Grishia was pretending to be a monster.

She didn't know a lot about monsters; only what she'd heard in stories. But they sounded scary, and to a child who'd never encountered a monster, that could only mean one thing: they were COOL. Admittedly she didn't want to run into a real one. That would probably go from "cool" to "terrifying," and quickly. But for now, the toddler was standing with a determined stare, arms spread wide--one hand holding a staff that was far too large for her. A small creature, something between a dog and a rat, but made entirely of bones and with a few too many weird spines, was standing beside her. It was a golem, and really, it made Grishia probably look like a little monster to the genre-savvy. But she was just playing a game, as any child would.

She squinted, trying to come up with a good monologue as she looked down at her mother's bone pit, but the reality was that she didn't really talk much. She didn't like to talk, and words were hard.

So instead, she made a scary sound with her mouth. "OOooOOOoooo," she intoned, mimicking a stereotypical ghosty sort of voice. Her bone golem just watched her, harmless; then Grishia called on her magic. Shadows coiled up, rolling off her, leaving her teal-grey eyes glowing in the center of the cloud of purple-black.

But nothing else was happening. No more bones rose or anything--all that was in her mind, in a game of make-believe.

The gnoll cub tried again to think of a monologue, and failed again, so settled for making another weird ghost noise. "OOOOOOOOOOooooo..."

She was having fun, with an imaginary enemy army falling before her, but she was realizing that she was really bad at words.

@Vestyge

A trip back home as a treat, after a cycle of difficulties adapting to this strange, new world. A treat for himself, by himself - he hadn't needed to earn permission to leave his post, with his employer busy with preparations. (These mostly involved stealing more curtains from the Palace.)

Now that the confusion settled down some, Vestyge was attempting to determine where he sat on the new Canis. It was never a lively cave, but now it felt... hollow, empty of even the scavengers that would pick at the meat as he worked. There was nothing left for anyone anymore. Just memories.

Except Vestyge could barely remember it, those times. Just how they started, and how they ended. The long expanse between was a blur of faces, sensations. Warm, cold, wet, dry. Over and over.

He shifted away from the view he'd studied at length - nothing but piles of bones, obviously - to the warbling of a little shadow. He'd been still for a while, perhaps long enough to go unnoticed. His joints clicked loudly as he turned and peered at the shape.

Was that a living skeleton? It was moving. Vestyge knew enough about the dead to understand that they did not do that often. Whatever the nature of this creature, he was interested enough to walk towards her and her companion.

He did not announce himself, apathetic to whether his sudden approach would scare the apparition. It'd be a little funny if it did.

@Grishia

She waved her hands (and oversized staff) around over the pit, and intoned again, except her eyes happened upon Vestyge as she shuffled to the side. So it became less of an "OooOOO" and more of an "OoooOOOAAAAAAH!?" Grishia tumbled onto her butt, yelped at that, flinched, and scrambled back up and away. Except she fell even as she tried to run, and also tried to grab her staff and keep it from falling and the entire thing turned into a disaster.

The shadows around her faded, her bone creature turning to "stare" between her and the stranger.

She got to her feet and sort of froze there, hesitating, holding the staff crosswise in front of her like a clumsy club.

"UHH. Hi?" she tried, uncertain.

@Vestyge

Vestyge's cackle was a high, irritating sound that left his lungs with force, his body curling inward as he fought for breath. He'd miscalculated - it had been very funny.

What had looked like a ghost of some kind ended up being a small, terrified cub of some kind. Not that he'd been expecting the shadow to be something grander - no, the truth was usually mundane.

He finally got some oxygen back. "You... You good? Sorry. That was just..." Vestyge sighed, recovering. "That was something." He'd been needing a pick-me-up after slogging through the trenches for hours, and with people who hadn't made the work any easier.

"You made that?" He flicked his head toward the golem, one that was staring blankly at nothing. Empty eyes, empty skull. It had moved before, right?

@Grishia

She was trembling a little as she picked her staff fully back up. "It's okay," she answered softly. Then she swallowed, and nodded. "I'm okay. Who are you?" Her tiny fist then tightened around the staff; her mother had warned her there were Bad People out there, those who'd harm and kill a stranger. "You're not going to..."

Grishia eyed Vestyge up and down, trying to figure out how he'd probably kill someone. "...Cut me?" she asked, as if hoping for reassurance. Her eyes were on his claws. His massive, scythe-like claws. And despite Grishia's precocious grasp of magic, nothing she knew was particularly good for actual combat. Shadows and wisps were all well and good until a Valkhound had you cornered in the bones.

Her gaze turned to her golem, then. She nodded and looked back to Vestyge, a little more confident now. "I made him. His name is-" (two seconds of thought) "Bone." (Pause. No.) "...Boney."

@Vestyge

Vestyge was not a good person, but he wasn't a murderer - well, not a conventional one. That fact was hard to broadcast, though, and a lot of effort for no real benefit. Intimidation was a good defense mechanism, and it took little work for him to maintain that effect. One of the privileges of his heritage.

He blinked at her, one eye at a time, the movement traveling smoothly down the row. His claws clicked at the mention of them, as if stirring awake. Vestyge chuffed. "No. You're hardly good eating."

He raised a fore-leg to prod slowly - gently - at the Golem's skull with those same long claws. "And you made this with magick?" Vestyge grasped it lightly between two fingers, attempting to rotate the head, looking for any structural support aside from its animating force: Tendons, muscle or string.

"Impressive."

He pulled back again, looking back to Grishia. "What else can you do?"

@Grishia

"Why am I not good eating?!" Grishia demanded, brow furrowing. That was mean! Was he saying she'd be GROSS?! Ugh! ...But even a few days old she realized maybe it wasn't best to invite a taste test. "I don't WANT to get eaten though." Her words were coming a little more smoothly as she entered one of her first real conversations, though she still paused and had to think about what she was saying.

But Vestyge was asking what else she could do!

Like any child invited to speak of their strengths, Grishia looked at once engaged. Focus sharpened her gaze, but before she could speak, she paused again, squinting. She'd been about to address Vestyge but--she didn't know how. "You don't have a name?" she asked, echoing her prior question, but her brow knit. She wasn't sure what to call him. Just. Mister? Sir, ma'am? Stranger? BigClaws McGee?

She shook her head and cleared her throat, trying to get back to the question.

"I can do lots of things? I can read bones! Mom taught me how. She's the Bone Reader," Grishia said, proudly. "And I can make mushrooms! And light, with mushrooms! -And just light! And I can see the past! And see how a bone died-... I mean, I can take a bone and see how the person died." She nodded up, wide-eyed and very earnest, and then scrunched her nose up again and held up a palm.

A small, phosphorescent wisp flicked up and burned there coldly, hovering over the black pads of her hands. "I could draw on you, if you wanted. And make this light, like... stick. I mean. I can draw on things with light. It lasts a little while," she told him. Temporary child-drawn tattoo: offered.

@Vestyge

She was upset that she didn't make a good meal? Children were stranger than Vestyge had recalled, but he had the awareness to recognise that was on him, and it wasn't a sign of whatever modern ailment he could prescribe to the world now.

Grishia clarified, which gave him a little hope for her chance at survival. "Too small. Too young. Weird meat." He preferred to speed up the inevitable, rather than cut a life short early. It was a personal taste thing. "Though that doesn't matter to some folk. Be careful."

She had a mother who'd hopefully instilled this in her before now, but a reminder wouldn't hurt.

Introductions were a formal matter, and Vestyge was off the clock. "I do. Vestyge." If the cub wanted to offer hers, that was fine - but he wasn't going out of his way to ask.

He considered her offer for a moment. A little glowing scribble wouldn't be the most embarrassing thing to return to Scorpio with, and he was curious to see where she'd go with it. "Sure." He lowered himself to give her access to the armour along his spine. It was the flattest surface to work with, and the light would stick out against the dark carapace.

"Bone reading? Bones don't have much to say, in my experience." Other than at some point in time, someone died. That happened too often to be of much interest to anyone. But to grow up in Canis, and to be able to witness what it had been thousands of cycles prior... "What have you seen?"

@Grishia

"My meat's not weird." Another squint, a peer--"...Is it?" How? Why? She was not a meat-expert yet. This was all very confusing.

Oh, but he'd given his name, now. Some vague instinct toward a handshake prompted a more formal introduction, except the instinct only went so far. Grishia toddled forward and knelt, and tried to gently put her paw on one of Vestyge's claws. She tried to just sort of... hold it there for a moment. "Grishia," she said, very importantly, and then made an awkward attempt to pat said claws.

Hopefully that didn't get her Valkhound-knifed or something.

When the Valkhound lowered himself, Grishia then tried to clamber up. She was very small. He was very large. So she would want to... climb? Sit? ...Well, something atop the armor as she leaned in and got to work. Magic flickered up in her claws, and her gentle tracing left lines of light glowing in pale blue behind her touch. She doodled a scene of bones, a skeleton with a canine skull and pointy ribs. She drew a rock, and then a bunch of dots, and some swirls, for good measure. She tried to follow the flow of the carapace as she did so. So long as Vestyge indulged her, the end result would probably end up somewhere between tribal cave art and a child's half-thought-out scrawl. It would only linger for a week or so, but it glowed while it lasted.

The cub drew and listened as Vestyge spoke of bone reading. She thought about this for a moment, and then with the wisdom of a week-old child, informed him: "That's why it's not called bone listening." It wasn't with a tone of mockery or condescension. Just self-importance, as if to explain why it was named what it was named.

And as for his other question--"Saw people die here." Her tone was only a little quieter. Solemn, but still with the resilience of a little kid. "Hiding in the bones, trying to run away. They didn't make it," she told him. As if he didn't know. As if they'd become bones some other way.

@Vestyge

"Weird to me." He answered, the shoulder-shrug present in his voice, if not his movement. "I have specific tastes." There was nothing wrong or abnormal about Grishia. Vestyge, on the other hand... Well, he didn't want to get into it right now.

It wasn't a handshake, and Vestyge thanked the caves for that. But his gratitude was silent, invisible - as most of his unspoken feelings were. It came across as a blank-faced acceptance as Grishia gave his claw a little pat pat.

Keeping still wasn't hard. The only notable sensation as she worked was the vague feeling of weight on one side of his back, tilting the plate ever so slightly. He couldn't feel the lines she traced at all - Vestyge realised that he'd given complete creative freedom to this random kid, and that she could be drawing anything on his side right now.

If Grishia drew anything crude, well, it was his own fault for getting himself in this position. He could only hope she wasn't the type.

He chuckled lightly, attempting to minimise any movement that might disrupt her art. "What do you read in them, then?"

'Saw people die here.' Vestyge wondered how many he'd finished himself, and found it impossible to recall. Meat, bone, Oil. Nothing else, no faces. Just bodies. Grishia hadn't recognised him - how would a Gembound of today react to him, knowing what exactly he'd been designed for?

What he'd done?

@Grishia