a caramel-skinned half-Drykas sat in the purple-clothed pavilion of Ferem's Fortunes. Incense wafted lazily, candles and braziers cast their soft glow, mingling with shafts of Syna's light as it filtered in through the haze.
Jasmine, rose, wood-smoke.
Scents to lull and calm.
Rufio was sitting at a low table, over which was scattered a collection of yellowing bones. Their origins familiar, and unusual. Wolves' fangs, a hawk breast-bone and eagle wing-bones, the femurs of rabbits and the molars of striders.
In her palm the fortune-teller rubbed a smooth, oval, ochre stone. Her reflection wavering across its surface. The fortune-teller's ochre eyes gazed aside, into the polished surface of metal that hung against a beam, serving as a mirror.
It was a little ways away, too much to be of use in applying cosmetics or to fix her hair. Rufio's interest was not in these things, though. She simply stared at her own reflection in it. Her reflection stared back.
She had been shaken, by the four days and five nights spent in Zith slavery, last season. Shaken, by the changes in her life, which seemed unending. Upping from her birth pavilion of Wildmane to live now with that of a stranger, to Stormblood.
Bonding to a Strider, becoming fully-fledged Drykas, weaving her spirit into The Web. Bonding to Ixzo, a night-lion, Myrian Kelvic. Finding love and joy and excitment and belonging in a spirit-sister.
Losing her Benshira mother's journal, and keenly sensing some loss of her Benshira self with it. Rufio was a tumultous river at this season's turn. As uncertain as the Winter itself was presuming to be.
Zulrav's brooding mood matched the fortune-tellers, as dark, grey, fluffy clouds gathered above the tent city. There was a tinge of expectation to the air, as if a storm were waiting. Bated breath, held.
It was as Rufio was wondering who she was, wondering what upheaval would split her life asunder and batter her soul and heart between rock and steel, strengthen or break her.
Now, though, it seemed a spirit of similar mood wandered into the fortune-telling tent. A Drykas she didn't recognise, with windmarks etched into the strong lines of his face.
Rufio set down the stone and turned towards him with a softly warm smile. Welcome, her hands brushed the air gently, in simple greeting.
While her gaze danced across his visage, appraising his build, his clothes, taking in his stance, his presence. Absorbing what hints she might about him.
"You come seek answers?" Her voice finally lilted off her lips, a Shiber whisper beneath the native Pavi.
