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[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

Aremu was sore; it ached all through him. His muscles were the least of it, and the most easily tamed. He knew, from years of long experience, what sort of soreness could be pushed through and what sort of soreness had to be yielded too. He did not grudge himself the yielding, when it was necessary, but he skirted the boundary, where he could, and pushed the limits too.

That was, at least, what he told himself as he made his way out of the house in Quarter Fords.

“The cliffs again?” Niccolette asked, eyebrows arching.

“While the weather holds,” Aremu answered, summoning up a smooth, faint smile like a mask.

Niccolette’s lips had pressed together into a thin line. The Bastian had shrugged, tucked her book more solidly beneath her arm, and went into Uzoji’s study.

Aremu had pulled on his warm, sturdy coat - hanging next to Uzoji’s at the door, still - over the patched sweater beneath. He tucked his right wrist into his coat pocket, settled solemnly inside, and tucked his left hand into the other side. He knew already there was no visible different between them - not like pants, which showed a bulge, or a lack thereof.

It was not, really, still warm, by any Mugrobi’s standards. There was a wind whistling off the ocean, cold; it brought with it the faint, distant smell of rain, or else snow. Darker clouds shifted and blew away on the horizon; darker clouds threatened to brew closer, too, on the edges of the city, but held their distance, for now.

Aremu quickened his pace.

There were many cliffs that lay along the edges of the Rose. There were many paths to explore up and down them - Aremu had long ago promised himself not to ascend any he could not then descend - and even the same path, on two different days, could be a wholly different climb.

Today, Aremu did not want a familiar path.

He went further along the beach, shoes clasped in the fingers of his left hand, until he found the place where the receding tide left the sand damp, where the contours of the cliffs rose up sharp and unfamiliar. He went through them, to the very edges, where water squelched up to fill his footprints.

He climbed. He put the rest aside - he left the coat hanging and the shoes tucked beneath it, and rolled up both sleeves to his elbow, the right easily - the left, with the slow, ungainly pressing off his elbow along his side, again and again, until the fabric bunches roughly above the elbow, and he could smooth it out with his wrist.

He climbed. He pushed himself through the sore and aching muscles, and the pain yielded and gave way to satisfaction. Even so, he did not rush; not even the trembling of hands and wrists could force that on him. He knew better; he went slower, instead, making sure of each grip before he rested his weight on tired muscles. They woke; they lived; they burned, and he knew satisfaction mingled with joy.

Aremu climbed to the top, where the bitter-cold wind skimmed the stalks of grass and cut sharp into exposed skin. It burned in the scrapes on his knuckles and forearms, and carried in its brush the faint tang of salt water, barely perceptible. He sat a little while, in the midst of it, while the pounding of his heart slowed.

Then he climbed back down. This, too, he did slowly and carefully, deliberate; he faced out where he needed to, through the spiking thrum of fear, and in, too, where that was necessary. He found nooks and crannies in the sea-roughened rock, and pried into them with fingers, elbows and toes; if once or twice he sent a scattering of pebbles glancing down the cliff side, at the end he stood on the beach once more.

Aremu glanced back on the shore, towards the way he had come. There were footprints still, damp in the sand, further back now from the lapping edges of the shore. He turned away; he carried his shoes and his coat with him, and went down the unfamiliar shores.

The cliffs turned, then, and wound in; Aremu followed the narrow trickling path of water and sand back, and found a patch of darkness at the end, and rock beneath his feet. He stood at it for a moment; he slipped shoes on sandy feet, one by one, his coat already shrugged on, and made his way into it.

He smelt rotting wood, although he could not see it; at the edge of the gleam of the light outside, he saw a glint of metal, and found a half-rusted lantern and a bit of flint. He picked it up, lightly, and swayed it from side to side; oil gleamed in the faint light. Yes, he thought; if he were to do this, let him be prepared.

Aremu slipped the flint into his pocket, and took the grimy handle in his hand, and wandered deeper into the cave.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
South of the Rose

Restless. The Gideon-face was more prone to restlessness than the bookseller had been, as far as they could remember. Which, thinking on it, weren't as very far at all. Still. Maybe all them gangling limbs just needed to move around. Peregrine found themself wandering all over the Rose at every hour, a tall dark smudge against the landscape. They weren't exactly too terribly afraid of the sorts that kept similarly erratic schedules; they all tended to avoid Peregrine, usually. Could smell something on them, maybe.

Sometimes they wanted the holes in their mind filled, and that wandering kept them winding through the streets of the city. Old Ring-Around-the-Rosie. Rosey-Cheeked. Some more colorful names besides, fuck if they could remember them all. There were people there in those wanderings; Peregrine let their voices and faces rush in where the gaps were and they felt almost like a whole person. Almost.

Sometimes, though, that weren't what they wanted at all. Sometimes them holes got too big and they couldn't help but let them swallow them up. No Gideon then, only Peregrine. They'd found themself all kinds of places on trips like that. Toes in the sand, their shoes a mile down the shore. Trapped on a sandbar once, on account of how the tide must have come in. Couldn't quite as remember walking out there, but they were content enough to wait.

Cold drove them out, somehow, like they couldn't stand as to see them folks bundled up in their coats and their socks and each other, then catch sight of themselves in some shop window. Shadow on the lens of a camera. Something poetical like that. Fucked them up, whatever it was. Drove them to the edges of town where it stopped feeling like a city and started feeling like just cliffs and sand and cold. Peregrine couldn't think as how they got down them. Careful-like, probably. Weren't too many scratches or scrapes on Gideon when they found themselves in the sand. Wrong kind of shoes for the sand, but there they were so they carried on anyways. If they'd looked down they would have noticed that someone had gotten there before them; they did not.

Peregrine liked the beach. Liked the cliffs but especially the tunnels in them. Smuggler's coves, secret places for ne'er-do-wells to do whatever it was they fucking felt like. Well, Peregrine was one of those, weren't they? Yeah, yeah they thought--nah, they knew they were. They'd spent a lot of time looking in at them caves. Holes in the landscape, just like the holes all up inside of them. Except more fun to look inside of.

To that end, they thought, this one seemed good as any. To that end, it was cold and they as had that hook still slung around their belt. No light. They wondered, idly, how far in they could make it without one before they was forced to turn back. They were attached to this face, but it got harder with each one to favor caution over entertainment. They grinned at the mouth of the tunnel. Some ideas seemed better when you hadn't slept in a full day, yeah? This might just have been one of those.

They put a hand on the wall of the cave and began to hum, loudly and without any sense of rhythm or melody. The wall of the cave was cold and wet and filthy. Peregrine let their hand trail along it and moved slowly deeper inside with the sound of Gideon's voice bouncing along before them. Using sound to feel out where they were going, yeah? Just like a bat. A great flightless bat. Alone in the dark, they laughed, then kept moving forward and resumed that humming.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

Aremu’s shoes scuffed against the packed earth floor of the cave; here and there, he caught a pebble underfoot or against his toe. Once, he brought his foot sharply into a small protrusion of rock; he grunted a swift curse to Hulali, grimacing, and held still for a moment, and then he kept on.

The early steps into the cave had been lit by the gleam of the light outside; it stretched on, further than he would have expected, as he made his way deeper inside. There was a narrow passage, and then the cave opened up, wide. Aremu held for a moment at the entrance, feeling the wash of cool air against his face; from some distant place above and behind, a ray of line shone in, illuminating scratches of damp blue moss across the way. There was a quiet rushing of water, and the sound of it dripping and splashing.

Aremu shifted; he adjusted his grip on the lantern handle, and slid his right wrist from his pocket. Carefully, he turned and settled the stump where his hand had once been against the wall. The skin there was roughened by scar tissue, and would never have been as sensitive as the fingertips he once had – but he could feel the rock, all the same, cool and somehow damp against his skin, and he began to follow it around, tracing the outermost wall.

Aremu could not have said why he didn’t light the lantern; he thought of it, once and then again, but it seemed strange; there was a bit of light, still, some echo of it from the tunnel and from the shaft through the ceiling, and it seemed – wrong, somehow, to disturb the peace of this place with fire. He preferred instead to follow the path, for now, although he did not let go of the lantern.

At first, he thought the humming some noise from deeper inside the cave – some shifting of the tides, some whistling of the wind through the rock. He had gone a good few steps around the uneven outskirts of the cavern when he heard the laughter; when he realized – with a shiver that went down his spine and all through him – that it was a man’s voice.

Aremu held, still; he swallowed. He turned back, his left arm brushing the wall, and crouched; not that he was not already out of sight, in the dark. He set the lantern down, carefully, off the back, behind a rock which had caught him on the shins He watched the limning of light around the entrance to the tunnel part which led back towards the shore, utterly silent. His knife, as always these days in the Rose, was tucked against his back, settled in his waistband. His left hand did not reach for it, but he eased the way, adjusting the drape of his coat and sweater so that he could, at a moment’s notice.

A shape emerged – big, Aremu thought, arms outstretched – and came to a stop in the entrance to the cavern. There was another noise, then; for a moment, he thought it came from what must have been the human –

It was a groaning, echoing through the air; it was a grinding, low and deep and steady. It was a sharp and sudden crack, and then an enormous grinding, crashing over and against itself; the wall against which he was pressed seemed to shake, and Aremu yelled out aloud as a boulder tumbled down, and nearly hit him. Dust puffed out into the cavern, drifting motes through the light – and then whatever light which had seeped in from what was once and entrance cut-off, entirely.

Here and there boulders had fallen inside the cavern, although only a few; the cave-in – for that was what it was – had been concentrated in the entryway. Aremu held, crouched still, breathing hard, and did not dare move.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

More light in this cave than Peregrine would have expected. Good or bad? Weren't quite as clear. Peregrine had resolved to go as deep as they could before it started to get too dangerous to go any further. Dangerous or boring--whichever seemed more pressing when they got there. A game of chicken with the dark. But there just weren't as much dark as Peregrine thought would have been. The mouth of the cave threw light deeper and deeper in, and there was a bleeding crack of it from above.

Peregrine didn't think too hard on this, or how deep they were going. Where did it end? Seemed a damn fool thing to do, digging around in caves with no light or even a rope, just that hand hook slung on their belt that likely wouldn't as help them much. Fuck though, what did it matter, hey? Gideon could get destroyed, yeah, and they'd be annoyed. Maybe even mourn the face. But there were always more faces. Faces upon faces upon faces. Weren't no cave as could keep Peregrine, only Gideon.

So they kept on walking and they kept on humming, tuneless and pleased. Feeling the wet rock and dirt under Gideon's fingertips, letting them skim around to keep steady and make patterns, too. They weren't even looking, quite, just sort of feeling and listening. Relying on Gideon to keep them both upright and forward. Until they saw something move in the dark, or thought they did. It was hard to tell, with the light at their back as it was, if it was movement or a trick of the eye. The humming stopped.

Which is how they could hear the new noise, the not-Peregrine noise. Low and steady until-- CRACK! and the whole of the wall seemed changed under Gideon's hand. Peregrine heard the shifting shadow shout and knew it for a person. Peregrine might have shouted too, or growled--some animal noise of surprise and displeasure as they went pitching towards the wall. Rock came tumbling down, close enough to injure. Peregrine and Gideon both pulled out of the way, and were merely glanced in the shin as they fell.

The light had been snuffed out; Peregrine craned around to look back the way they'd come. A godsdamn fucking cave-in! Of all the things Peregrine had thought might happen to this face in this adventure, having the exit sealed off by the fucking ceiling coming down on it weren't one they'd considered. Always the fucking way of it; weren't never the destructions you expected.

"Well fuck." No getting out that way, unless the shadow they'd heard had a real good shovel. And was more than one person, really. It was--it was fucking ridiculous, is what it was. A cave-in. A cave-in! They threw their head back and laughed, the sound of their voice bouncing off the stone and the dark.

"...Ent dead, is you, shadow-shape?" Peregrine called out into the dark with their face still split in a grin. Nice thing about dark, they reflected, was that they could smile all they wanted. Weren't nobody to see it and tell them it wasn't right. The question was asked without much emotional investment in the reply, just curiosity.

Rolls

Peregrine vs cave:
SidekickBOT Today at 2:25 PM
@Cap O' Rushes: 1d6 = (5) = 5

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

The distant creaking and groaning stopped, or near enough; there was a sound like the shifting of weight and rocks, some noise glimpsed dimly through the cave walls. Aremu crouched, closing his eyes. Any moment, he thought, the noise would start again, this time closer; any moment, and he would feel the crushing, tumbling weight of the cavern collapsing –

There was an ache in his right wrist, tension, as if he was holding on tight, and he didn’t know how to let go –

No more noise came. There was a distant settling still. The air tasted like dust, or near enough; not nearly as bad as a sandstorm, the Mugrobi thought, wryly, but then one could survive being buried alive in sand. Aremu breathed deep, and settled back.

Well fuck.

They weren’t the first words he’d expected to hear, but Aremu had to admit they were warranted. There was a loud boom of laughter; it bounced off all the walls, and shivered cold down Aremu’s spine, prickling all the nerves and small hairs over his body. It did very little for the ache in his hand.

Aremu held a moment more against the wall, weighing his options, when what must have been a human spoke to it. His voice creaked and groaned with the rasp of the dust; stranger still, Aremu could have sworn he heard laughter in it. Something about it rung through his teeth, and all his bones.

There was still the shaft of light peering in through the cliffside; the air it shone through was full of dust, now, thick with it, but there was – however barely – light enough to see the man’s shape by. He had the advantage, Aremu thought; if he could move silently, deeper into the cavern, the man might never find him in the dark. And then? When the large, laughing Anaxi stranger had gone – and then? Aremu would very much have liked to hold out hope he could go back out through the tunnel entrance, but with the way the flow of light had choked – he knew better.

So, Aremu thought. Did he want to play keep-away in the dark, with a man twice his size, who knew him for there? The knife pricked against the bare skin of his back. He thought it over.

“Not yet, so far as I can tell,” Aremu said, making his decision. He scooped up the lantern; he came a little closer, slowly, against the wall, his right wrist settled in the pocket of his coat, and his left arm just bumping the cavern wall. “Well fuck indeed,” the Mugrobi said, the curse familiar and easy in his lilting accent. He coughed; he spat on the ground, once, clearing the taste of the dust from his throat.

“Are you injured?” Aremu asked, feeling his way along.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

Peregrine's ears perked up at that accent. Familiar sort of accent--they'd tried it once, although it had gone only dubiously well. That had been long ago, with a very different face to Gideon Carver. The dusty light that came in through the crack in the ceiling--roof? something else? what was it, when it weren't really neither?--wasn't quite enough to see the not-dead person by, not really. Whoever it was, they were just as trapped as Peregrine. And probably less happy to be so; at least Peregrine always had one exit. Inconvenient exit, sure, but they always had it. In all situations, they had that option.

The not-dead person--a man, Peregrine thought, from the voice, although weren't like one ever could tell really--came shuffling closer. Peregrine came to stand, as well, pulling Gideon up from where he'd sprawled out on the ground when the cave-in had happened.

It happened that Gideon's eyes weren't so good in the dark, much to Peregrine's regret. They were adjusting, slowly, to the gloom but still squinted as they considered the question of injury. Their leg? They stamped it on the ground, hard. It made them hiss but no more; the rock had bruised but nothing felt broken or otherwise in ill-repair. Peregrine shook their head, then stopped, remembering the light.

"Nah," Peregrine said, "ent broken or nothin'." They considered this a stroke of victory; place was fair filthy and if they were down here long enough, a proper injury was just as likely to get infected and make them sick as anything else getting them. Of course, they had high hopes that it weren't likely they'd be stuck down in the dark that long.

"Don't as think anyone is getting out that way," Peregrine said and jerked their thumb over their shoulder. If the other could see it, they didn't know or even particularly care. Stating the obvious, anyways. They tapped against the cave wall, leaning into it. Thinking. It was fair likely that this cave weren't nothing but a dead end. Sometimes, though, they came out another way--smuggler's tunnels. Peregrine hadn't been far in this one, not yet. Weren't sure which it was. They tilted their head consideringly of the man they could see just a little more clearly now as their eyes were more adjusted.

Could be as he was a smuggler, his own self. This was the Rose, after all, and Peregrine couldn't think as there were many other reasons to be here in a cave like this on a cold Dentis afternoon. That Peregrine was here just to entertain themself weren't the point. That weren't the hobby of normal folks, even they knew that much. And he even seemed to have something in one hand--a lantern? Looked like a lantern. So he was prepared, not like Peregrine who came on a whim and brought nothing with them to help. They thought and thought.

"Ent never been in this one afore," they admitted at last. "But could as be another way out." The offer to cooperate was unspoken; Peregrine could muddle on through on their own, no matter what. Seemed easier not to, though. Peregrine always preferred things the easy way.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

The answer to Aremu’s question was a quiet sort of shuffle, and then a loud, hard, thud, and a quiet hiss. The Mugrobi froze against the wall for a moment, holding his breath, though the thump of his heart was so loud in his ears it scarcely made a difference. He strained, listening a moment, waiting once more for the continuing echoing tumble, the sharp scrape of rock against rock.

It did not come, but the other man’s voice did. Nothing broken, he said, and no one getting out that way. Aremu came a bit closer; close enough that he could make out the shape of the other man well through the dark, though not quite close enough to touch, nor even quite at arm’s length. He shifted; he was still close to the wall, watching him.

Another way out, the man suggested. He thought he saw the gleam of reflected light in his eyes.

“It’s new to me as well,” Aremu said, honestly. He glanced down at his hand; he lifted the lantern, letting the dull glass glint in the light. “I found this at the entrance.” He glanced across the cavern, the great dark emptiness, full of the rushing of water and the echoing of their voices.

Aremu eased back; he crouched, right wrist still in his pocket, and set the lantern down. His left hand opened the small cage; he struck a spark, and watched it spread, flickering, over the oil inside. He closed it again; warm light washed out through the old glass. Aremu took the hand in his hand once more, and rose, holding the lantern at his side.

It was enough light to see just ahead by; it was enough light to see the other man by. He was tall; was it the darkness that cast those shadows all around his eye sockets, as dark as bruises? Aremu came a little closer, a step, and then another, close enough that if either had had a field, the other would have felt it – not, Aremu thought, that there was much chance of it, with how large the human looked.

A shiver ran down Aremu’s spine; all the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck were standing upright; something tasted wrong on his tongue. He breathed in; he shifted. He wanted more than anything to rub the back of his neck, beneath the collar of his coat, but the lantern was in his left hand, still. His right wrist he kept in the deep pocket, still; it was natural enough to turn with the lantern somewhat between them.

The cave would not collapse, he told himself. If it did - well. There was always a choice; stay here and wait, Aremu thought, grimly, or go forward. There was always a choice; it was his to make.

Aremu turned, fully, then; he held up the light, blinking and squinting against the wash of it brighter over his face, and looked out. It was not much; perhaps it was not enough. He could still make out only a dark, cold cavern; there were puddles of cave-water, damp on the ground before them, and moss-slick rocks that waited underfoot.

“I’m Aremu Ediwo,” Aremu said, after a moment, glancing back to his left at the man. He shrugged, lightly. “If we're to explore together, I'd rather not be strangers.”

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

Not prepared then, just luckier than Peregrine. Earlier than Peregrine. Well, shit. Weren't that just convenient--there went the idea that the other man might be some kind of smuggler here for his merchandise. Or whatever it was. Man came a little closer to Peregrine but stopped out of arm's reach. They would have snorted if they didn't think it was slightly counter-productive. What was Peregrine going to do? Hit him over the head and take the lantern? Well, they supposed as they could do that. Just seemed like an awful lot of work for no real reward. Supposing the living man was good in a fight? What then? Nah, nah. Safe as a bug in a rug with Peregrine, this one.

He pulled back then, and lit the lantern. Peregrine was almost disappointed--there went their adventure in the dark. Seemed as though that plan was canceled the moment the ceiling caved in and sealed them both up inside, but hope sprang eternal. Or some rot like that. Enough light though to see the other man, and to be seen. Not kind, this lantern light--it cast all kinds of shadows on the hollows of a man's face. And no field, neither. Just--just something, something that pressed against the back of their mind, something they--

No. Weren't the time to think on that. Enough dark and echoes outside their skull, yeah? Didn't need to go spelunking around in there.

"Gideon," they offered after a moment's pause. They were somewhat surprised by the introduction. Weren't even drunk or nothing, how about that! Their face split in a grin for just a moment before it dropped off their face entirely, expression slack again. "Carver," Peregrine added, because the other man--Aremu, they knew now--had offered his full name.

Exploring, though--what a way to put it. That was how they got here, to be sure. They weren't quite sure how Aremu came to find himself in this tunnel o' love, or what his intentions had been. If not a smuggler, then what? Some fool with a death wish (who could, in fact, actually die)? Not that it mattered, as such. Peregrine could wander around with the dark with a moony fellow just as easy as a smuggler.

Peregrine peered ahead into the tunnel that was lit now by the lantern Aremu held. They saw nothing, just rocks and wet and dark. Couldn't hear much either, or get a sense of where they might be going by any other sense. They hummed a few notes, then shrugged, a jerky motion of broad shoulders.

"You got the light, so lead on, Mr. Aremu Ediwo." A laugh, low and abrupt. "Less you wanna be givin' it over to me, of course. All I have is this," Peregrine tapped the hook at their side. Their hand didn't come back off of it when they had done so; it was a comfortable a place as any to rest the hand. If Aremu chose to go forward, they would follow along behind, humming as they went. There was a lightness to their step, a jovial little bounce. This, they decided, was more fun than just walking in the dark alone would have been. Even if there was a something about this Mr. Aremu Ediwo what agitated Peregrine, just a little, persistent like an aching tooth. It would be fine. Most likely.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Cave in the Cliffs, to the South of the Rose

There was a brief grin with a good deal of teeth in the midst of the other man’s introduction, in the space between Gideon and Carver. It provoked nothing like a desire to smile in Aremu. He watched Gideon in the dark; when he turned, so did Aremu, glancing down the tunnel that they had both come from.

Something shifted in the dark; something skittered and thumped its way along. There was a little puff of dust, like a sigh, and not the faintest hint of light.

Aremu breathed deep. The air tasted dusty; he wasn’t sure what else he’d thought to make out in it. The shaft of light – less visible, now, with the flickering glow of the lamp – was proof enough that light was coming in through the cave.

Lead on, Gideon said. Aremu glanced down at the light in his left hand; his right wrist was still tucked into his coat pocket. He glanced, too, out at the slick stones before them. He trusted his balance; all the same, he knew, too, something of his instincts. If he fell, Aremu thought, slowly, and put his hand out to catch himself.

And if the other man was clumsy? The worst that could happen, Aremu thought, was that they’d be left in the dark. He didn’t relish it; something about the thought crawled over the back of his neck and shivered through him. But there were worse things than the dark, Aremu thought; shattering his remaining hand against a lantern of warped glass and half-rotten wood was one of tehm.

“You’re welcome to it,” Aremu said, a little abruptly. He looked up at the taller man; after a moment, he moved a little closer. He looked squarely at Gideon’s face, and the deep dark holes around the flash of whites that were his eyes; he did not look down at the large hand resting against the large, sharp docker’s hook.

The crawling over his skin was worse. He was not, Aremu thought, afraid of the dark; he never had been before. He had worked in the narrow, tight shafts of the Eqe Aqawe; he had crawled through vents in the darkness, lit only by the engine shedding sparks, or by the distant glow of the stars. More than once, Aremu thought grimly, he had not known whether he would emerge again.

At least, however, then he had known the way; at least then he had known that there was a way.

“Please,” the Mugrobi added after a moment, in his quiet, lilting accent. He lifted the lamp a little higher, and extended the lamp into the space between them, waiting, his face a smooth, even mask. He didn’t take his right wrist from his pocket. He supposed the desire to keep it hidden was vanity; all the same, he didn’t let the other man see.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
A Cave in the Cliffs to the South of the Rose

Peregrine had expected Aremu to walk on, really. Weren't like as they expected him to just hand over the lantern all trusting-like and let Peregrine go first, right? It was Aremu's lantern, after all. The only useful tool between the two of them, as far as Peregrine knew. They tilted their head to the side in that jerky, bird-like motion that had become their habit, watching as Aremu seemed to consider something.

Without much warning, the question of light was made their responsibility. Peregrine's eyebrows raised, a flicker of motion on an otherwise still face. It was hard for them not to smile, so they didn't bother. But weren't this just a fair sight more exciting than running around in the dark on their lonesome, hey? Yeah, yeah, this were--so much more interesting. Peregrine alone would have just kept one hand on the wall and only had themself for conversation until they got bored. Or slipped and fell and died in this dark, dusty-smelling rat hole of a tunnel. Either way, they had planned on a solitary activity. Weren't it just so much more fun with company, though?

They held Aremu's eyes unblinkingly. Eye contact and everything--well weren't this just a special sort of day. Made Peregrine feel fair giddy, all this excitement. Peregrine removed Gideon's hand from the hook at their side then. The feeling they didn't like, that scrabbling little tug from some hole in their memory, that got worse when Aremu got close. Didn't make a bit of sense, Peregrine thought. Weren't like--it weren't like a field, that got worse the closer it got to their stolen skin. Peregrine didn't like it; their teeth set on edge. But who were they to complain?

Aremu had added that little "please", pretty and polite. Wonders upon wonders. Peregrine reached out and took the light from Aremu's hand with a sharp nod. They took care not to let any of Gideon's long fingers touch Aremu's hand. It was difficult, but they thought they'd managed. Peregrine lifted it higher, above Aremu's head. The light bounced off the walls and didn't help too much in front of the pair of them. Probably good Peregrine had it, really. Taller. Dark eyes considered the slick, wet rock before them that led deeper into the dark.

"Better cooperate," they muttered darkly, comment directed at the face and not at Aremu. To Aremu they turned and they thought their expression must, surely, look a little brighter than usual. They couldn't as tell what it looked like from the outside--they were happy as a clam.

Wait, were clams happy? Peregrine weren't sure. Had anyone ever asked the clams? Supposing clams could even be happy in the first place, which Peregrine didn't think as they could really, wouldn't it make more sense if relative life satisfaction varied just as much among clams as with people? Unless clams had figured something out that people never seemed to. That was very possible--they weren't too smart, and that could be useful in a way. When it came to being happy, that is.

"Ye think anyone ever did ask clams, about how happy they are?" No, wait. That hadn't been the question Peregrine had meant to ask. They passed Aremu to stand in front of him, deeper in the tunnel. Shook their head, trying to clear the cobwebs out of it. Then started forward, pausing after a few steps to turn back and make sure they were being followed. Wouldn't do no good to run off with Aremu's light, would it? That would be fair rude of them. And Gideon Carver tried to be polite, yes he did.

"Let me know, if I get to far ahead. Ent gotta be shy about it." They paused, then remembered suddenly what they had meant to ask. Hadn't been about clams, at all. "Why ent you takin' that hand out of your pocket? Might have an easier time of it." The question was only mildly curious; Peregrine wanted to know, but would just as happily get told to fuck off and carry on their little cliffside adventure.