Her eyes were very deadpan and not at all impressed at his funny trick of making noise with the rock. That was not at allwhat she wanted, and the thing knew it and was being so incredibly silly that she was in the mind to just walk away. If she could manage more than a few steps in any direction, she surely would've tried. That grin it made only made it all worse!

Utterly ridiculous thing! Silly! Annoying! Ughh! Ohh, there was a word to better describe it, and it was on the tip of her tongue...

Ah, yes. Cocky.

And what the thing did with the feet, that was just so very different and rather weird; why would the thing want to nibble on its feet? Wouldn't that tickle? It didn't seem to be laughing. Maybe it couldn't laugh? Maybe if it came from the damp-smelling place that she would surely walk away to find any second now, it naturally couldn't laugh. She noted to herself to try to laugh if she was ever damp.

Well, there was only one way to find out if it could or couldn't, and it was just by happy coincidence that it coincided with exactly how she felt. She pouted, then stuck out her tongue at him in her indignation.

So there!

What was that supposed to mean? He knit his brow and flicked his tail much in the way of a perplexed kitten... Though really it was difficult to say whether he was grumpy puppy or merely tsundere in nature as the encounter progressed.

Perhaps he was both. He did have to come out of his home for all this, and his home was most completely and thoroughly broken in the process. Having yet found anywhere quite as nice as it had been in his home why shouldn't he be grumpy? It was cold and wet and dark and weird out here, and uncomfortable. For the most part.

And -

He felt something move in his stomach, some lump that bumbled around and emitted noise periodically ever since he began to walk around. While not completely certain he believed that phenomena to be a 'growling stomach' and its cause 'hunger'. Not that he ever had to eat, let alone find food before! What was food?

He eyed the she curiously.

Was she food?

He wasn't certain if eating someone that looked like oneself was bad or not, but he was quite certain that she probably did not want to be eaten… which meant in all likelihood she would create quite a fuss if he tried to eat her. Hmmm.

Saudade drew himself a conclusion.

It was a bad idea to eat she. Currently, anyway.

He made a note to revisit that decision in the future.

Yet as he glanced back in her direction he noticed something peculiar about her eye. It wasn't like the other one at all, it was much shinier and...

Ah. It glowed. Was that what allowed her to bring the light? Did he need one, too?

"Hmmm..." He murmured, unaccustomed to the use of his vocal chords. He had lived in silence and solitude so long that forming words seemed like such a strenuous endeavor! But if he asked, would she give him that thing? The thing that let her make things bright?

Glancing over his shoulder he finally noticed the remnants of the rock that gave way to the girl. Rising (a little more confidently than her, but not by much) he strolled towards the shards and then glanced between the fragments and her face, particularly her eye.

His expression was suggestive: 'Yours?' He asked with arched brows.

She didn't much like the look the thing was giving her, especially after the thing fell flat on its butt. The look was gleaming unfiltered wanting, staring intensely at her unseeing eye.

Did it want her light-making eye?
Well.
Now the thing was just entirely made of silliness, in her opinion.
Even if she could give it to the thing, the thought made her incredible uncomfortable, like the thought of pulling out one of her hooves and handing it over, and she didn't think she could bear to be without it. She didn't want to be afraid again.

Maybe she could use the thread she used earlier...maybe she could make his eye all bright and light-making too. Would it like that? Or would it find it tiresome to have to turn its head slightly to see everything like she did? Maybe he could make the far away damp place bright so she could see it, she would like that very much.

Its slinky movement snapped her out of her thoughts, and she watched it walk over to her now shattered shell. She looked at it, mulling briefly over what she had lost, and watched her dim glow play on the pretty reflections of the inside of the shell.

Yours? It asked, looking straight at her.

She paused, then made a quiet, sad sound. "Yes."

She knew she could never go back, the shattered remains and the tight pressure that she felt non-withstanding. She just knew too much now, and she knew that even if given the chance, it wouldn't be the same. She would just be thinking of all the things she had seen outside her dreams.

Tears welled up. But that didn't mean that she didn't miss the whispers, the gentle guide, the warmth, the mystery, and the utter sense of protection. She sniffed.

He stared intently at the pieces, thinking to himself that this might be his chance. Perhaps he would not need her eye if he could have a piece of what once was hers...

But when he looked back to her he realized something. The quiet omittance from before - did he not notice the melancholy attached to it? He suddenly felt very foolish for not noticing her despair. She was sad and he could see it on ever inch of her face and form. How could he not have seen it before? Did she miss her home?

He looked back to the shards, quickly thinking. He had been displeased when his home was lost, too, but had he been so upset? No, the Wolf-that-was-not-a-Wolf had been there. It had been good not to be left alone, and perhaps that was all the little glowing thing needed to not be so sad.

Saudade had been so involved in his own throes of greatness that he hadn't bothered to think of... Well, of her.

So he returned to her then, walking back to her and placed a forelimb across he shoulder. To steady himself, of course, and to make certain she couldn't run (Hahaha - as if she could run) away and began to lick at her eyes and her nose and nibble on her ears.

I rather you laugh, he thought to himself, but more than that... when one was hurt, one licked them. It was just something he knew.

She snuffled and sniffed, her tiny shoulder pushed down from the weight of the things foot, the loss of her whispers like a gaping hole in her chest. It was a piece of her that was missing, and it was so wrong, but...when her ear twitched again and the thing's slobbery tongue went over her eyes, making them not at all any drier, she couldn't help but be somewhat cheered up by it. It was like the thing cared, and the thing was the very first thing she had ever met, and it was wonderful.

The thing was cocky and smart-alecky and considerate and intense, and incredibly comforting. She was half sobbing and half laughing before she knew it, licking his nose and smothering her head in its chest.

"T-thhhhh-" She sounded, feeling out the word. "Thhhaaan-thnk-thank. Th...thanks."

She smiled up at the thing, sniffed one more time, feeling much better than before. She felt very warm.

Then she stepped away (slowly of course, she didn't like falling. Falling ranked somewhere on her 'do not like' list in between fear and sad.) and over the shards. She really wanted to find that damp smell, preferably with the thing. For some reason it meant a lot to her, and if she could see it, then--

A sudden dip, like she missed a step, and an icy sensation gripped her hoof, making her bleat sharply. It was cold cold cold cold! She scrambled back, tangling her legs and thumping onto the ground. Her hoof was wet? Looking carefully at where she had just stepped, all she saw was a inky reflective surface, like her shell, and when she craned her neck to look at it, the ripples in the inky flat thing smoothed out and she saw a deer with a shiny eye looking back at her.

"Ahh! A thing!" She looked back to the furry thing behind her, and motioned to the inky thing. "Lll-look!"

Perhaps... He wasn't able to make light. Maybe all he could do was make things dark, but...

He eyed the pieces left from her home, a thought becoming firmly planted in his mind. He imagined it very clearly, able to form in his mind's eye what he wished... what he wished would happen at the end of it. But he couldn't possibly make it happen. And it might end up worse, like before.

Unable to tear his eyes completely away from the fragments of citrine that glowed faintly in the dim lighting, he merely turned a large ear in the direction she moved. A frown returned to his young features, a rather solemn look settling into his eye as a seriousness came over the little boy.

I wonder...

He was drawn out of the thought by her startled cries, his natural response the swiveling of ears, the raising of hackles and the stiffness of his physique - a response to danger, surely, and the first time he had ever reacted to any stimuli in such a way. And to think his aggressive reaction was not even on his own behalf!

Concerned, he walked over carefully, puffing himself up unconsciously towards whatever had garnered the she's attention.

"Hmmm?" He looked from her to the place she had been, taking a moment to sniff her feet and nudge her gangly limbs, licking the moisture that was left clinging to a hoof. She was not harmed, it seemed. Saudade then approached the 'thing' skeptically at her behest. When he stepped before the rim of the pool he saw...

"Who are you?"

It might very well have been the first sentence he had spoken, but it was the one the Behrdwoof had asked him when he was born and the most appropriate question for new faces he knew. Staring at the entity in the water Saudade waited for a response. Peering into the depths he couldn't help but be perplexed when it did not immediately reply. The shadows were a bit deep but that face seemed...

The thing did not reply and it seemed unwise to turn ones back on it. He didn't trust that face (such irony!) and instead flicked an ear towards the pile of milky white - the one dubbed she - that had ventured to the lip of this pool first. Had she seen this face? Is this what startled her?

"Wolf?" He asked it. It was silent. He tilted his head, and it tilted its. "You has eahrs. You hear with you eahrs." He phrased, citing the knowledge with conviction. Even if he didn't see the ears - which he very much did - he knew the other had them. Sometimes things were hidden but that didn't make them any less there.

… Like she when he thought he wished her away.

After the thing hurried over and made sure she was okay, the thing asked a lot of questions, and as she watched, another thing that looked so incredibly similar to the thing in the inky thing--

This was making her head spin! There were just too many things that didn't have names!

Maybe the first thing could called...friend? That sounded right. The friend peered into the ink to look at what she was so startled by, and when it did, a similar furry thing that looked eerily similar to the friend appeared in the ink. The friend called the new thing a wolf, but the new thing didn't reply....so wolf it was!

She looked between the wolf and the friend, and looked at the similar features. Same red fur, same long nose, same teeth, same colored eyes. When the friend's ears moved, so did the wolf in the ink. Head movements, snarling, intense staring, anything the friend did, the wolf did too. It was incredibly eerie, and fascinating at the same time!

Maybe when the friend left this damp ink to come and meet her, he left the wolf behind? That would explain why the wolf mirrored him so exactly.

She looked to the glowing thing that did the same for her. Did she leave this part of herself behind too, when she left her shell?

"....Me." She said, in awe. "This me. That you. Wolf."

What they were seeing was what they had left behind.

Had his eyes the ability then surely the face in the water would have been turned to ash and dust. He peered at it with needle eyes, his concentrated intensity enough to burn living creatures to oblivion.

His eyes flickering over to her reflection when he saw it, glancing between her and the mirror that resembled her perfectly. He hid his confusion in his silence... And he listened to her.

That you. Wolf.

Saudade reached out to touch the wolf he saw, a troubled look surfacing in both his and his reflection's guise. "Is that you, wolf?" He echoed her question quietly, whispering, his touch disturbing the surface of the water and causing his image to wander. His paw felt wet.

He stepped into the pool, feeling the water crawl up his legs. It was cold and he swallowed a shiver that would have came otherwise. He felt soft dirt and pebbles under his paws...

"I..." want to give you something. he thought to himself. As an apology? No... As something to be remembered by.

Glancing over his shoulder at the she, his gaze flickered to the pebbles and crystals beneath the water. So smooth... Dipping his skull into the dark fluid he scooped a pebble into his mouth. He felt it on his tongue…

And he thought, feeling a warmth in his belly...

// roll

He thought about being alone. Truly alone and though he wasn't afraid of it, he imagined what if he was and why he might. He imagined despair and loneliness, the feelings of never ever finding ones way.

And the light in his belly dimmed - that wasn't the right feeling.

So instead he glanced again at her. Thinking.

He thought about the warmth of her nose, the softness, the tenderness. He thought about her sadness and his desire to stave it. He thought about her fear of the dark - he thought, now, that that might be her reason for latching on to him. And he realized two things. One, that he was not afraid of shadows.

And two...

Opening his mouth he revealed a lovely little bauble produced from a gem on his tongue. It glowed sweetly, like a dainty star he had caught and cradled now.

He could make light, too. Sometimes. Maybe.

Returning to the waters edge he hopped onto the dry rim, the water dripping from his thin, willowy body. He looked darker in color and more skeleton-like after his dip. Before his fur had filled him, now he was all bone.

He dropped the light-stone on the rock floor.

And then he nudged it to her, cracking a smile more tired than not. Easing to his haunches (still wet as he was) he slipped to the floor, too tired to bother anymore.

She went shock still when the friend went into the water, frozen, eyes wide. Her mouth opened a little when it turned to her, and its look was so, so utterly lost, and it made her chest clench. She was going to say something, but the thought died in its conception, like a withered seed in the ground.

Did she cause the friend to feel that way? Did she say something wrong? Or was it thinking of the piece that was missing? She felt that emptiness, felt it strongly. Did it feel that too?

"Aah-!" She rushed forward when it dipped its head into the inkiness, like it was trying to get the piece back. Her legs flailed and rushed into the water, splashing like mad, but before she could reach it, it raised its head.

It looked straight at her, its pretty eyes searching her face, like there was an answer there. She wanted to help it, wanted nothing more. The friend had been there for her when it was dark, was there when she came away from her shell, when she was sad, frightened, and alone, making her feel better, comforting her, making her laugh. The friend made her unafraid.

Then it opened its mouth and produced a glorious, tiny little light, and she could see the quiet pride in its eyes from creating it. She couldn't speak, for the clenching moved from her chest to her throat, making her breathless, and she felt like she shared that pride and wonder with it. The friend could make light just like she could, and she had never felt so....she found it hard to describe what she felt.

She followed it to shore. This happiness was different than with the dreams, the sweet whispers. That kind was calm and all embracing warmth, like....like nuzzling against the friend. This kind flooded her whole being, all her limbs, her head, and her lungs, with a bristling excitement she could barely contain. It was like a intake of air that was made with everything she had.

The friend dropped the little beauty onto the rock floor, and it went tink tink. It looked like a big sopping mess, but entirely too tired to care, and when it smiled at her, she smiled back, her emotions shining clearly on her face. She received the nudged gift and picked it up with her mouth too, like the friend did, and went over when it thumped wetly onto the ground.

With all the love she could muster, she nestled next to the friend as close as she could, for she was only wet up to the shoulders, and she could already feel the friend start to shiver. She very very gently licked its soaked cheeks, nose, and chin, then put the little beauty in between its paws right in front of them both and said with quiet happiness, "Look. Wolf made. Wolf be proud."

Then with a happy huff, she leaned into the friend's shoulder and closed her eyes, holding this amazing feeling close to her.

They both fell into a quick and deep slumber, and she did not dream.

(end thread)