He stretched his thoughts out to his crows again, seeking to understand how she had broken his connection to them the first time. Lightly, with just a whisper of power, he tried to coax them into following him again. He would increase the strength of his summons to them if that didn't work, trying to test the limits of this sudden cap on his ability to call upon his feathered friends.
The way the woods adored her, the trees shifting like great, slow cats to try and catch her attention, did not go unnoticed. If Caido didn't have dryads as he knew them, this beautiful woman was surely the closest thing to one, Jigano thought as he followed in her wake. Her voice was no less lovely than her form, and the musician in him itched to provide a melody for her to sing to, but the seriousness of their mission and the danger that might even now surround them, unseen, kept him alert for trouble beyond their guide's presence.
"Change can be frightening," he agreed, "and it is not easy to face what we fear with poise. Easier by far to attack it instead, and cling to the past, and the familiarity of tradition." Was that not what the schism between so many naturals and outlanders had boiled down to? Now that it was in the past he did not know if 'right' or 'wrong' could be applied to either side, though he still wished things had at least proceeded at a slower pace. Was this how the Fae viewed them? As an intrusion - an invasion - of Outlanders? The Barrier might as well have been a separate world, after all, and even those born to Caido were now finding themselves strangers in their own larger world.
He looked around at his companions with lingering concern, wondering if Deimos and Sam were making the same connections - and to reassure himself that those he had convinced to join him were still safe. Once he knew that all of those who had stayed were accounted for, he turned his attention back to their guide. "But what of you, Lady? What do you think of the fall of the barrier and the changes we might bring to your woods?"
