Log Date: 9/16/97 Log Cast: Aureole, Briarcatch Log Intro: With the aid of Doreel's trollish Helpers, as well as the soul of the slain Wolfrider Thicket now lodged within her skull, Aureole has escaped the confines of Doreel's grove at last. Found by Slate, an elf once enamored of Thicket, she has managed to return to her home tribe at last... and to the arms of her lifemate Briarcatch, who had been frantic with grief during the span of time in which she'd disappeared. Finding his familiar face and voice and arms more comforting than she can possibly express, Ree retreats with him to the shelter of his cave in the canyons, and struggles to regain a sense of her proper place now that she has been reunited with her mate.... ---------- It _is_ her, there can be no doubt of that now. Ree's scent... Ree's voice... Ree's body. But it's a strangely solemn Ree who, once she has drawn you into the shelter of this cave, wraps her arms around you tightly, buries her face against your shoulder, and whispers huskily, "Sorry... so sorry...." Scent is not as important to Briarcatch as it is to you, but, the faint trace he catches is still a world of reassureance. Your voice, your warmth, and real, not imagined, in his arms. His embrace is likewise tight, not painful. "Sorry means you have something to apologize for.. you don't need to apologize. Not now, Ree. Not any more. Not ever." She looks up, blue eyes pained, strained, her face a scant few breaths away from yours as she drinks in your features. "Gone too long," she says lowly, gruffly. "Must have hurt you..." Briarcatch smiles one-sidedly; a smile that doesn't yet touch his own blue eyes. Uncertainty still lingers there. "You -were- gone too long," he agrees quietly. One thumb brushes over your cheek, as the hand cups your face. "Too much time doesn't hurt any worse than a little time, though. It's not -time- that hurts, Ree. It's .. thinking. Wondering. I don't have to do that, not any more." "How long?" Ree asks, still speaking aloud, her voice uncharacteristically rough, her words more terse than Ree's words usually are. Her eyes are still hers, though, blue and liquid under her disheveled mop of star-pale hair. Strange -- thinner than she should be, and paler, she looks more like her mother. Briarcatch's brow furrows. "How.. High Ones. A lifetime," he answers, "and then a few more on top of that one." He takes a breath, and answers again, "Turns. Half a hand's worth. Seasons, and days and.. a lifetime." Aureole lifts her hands to cup your face, and her hands, too, are hers and not hers... thinner than they used to be, her touch bemused as she runs her fingertips along your features, almost as if reminding herself of what you look like. "Didn't know," she whispers. "I was hurt...." Briarcatch smiles lopsidedly again, suddenly, and his gaze drops. "I hoped you were. Hurt." He shakes his head, and lifts his gaze again, to explain, "I hoped you were hurt, and that you'd come back. That I hadn't lost you. The twisterwind.. and it was so long." The smile disappears. "I had to let you go." Those liquid eyes turn more liquid, and Ree breathes out hoarsely, "I... I-I _was_ gone... I couldn't remember...." She throws herself against your shoulder again, and now, Ree, brave young huntress Ree, is trembling like a leaf in... well, a twistwind. Briarcatch's arms tighten around you, automatically, and he murmurs into your ear, "Shh, now, Ree. You remember now, don't you? You're here now. You're all right. We're both all right. You're here, that's what counts." "You don't understand," Ree breathes out. "Changed. I... changed..." Briarcatch looks at you for a moment. Aureole(#769POUXcey) Standing at about 4'4" in height, this young elf-maid has a huntress's rangy build to her, though on the thin side, as though she might have gone through a recent long period of illness or deprivation. Her golden tan, just a shade too sallow, speaks of the same, and the periodic distant, fey looks that come into her eyes -- wide, twilight-colored eyes, flecked with tiny bits of silver like stars and set at a lupine slant in her face -- suggest that something must have marked her deeply. For those who look closely enough at her, a glimpse of what that something must have been might, just _might_, be seen in her shaggy, hip-length mop of hair -- for among the otherwise silver-white strands, in translucent, barely detectable shimmers like fragments of rainbow caught in a cloud, are glints of colors that surely don't naturally belong there... pink, purple, blue, and green. Briarcatch pulls away enough to study -- really study -- your face. Features. "Changed? How? You're still Aureole, aren't you?" It _is_ her face, even if it is too thin and too pale. She swallows hard, her gaze half-distant, her expression reflecting some sort of internal struggle. "I had... dreams.... strange dreams..." And as she utters that latter word, her features shift slightly, at least for a fraction of an instant: her mouth slackens, softens. Her eyes go almost vacant. But the moment passes as quickly as it came, as she shakes her head violently, as if trying to clear it. "And... _she_ got me out... out of the Dream. Yes." Briarcatch frowns once more. "Ree..?" Concern creeps into his expression, and he brushes his thumb over your cheek again, more as encouragement to come back to the present, than an affectionate caress. "She? She who?" Blue eyes blink a few times, and Ree looks fully at you again, before telling you gruffly, "Slate says she's Thicket." Briarcatch blinks in response. Then he nods. "Thicket, then. She woke you up." Slowly, she nods, making the heavy lock of hair hanging over one eye bob a little. Her hair is longer than you'd last seen, as unbound and unkempt as Ree's hair ever is, only with more of it. "Out of the Dream," Ree agrees. "Came... with... me." Her brow furrows; this seems to trouble her. Briarcatch brushes that lock of hair away from your eye, carefully. Smooths it back, for the brief instant it stays smoothed, and returns to meeting you eye to eye. Once more, he smiles a quick, one-sided smile. "I'll have to thank her, when I see her." Ree's head quirks, then, just a slight bit to one side. "She... knows," the maiden mumbles, and her voice grows gruffer, her eyes changing ever so slightly again. "Had to do. To help cub." Briarcatch blinks twice and withdraws further. "Ree?" Abruptly, Aureole shivers, rubbing the back of one thin hand across her eyes, as she mumbles, "Thicket's dead..." Thicket's dead? Before or, er, after she woke Ree up. Thoughts, that's all they are. Unspoken questions, thoughts. Briarcatch doesn't ask, though his unease doesn't dissipate at all. "I'm sorry. Ree." Slowly, bemusedly, the maiden nods, pressing close against her lifemate's shoulder and murmuring, "Killed... in the Dream. DreamShaper was angry. So she had to get me out, then..." Briarcatch reaches over to lay a hand against her forehead, testing for heat. "It was just a dream then, Ree. I'm sure she's fine.. Were you feversick?" He asks, changing the subject. Her brow is cool, but all the same, her eyes retain that half-distance. The question, though, seems to confuse her. "Ill?" she echoes. "I... don't think so... at least, not after DreamShaper healed..." Briarcatch lets his hand drop away from her forehead, though he frowns, more noticably now. "You're not warm. Not sick now, Ree. So what's wrong?" he asks, almost a whisper, and turns to face her properly. Touches her cheek, and then her shoulder. "Aureole, look at me." She lifts her head obediently -- the motion strangely languid for her. Briarcatch's frown doesn't fade at all. "Are you hungry? Tired?" "No..." She shakes her head, her brow furrowing slightly under her shaggy bangs -- longer than they used to be, they hang down almost obscuring one of her blue eyes. Briarcatch brushes that hair back once more, for as long as it will stay back. Even makes an attempt at tucking it behind one of her ears. He searches her eyes, then takes a breath. "Did something hit you in the head, you think?" Ree's hair clings to the fingers that brush through it, springily, fine and light for all its thickness. A few individual strands feel as soft and fine as flower petals, before Briarcatch's palm smooths them down. And Ree, her eyes focused on the other elf, considers his question, a small frown curling her mouth. "Yes," she says after a few moments. "I got... hit. In the twistwind." Briarcatch says "But the.. whoever. The DreamShaper? He didn't fix it. Heal it." Aureole's eyes begin to darken, and she looks away slightly, her frown deepening. "He... was supposed to heal me, yes... help me remember who I was..." Briarcatch's voice is urgent, a little sharp. "Ree? Don't look away. Please? Don't.. go wherever it is you go, when you look away. Please." That startles her. She jerks her gaze back to his, dismay flickering through her expression. "Briarcatch...?" Briarcatch smiles faintly. "I just don't want to lose you again, that's all." Aureole swallows. "Was gone a very long time," she whispers. Briarcatch shakes his head a little. "Doesn't matter how long you were gone, now that you're back. If you're still hurt, we'll find a way to make it better. Just stay with me." "You're... gonna keep me out of the Dream?" Briarcatch says "Is that where you go? Yes, Ree. I'll keep you out of the Dream, if it'll keep you here." Aureole swallows again, a slight flutter of movement along her throat. There, too, she looks subtly different, more delicate somehow, as though something of the substance had been leeched out of her. "Can still feel it..." Briarcatch reaches down for one of her hands, and lifts it, placing it against his chest, over his heart, which pounds. "Feel that. That's my heart, a -real- heartbeat. I'm not a dream." Aureole draws in a breath... indeed, feeling the subtle throb beneath his living flesh. She shivers a little, then sends, for the first time since she'd put out that tentative call that alerted the canyon to her presence: ** Yes... not a dream... ** It's quick movement, maybe even a little fierce, the gestures that end with his arms wrapped tightly around her, and his nose buried in that mop of fine hair, eyes closed. His send echoes the physical: a protective shield, a possessive embrace. Her scent lingers richly in her hair... her familiar scent. But even that is subtly different, a trifle lighter, a trifle sweeter, as though she'd crushed flower blossoms and rubbed them all throughout that thick white mop. As her mind brushes Briarcatch's, there's a whiff there for the briefest instant, too, as of a breeze drifting across a cluster of blooms and leaves. Then it passes, and there is only Ree sending, ** // ** [The scene was never finished... and, accordingly, end log.]