They came upon an area where a boat might have come apart; there were many more boards and other pieces of debris lying in a more compact area than they'd previously seen. What had become of the boat's owner was unknown, but Tal hesitated only for a few moments before shrugging and stepping in to continue their clean-up. Boreal abandoned the sky to join the men on the ground, her pale scales gleaming brightly against the green grass as she trotted up to first Sunjata and then Tal with a board in her mouth, looking quite pleased with herself.
It would have been nice if Tal's feet could have avoided the damn wood that he almost fell over, but a surreptitious glance at Sunjata seemed to indicate that the Archon hadn't seen it, and the courier breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
Right before he heard the question that got turned back on him.
He couldn't suppress the wince, though he tried to cover it up with a sickly grin in return. "Haha, yeah... well. 'S... complicated. He was kind've... my first real friend in a few years. An' then this girl came along an' I didn't much trust her. But she started hangin' around 'im a lot. An' he didn't take well t'me not likin' her." The courier scowled as he scooped up some lengths of wood that looked like they could be reused, glaring at them before shoving them into his Bag of Holding. "I was worried about 'im gettin' taken advantage of!" His pale eyes flashed up to meet Sunjata's briefly, wounded and still upset in spite of the years between then and now, though there was a tiredness to his hurt that spoke of scabbing and scarring around the hole that had been left. Just as quickly he looked away, shoulders hunching in an awkward shrug. "But I'm kind've shit with words, yeah? Put my whole damn foot in my mouth tryin' t'explain it t'him. Got so wound up worryin' about her I didn't get what he was sayin' about bein' sent t'the Draig. An' that was it." Persona non grata to the ruler of the land Tal had been born and raised in his entire life up until that point.
Though from the pain that still festered it was, perhaps, not entirely 'it.' But that had certainly been enough.
It would have been nice if Tal's feet could have avoided the damn wood that he almost fell over, but a surreptitious glance at Sunjata seemed to indicate that the Archon hadn't seen it, and the courier breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
Right before he heard the question that got turned back on him.
He couldn't suppress the wince, though he tried to cover it up with a sickly grin in return. "Haha, yeah... well. 'S... complicated. He was kind've... my first real friend in a few years. An' then this girl came along an' I didn't much trust her. But she started hangin' around 'im a lot. An' he didn't take well t'me not likin' her." The courier scowled as he scooped up some lengths of wood that looked like they could be reused, glaring at them before shoving them into his Bag of Holding. "I was worried about 'im gettin' taken advantage of!" His pale eyes flashed up to meet Sunjata's briefly, wounded and still upset in spite of the years between then and now, though there was a tiredness to his hurt that spoke of scabbing and scarring around the hole that had been left. Just as quickly he looked away, shoulders hunching in an awkward shrug. "But I'm kind've shit with words, yeah? Put my whole damn foot in my mouth tryin' t'explain it t'him. Got so wound up worryin' about her I didn't get what he was sayin' about bein' sent t'the Draig. An' that was it." Persona non grata to the ruler of the land Tal had been born and raised in his entire life up until that point.
Though from the pain that still festered it was, perhaps, not entirely 'it.' But that had certainly been enough.
