"No apology needed, my dear, unless you are hiding them away," he responds with the hint of a smile curving up the corners of his mouth. He withdraws from her, albeit slightly, and the new space between them is cold but mixed with her scent and he can feel himself relaxing in her presence. His childhood friend, ever the optimist, offers a simple solution to his problems ─ the plains, where Tangerine is from. He chuckles quietly in response and gives a gentle nod in affirmation. That was an explanation he could wrap his mind around. Perhaps they were not actually in the plains with the wild and free, beneath the millions of stars that Svedka had told him so much about, but it will do for now. Until his worry comes back, full-fledged, and forces him to search again.
"I'm happy to be back, too," he whispers gently, the words wrought with emotion as the blue-tinted girl drapes her neck over his withers. Smoak leans into the embrace, a quiet sigh slipping from his maw at the warmth and familiarity of her. He is self-conscious, for a brief moment, of the severe dip in his back and the sharp presence of his ribs, but the beautiful winged woman seems not to notice nor care about the state of his thin thoroughbred frame and for that Smoak is thankful.
Their embrace ends too soon and he does his best not to look disappointed, but the son of Dahmer and Ellyse is caught up quickly in Solace's excitement. "Hyaline is lucky to have you at its helm, Lace," he tells her truthfully, his boyish grin returning and his spirits rising. Politics had been far from his mind for as long as he had been gone, but now that he has returned and the sanctity of Hyaline, Solace, and Svedka could be threatened by outside forces, Smoak finds it easy to jump back into the conversation about foreign relations. "Which kingdoms? Do any threaten Hyaline?"
His ears flutter, emerald eyes watching Solace closely as her demeanor begins to change. She seems hesitant for a moment, unsure in her silence; her wings rustle at her sides awkwardly and Smoak purses his lips in confusion.
I found someone, Smoak.
Admittedly, he hadn't expected for those words to fall from her lips and he struggles for a moment, silent as the uncertainty reaches her usually warm eyes. "Oh," he expels with a quiet exhale, though he's unsure if it will come across as surprise or disappointment. Kagerus. Smoak mulls over the name in his mind, listening intently as the painted girl tells him of her lover. He smiles fondly at the mention of Warrick, deciding that he would need to venture to Tephra as soon as he was feeling healthy enough. "I'm so happy for you, Lace," he says after a moment of heavy silence, his soft muzzle reaching out to nuzzle against her cheek again. "She sounds like she is good for you, and for Hyaline."
He pauses, more words caught on the back of his tongue as he wonders just how candid he could really be. After a few moments, he gives her a smile of whimsy. "I knew things would change in my absence but..." but what? but I had never expected them to change this much? but I had never thought I would come back to find you happy with someone else? He, as a colt, had been no sturdy or stable shoulder for her to lean on (in friendship, yes, of course ─ but he had been folly to think that he would have years to tell her how he truly felt). Any missed chances are his fault and his alone.
"And what of Svedka? Has he found someone to keep him in line?" he asks nonchalantly, in an attempt to change the subject to something that would bring him a little less emotional turmoil.
here's a handshake, soldier, 'cause we both lost the war
@[Solace]