The voice she encounters is not one of prey. It is not of one known to fear. His voice is clipped--matter of fact. Arete thinks for a moment, and drops her shoulders and steps more plainly into his view. If she could understand him, then he was similar to her. Limping, the scars still stare out as baldly as a beacon. She does not like to show her weakness. And right now, her body unkempt, deprived of food and water, she had nothing to lose by stubbornly staying behind a tree. She was more likely to die even quicker that way.
With a grunt, her yellow legs carry her forward to a beautiful example of male flesh. The only boys she'd known were as children, and this was certainly no one she'd known in her youth. Her eyes opened for a second, and she could not help the way her mouth hung open--and distractedly, she stumbled forward on her bad leg. She shook her head, her mind back on her rather dire situation. "This hurts." She spoke to mostly herself, saying much worse things... but a lady does not swear. No until she knows her companion.
This would not do.
"If you wish to continue within my company, short as our accquaintance has been, I'm going to need you to help me to the grasses... and then some water." She looked up at him, aggravated at her own lack of stability. "My name is Arete, and I am sorry about this."
The look on her face was dipped in two parts embarrassment and about eight parts frustration. She wanted nothing more than to be as she knew she was supposed to be. To be made whole again. Strength was something she'd always prided herself in, and to need to lean on someone else, let alone a handsome stranger that just five minutes ago she had been squaring off against in the shadows of the treeline--it was just so unbecoming.
Her sister would never let her live it down if she ever found out. Thank God for small favors.
And then within the same breath, a look of dark sadness crossed her features at the loss of her family--the sick feeling that she was perhaps the only one of them that had survived. She turned to her company, and almost said as an extreme aside...
"It sucks to be on your own. It really sucks."
Arete
Some like beautiful, perfect and pretty.
I see the good in the bad and the ugly.
I see the good in the bad and the ugly.