ORIGIN

She followed the sound of rushing water, a hand on the wall and her ears lifted high. Eurydome's eyes could adjust to the dark easily-- most of the gladiator's life had been spent in Orion, after all --but when it came to the mist that shrouded Cetus, she was at a loss. It was easiest to rely on other senses; her hearing, her sense of smell, and like, whatever the other two were, instead of her sight. She could barely see in front of her and what little that she could were just distant, high trees she had no particular interest in.

The amethyst blade sat on her shoulder glinted in the low light, and she held it a little more tighter than she would have liked. Something about Cetus set her on edge; the way her paws slowly squelch, squelch, squleched through the marsh and the crooning of distant insects inspired something more primal in her gut. Not fear-- never fear --but certainly the wary sense that an attack might come from the mists and she wouldn't be able to see it.

Cetus had no audience; no prying eyes or roaring crowd. Any fight here would be for the hunt; for food or for survival. While Eurydome had little intentions of either, it didn't mean that someone else out there wouldn't take offense to her presence. Compeition in the hunt for food, a trespasser to dens-- it didn't matter in the long run. The best that Eurydome could do was be quiet and be quick, and once this realisation dawned on her, her amaranthine limbs began to pick up the pace.

Squelch-squelch-squelch-squelch-squelch-- SPLASH

The swampy ground under her paws simply stopped, it dove down into the murk and left nothing but an abruptly deep pool of acrid water for her to tumble into. So much for being quiet-- a sharp 'ARGH' left her chest as she fell in, and combined with the splash, it startled a flock of black birds on the nearby tree-tops.

Eurydome's head lifted, an unpleasant, bitter taste in her mouth-- thick mane sticking to the sides of her face, gold-plated scars drowned in mud, and listened to the distant fltfltfltfltflt of Callers far above. The gladiator pried her sword from her shoulder and began to stumble back onto mostly-solid ground again, sharpened teeth gritting.

Now, she'd have to prepare for the worst and hold her ground if something decided to come inspecting what had startled the birds-- and maybe a good tussle would help her dismiss the embarassment flushing her cheeks.

Her breathing was shallow. She hadn't allowed herself to settle-- especially when an unfamiliar voice called out, but she didn't make the first move to attack. She was defensive instead; she faced the creature and the blade twisted diagonally over her torso, muddy limbs turning in a pivot and half-slipping in the marsh. This was no smooth, dusty arena-- Eurydome had a long streak of disadvantages here, but they were opportunities that this stranger had either missed or were ignoring completely.

"No," the gladiator said, her voice rough, but the blade lowered slowly-- a silent indication that she wasn't going to strike first. This thing with magic wings and horns seemed familiar in some distant way, as though someone had told her about it some time long ago and she, in turn, had not bothered to listen. "I'm fine. ... thank you."

At least she could remember manners, and as a few beats passed, still with no combat, Eurydome heaved the sword back onto its spot on her shoulder and began to roughly shake out her lower body. A good amount of mud went flying; but the majority remained, clinging like leeches to her thick hide.

"Are you the Master here?" She asked tentatively, because you can never be too sure. "I do not mean to disturb your work here."

Another slight shake, but this time it yielded no results. Half-irritated by the sensation of her coat being weighed down, a powerful hind leg lifted and began raking great sheets of mud from her striped haunches. "--I'm Eurydome," she offered mid-scritch.

Dragon laughed and Eurydome went stiff with brief alarm-- alarm that lingered until she realised what that strange gesture in combination with the bellow was, to which her pale eyes blinked a few times. It might be a little funny to be asked if you were a Master mostly out of the blue, but it was a reasonable question from where she was standing.

Still, Dragon (and he was definitely no Raheerah) showed no aggression, and that was more than Eurydome could have asked for. She listened with her oversized, damp ears twitching carefully. She'd never been to Cetus, but she knew it from the mere identifier of Aquarian.

She had pictured it being... nicer.

"It's, uhh, a nice home," she lied anyway, because telling someone their house smells like shit and looks like shit to their face was considered rude in most cultures. "I didn't really intend to stay for long, but it's nice to be accomodated."

It was... very nice, actually. Vaknornol had offered nothing but a fight and the others seemed just as unhelpful-- granted, they didn't know that she'd just woke up out of a five thousand year long power nap, but it would still have been nice for someone to at least go 'hey, what's up, just about everything as you knew it is different now.'

The oversized paw plopped back into the mud with a muted splash. "What do you want in return?" she asked-- good-naturedly, though distinctly business-like. Who was just nice for free, anyway? "I can catch some prey to feed you or your Master, if you'd like."

She shook a little, unsatisfied with the extraction results. "You, uhh, got anywhere drier to stand around?"

Eurydome hadn't known anyone to pass up a free meal before-- and although Dragon didn't directly say yes or no, she felt as though he were almost avoiding the question. Her great limbs began to bring her south where the alligator had pointed-- at a slower pace, noting Dragon's shortish limbs and assuming he was also slow.

"I've only eaten fish a few times, always raw," she said as she went splashing through the mud, undoing all progress she had done in cleaning her fur. "I'm faster than deer," the gladiator boasted with a good-natured grin splitting her face-- perhaps unaware that the thick, gold-plated scars draping her shoulders and haunches might suggest otherwise. "Have you ever eaten deer hot? Do you wanna try it?"

The mention of spiders had Eurydome making a sharp turn, heading towards the treelines instead. She would not be dealing with that shit today-- not if she had any say in the matter. "From what I've heard of your Master I don't think he'd, uh, really discriminate between what is and isn't food," she offered-- not unkindly, but matter-of-factly. There must have been thousands of gembound who met their end in those jaws.

Not that Eurydome judged. You gotta eat what you gotta eat. If people were dumb enough to get eaten, that was their problem.

The centaur came to the beginning of the Grove and unsheathed her claws, gripping the great roots and pulling herself up. She settled, her belly on the dry (okay, DAMP) root and her legs dangling close to the surface of the water. The humanoid half of her wriggled briefly; twisting and then offering a scarred hand down towards Dragon to offer to pull him up onto the roots, too, if he wanted.

Her paws flexed, toes spreading and joints clicking. Better.

"What do you do?" Eurydome asked, adding with a little more humour-- "Did Aquarian make you just to feed him?"

It should be noted that Eurydome didn't care about getting bitten-- she had no idea how powerful Dragon's jaws were, that he could quite easily tear off her limbs --but she didn't pry the situation nor did she try to touch Dragon without his permission. She leant back against the tree-trunk and watched the alligator slowly ascend.

"Not bad," she said. "I didn't take you as a climber." He was slow, sure-- if he tried to pull that off in the arena he would be torn apart in seconds, but anyone with a limp and ungodly amount of bulk being able to slither up onto the roots was a good climber in her books.

Her arms stretched idly up behind her, listening. She hadn't met Aquarian-- only heard stories involving the little sprite Nemean leading gembound into his maw for fun. She hadn't ever imagined him as particularly... active, however. It didn't seem like he did anything but act as a glorified garbage disposal. "What kind of wisdom does he have?" Eurydome asked with some lingering amusement.

"I live in Orion," the gladiator went on, and there was a little bristle of pride as she went on. "I was created for the Arena. Entertained all kinds of Masters and Overseers and even Hands, you wouldn't believe." She was bragging, but it wasn't entirely over-exaggerated. Even beyond the boasting her passion was clear -- Eurydome loved being released into the coliseum. She adored every eye, every cheer, every splatter of blood.

And maybe that brief glimpse of passion is why she suddenly seemed to deflate with her next sentence. "It's very quiet, now," she said. "Before I fell asleep-- before the dark --there was so much life here. Now it's just... empty."

A long huff left the gladiator's chest, and one massive forelimb slowly folded over the other on top of the root, tail lazily flapping at the surface of the murky water. Then, she was moving on-- continuing conversation, and all that.

"Sounds like you're being trained for the Trials," she offered. She would have loved to go-- running in the desert, surviving, fighting-- what more could you want? "Have you been taken into Hydra yet?"