[ooc: heeh, no comment...
I'll keep the ear-mufflers on her, maybe she won't hear the part about "cute"... oops, no, oh well. Just keep a trout handy and you should be safe.
Anyway, back to business...]
The second they were out of sight round the corner Aura turned back to Jan and held out an arm. "Carry me, Jan, please, I don' like it down here no more..."
He rolled his eyes, exaggereatedly, but caught her wrist and hoisted her so she could ride piggyback. Her arms immediately went round his throat, nearly choking him. "Steady on, Aura, you want me to suffocate?"
She whimpered softly in his ear, but loosened her grip. "I don' like this, Jan, I don' like it, it's scary... let's go back, huh? That's a marvellous idea, yes it is..." she hauled on his ponytail. "Come on Jan, turn round, we're going back."
"Aura!" he snapped, sharply disengagin his feathers from her grip. "We might as well just go there, I'm guessing we're so near by now it won't make much difference if we go there or not."
"But y'heard what that... that
thing said...!"
""Look, it can't be any scarier than what we've already been through this past couple of months, can it?"
"Bet it can..." She leaned her head on his shoulder, eyes flicking back and forth, scouring the under-tree gloom. "I bet there's thing watchin' us, Jannie, nasty things, things what want to
eat us..."
"He really got
you spooked, didn't he...?" Jan shifted her weight a little so she wasn't strangling him quite so much. "This from the young sligette who in her own words
ain't scared o' nothin'."
She scowled and tightened her grip, deliberately. "Don' you take the piss, fish-head."
He smiled, tautly. "Well, at least you're getting back to your bolshie old self..."
"I am not-" she started, but wisely thought better of it and shut up, instead pretending to bite his shoulder.
Jan just smiled, and padded tiredly on, wondering what all that "warning" had been about... He dismissed it from his mind, at least for now. "I don't think we have much to worry about, anyway," he said, mildly, trying to keep his spirits up. "After all, we're only passing through, hey? Maybe snatch a bite to eat, if there's any shops around, find somewhere to kip for the night and we can be off again come morning..."
Aura watched silently as they walked, chin on his shoulder and mind in turmoil, and wondered just how right he was going to turn out to be... And there, on the wind, she was sure she could hear the thin, high, keening cry of something being killed, and not killed cleanly, either...