its in the way you leave

Koa

Don't take this the wrong way
You knew who I was with every step that I ran to you

The Saltkiss is beautiful in an unsettling sort of way; the kind of place that surely holds secrets, hidden beneath the twisting roots and plunge beneath the brackish waves. Koa walks the estuary with practiced caution; a city boy through and through, he's found the experience of living in the wilderness wholly foreign and full of new and, were he in a better headspace, rather fascinating things.

Like nearly everyone else on the continent, Koa is looking for stupid flowers in a stupid forest that he's pretty sure is actively taunting them all. It's been nearly a week since he reached the Greatwood, and in that time he's neither found a rose nor heard of anyone else stumbling upon one. But what ese is he supposed to do, with the world actively crumbling around him? Without his home, his family - without hope - what does he have but stubborn persistence and the ability to wander through some woods?

But still he looks, peering among roots and under bushes, desperate to spot a flower in the brush. And that is what happens, in a sense, although the flower the boy stumbles into is far from the one he'd sought to find. Like a kiss in the dark the murmured voice is carried by the wind, causing Koa to hesitate as indistinct words tickle against his ears. It's something he almost recognizes and yet cannot place; he cannot decide if it's a mistake or not to follow it to the source. Probably, but that doesn't stop him.

When has it ever, before?

Pressing his palm to the rough trunk, Koa peers around the tree. "Hello?" he calls out cautiously, his steps steady and slow. "Are you alright?" He does not immediately spot the Doubletake, tucked away as she is. But she is sure to see him as he rounds his way further, familiar and a stranger in this most unlikely place.

Only blue or black days
Electing strange perfections in any stranger I choose