

Zephyr rose one eyebrow in a delicate arch as he heard the girl turn and walk away before pausing for a half second, then coming back towards him. He carefully let a tentatively friendly smile settle onto his pale features, careful to not let any of his fangs show. He mused to himself that she seemed indecisive rather then timid, since she was heading back towards him...

'She could be coming to attack me...' His expression hardened a bit as he thought to himself, then dismissed the thought with a shake of his head. 'If she was, I'm sure she'd be trying harder to be quiet...' He moved into the barely there path, and let his form loosen to the point what he hoped was non-confrontational, but he still kept his guard up, just in case.

[fayden]

Arelia actually emitted a soft squeak of fright as she saw who was speaking to her; he seemed to be human, but she had learned not to trust appearances alone. He was grinning at her, but whether as an assuring gesture or as to attempt to placate her to let her guard down to...

Well, no sane male would want her anyway, she noted wryly. She was, at the very least, sure of that.

She furtively glanced around, then sidled up a few meters towards the person, trying to look as defensive yet also trusting as well, an arduous task she failed miserably and wholly at, merely looking ridiculous and slightly injured, what with the slight limp in her left leg and the grimace on her face.

"Well, how are you today, sir?", she managed darkly, glancing every so often at the trees. One had nearly fallen down, and she was sure a few thistle bushes had grown in the crevice, though she was not sure; the enclave wasn't lighted fully, to understate it remarkably. Moss was flourishing amongst the decaying remains of another such tree; a rabbit pranced happily along the forest, dancing in and out of the light, and occasionally stopping to gnaw on some oddly colored blades of grass. She swiveled her head and affixed her attention on it for a few seconds, then turned back, staring at anything but the person a few rod-lengths in front of her.