Darling please, just give us some time, and I swear we'll be alright
Hotaru has never been prone to fits of depression. At least not outwardly. As a creature with a strong will to live and thrive, there have been few times when life has brought her low enough to consider giving up in any sense of the word. Though things are slowly returning to rights in some ways - Kiada returning from death, reuniting with Deimos - everything else is simply...wrong. After the showdown with Shaju, the brief stint to see Deimos alive and well with her own eyes instead of word of mouth, Hotaru has returned. Not to Torchline directly, no, but to the Wilds beyond. The place she had stayed in her sickness, lost and delirious. Those memories are still locked behind a miasma, though she suspects they hold nothing of real value. All the same she is drawn past Torchline's boundaries and into the Oerwoud, Atlas trailing faithfully behind her as twilight descends in a haze of purples across the sky.
Part of her regrets having awoken here at all.
Superstitions do not often affect her, but it seems ever since her return everything has been falling apart. Shaju's return. Sunjata's status of Governor being attacked. Nate departing for the Grounds. Remi and Zephyr attacking Sunjata. The mob. Their house. The fight. All throughout she is helpless to do anything but try in vain to hold the broken pieces in hands too small and scarred to be of any use. Her own anxieties plague her. Some nights she stays awake staring at her beloveds, feeling misplaced and out of sorts. She loves them, and they her, but even Hotaru can't overlook the deep bond between them that she can't replicate.
With their recoveries hanging over her head, the stress of it all drives her out and away, where the air is cooler and not so oppressive. Hotaru is a child of snow and ice, and no amount of time in Torchline will change that. So she walks as the sun begins to sink, hands extended to let her fingers dance listlessly across ferns and flower petals as she tries to come to terms with everything that has happened since her return.
Part of her regrets having awoken here at all.
Superstitions do not often affect her, but it seems ever since her return everything has been falling apart. Shaju's return. Sunjata's status of Governor being attacked. Nate departing for the Grounds. Remi and Zephyr attacking Sunjata. The mob. Their house. The fight. All throughout she is helpless to do anything but try in vain to hold the broken pieces in hands too small and scarred to be of any use. Her own anxieties plague her. Some nights she stays awake staring at her beloveds, feeling misplaced and out of sorts. She loves them, and they her, but even Hotaru can't overlook the deep bond between them that she can't replicate.
With their recoveries hanging over her head, the stress of it all drives her out and away, where the air is cooler and not so oppressive. Hotaru is a child of snow and ice, and no amount of time in Torchline will change that. So she walks as the sun begins to sink, hands extended to let her fingers dance listlessly across ferns and flower petals as she tries to come to terms with everything that has happened since her return.
HOTARU
