[seasonal event] Fake smiles and happy never after

It is another day, and another day of waking and feeling a strange need to go outside. A part of her that was so willing to remain indoors – to become one with the darkness in her heart and her soul. But she imagines the change is because of Auni, the Luxere as her companion that continued to bring light into the deepest recesses of her mind. She doesn’t think she’s getting better, and she blames it on her soul bonded, finding it easier to blame him for making her move on when she isn’t quite ready to let go just yet. Besides, Seiji and her still need to go pray for Ru’in and find out more about what kind of rituals the Naturals held for the dead. If for nothing else but to ease her mind, to focus on something else other than the what could have been’s. And so she steps out into the light, blinking for a moment with her pale, icy blue eyes as she takes in the sudden brightness from the darkness indoors. She holds the door open for Auni to bound out, his long knobby legs carrying him around the entry way of the home to the Settlement – knowing that Kiada would have to follow. And well, if she didn’t, he was prepared to turn around and herd her toward it. She needs it, he thinks. And she wants to argue, but she can’t find it within her to care much about it anymore. So instead of heading out on her own, she follows Auni as he explores. The deer bounding around each of the merchant carts, some surprised (she thinks at least) to see a Luxere remaining from Longnight. Especially one so young. He appreciates the attention regardless. But it’s when he notices a woman in a makeshift kitchen that he makes a line straight for it. He’s polite, at least. Standing outside the front of it with wide eyes and a head with antlers that hadn’t quite grown in just yet, his nub of a tail wagging in excitement. Kiada trails behind him, quietly chastising him the entire way there. She sighs quietly as she approaches and notices the woman and offers a quiet dip of her head in greeting. “He’s not usually like this, I’m sorry.” She says to the woman, prepared to grab Auni and leave before the smell of what she’s cooking reaches her nose. “What are you making?” She asks, perhaps a bit less tactful than she might have once been. But it came back to the could haves and would haves, and she finds that she doesn’t care to know what she could have been anymore. Maea KiadA and here you come, with a shield for a heart, and a sword for a tongue.

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