Sticks and Stones (open)

[Anonymous]

Sarivi sighed happily as he settled to lay on his stomach, stretched out over a large boulder. It was the first time in days that he had been able to come onshore and not have to worry about keeping within jumping distance of the ocean, and he was planning to actually use that freedom. Stupid rain, it had made things horidly difficult all through the last week.

Today though... today was shaping up to be different. Even with the sun just barely high enough for it to be day instead of dawn, it was was shining brightly; beating down on his skin and already beginning to dry out the water that kept his fins elongated. At this rate, he wouldn't have to wait to long at all before he could jump up and go see what new things he could find in this stretch of land.

That he had even managed to find such a rock, more than large enough to accommodate a drying sprite, had been a stroke of luck. Or... Well maybe not luck. A glance down the shoreline brought the faint shapes of other similar large rocks to his eyes. Most of those seemed to be either fully onshore or offshore, not conveniently placed half and half as his one was, but there was no way of knowing if there wasn't some other perfect basking spot just out of view.

Shrugging away the mental question on whether he was lucky or just happened to come ashore in the right place, Sarivi nestled his head in his arms and let his eyes flicker closed. It was warm, it was sunny, and he was happy enough that just lazing in the bright heat was enough for the moment; his mind for once clear of puzzles. His skin, though near white, didn't burn, so he wasn't overly worried about what would happen if he did fall asleep. It would be a waste of a day, but overall nothing bad would come of it.

Or maybe by staying here something interesting would come to him before he had a chance to move off into the trees. It wasn't like he was hidden, and his still damp dorsal fin stood out like a large turquoise flag from his back.

He had started to almost doze off when a harsh noise suddenly erupted through the air. His head jerked up, eyes wide. For a moment he just stayed frozen in place, staring at the trees, then his mind started to work and he realized the sound was birds, a thought proven as the creatures lit up into the sky. It was a lot of birds. A lot of possibly scared birds... But he couldn't really move to investigate what had startled them all so suddenly yet; not until his rapidly drying fins were retracted enough for him to run. Or at least walk quickly.

[Anonymous]

Mew giggled as the birds flew away from the tree she was climbing trying to get at the juicy fruit it grew. Her stomach rumbled beneath the cream and pink dress she wore, "Quiet tummy I'll get you food in a minute" she thought as she put her barefoot up to the next branch her small left hand reaching for the round fruit suddenly the branch snapped and Mew went falling to the ground with a sqeak of shock. Luckily she had not climbed up very far so the fall only knocked the breath out of her, "Owie" she moaned her hands going to the back of her head, the seagulls from before had returned to the tree and began cawing as if laughing at her. And Mew did what any other 7 yr old child would do ,she stuck her tongue out at them . She got to her feet and brushed the back of her dress off "Dumb meanies keep your stupid fruit!" she yelled and stomped off. She the saw a person lying on a rock she could also see fins. Mew smiled , he was like her she walked out of the brush and stood behind him " Hey mister whatcha' doing?" she asked leaning over him.

[Anonymous]

Sarivi had begun to doze off in the warmth of the sun, but he jerked up as a voice suddenly sounded out over him. A decidedly small sounding voice, he realized as he blinked the sleepiness from his eyes and glanced back.

A delighted smile flickered over his lips as his eyes lit on what he thought was a human child. He hadn't been close to one of those before! Most humans in villages had kept their children away from him, eyeing him like he was going to drown the poor things or something. As if he would do something like that. It probably had something to do with his clothing of choice, since most things humans were iffy about around him had so far had something to do with that... Though the slight points to his teeth doubtless had helped.

But enough with thinking back, there was one right there! And... she had asked him a question, to which he had simply stared and grinned at her, rather rude of him. "I'm drying off! Have to let the water go out, or my fins'll make it impossible to walk, you know?" he answered, webbed hand flapping back towards the dorsal fin and leg fins, which were still halfway extended, the legs far enough out that there was no way he could walk yet. Just another bit and he'd be good though.

The sprites head tilted, ears twisting slightly as he grinned up at her again and asked, "What brings you out to the beach, little one?"

[Anonymous]

" I was getting food or trying too but I fell" Mew answered sitting on the ground beside him " So are you are merman or something?" she asked genuinely curious. Her ruby eyes looked up at his hair " Your hair is a pretty color, do you dye to make it that way?" , " Your tail's a pretty color too I wish mine was like that but it's just one color" Mew added smiling.

[Anonymous]

For a brief moment Sarivi was confused as to why she had fallen getting food... Was her balance bad? Then after a moment it clicked. The food trees, of course! How could he have forgotten that! Granted, it had been a good twenty five years or so since he had decided to try his luck there, but one would think that he would remember that fall. Right onto his dorsal fin, no less, and the fruit he had taken down with him hadn't even tasted any good. Poor thing was probably hungry. Ah well, he could take her with him while he went in search of lunch and find something for them both.

"Oh no, I'm a sprite!" He answered cheerfully, tilting his head at her and tilting up one of his legs at the knee. "See! We have leg-fins, though they do look an awful lot like a mer's tail with the fins out, just quite a bit more fanned, yanno? You can tell because my legs are all whiteish, and then it goes right into the turquoise and greens." Said fins weren't near as spread out now as they had been even when the girl had first appeared. Bright sunny days were such wonderful things, especially warm ones!

If he hadn't known better, he would have assumed that someone had told the girl how best to deal with a sprite. They were notoriously vain (though the notoriety of that was questionable, since they were also a shy species. Wonderful oxymorons, that's what they were!) and the complement made his eyes light up and his fins shift a little, almost preening. "Oh no, dye doesn't work for us at all! Sprites are all different sorts of colors! And if you think my fins are different colors you should see my brother! He's almost rain--"

He abruptly stopped his cheerful explanation, having processed that she mentioned she had a tail, and implied it was a finned tail. His head tilted as he blinked at the girl before he exclaimed, "Oh, then you aren't human! I hadn't seen that coloring on a human before, now that I think about it..."

For a moment he simply peered at her, then he grinned, "I suppose you're a little mermaid then? I guess that would be logical, since you knew about mermen but not sprites."

[Anonymous]

"Well I'm only half- mermaid my daddy was a human and my mommy was a mermaid he saved her from a net way 'fore I was born" Mew replied still smiling " My name is Mew by the way what's your's mister and do you live around here?" the girl asked sweetly.

[Anonymous]

Sarivi blinked, ears twitching, "Really? I haven't met a halfbreed before! At least not a human and mer one!" He grinned at her for a moment, staring at her with fascination as he tries to pick out what might be human and what might be mer. Not knowing either of the species correctly, he admitted failure fairly quickly. Halflings always caught his attention, since it was exceedingly rare for a sprite to be crossed successfully with anything. So far as he knew, it hadn't happened in his lifetime.

He laughed at the next question, "Oh no, I live... A long long way that way!" He said, waving his hand to the south. "I've decided to take a few years and explore the coastline! There's a larger current a few miles out, so I just change into water and let it carry me while I'm sleeping, and stop every time I wake up to see what I find! If I find interesting stuff then I stay for a bit and explore until it isn't interesting anymore."

For a moment the sprite grinned at her, then his head tilted back as he felt his legfins withdraw up past his heel. They were still a bit stretched, but while those last few inches were pulling in he could at least walk! The sprite pushed up to his knees, tilting his head at the child, "Finally! Waiting for those things is always so boring."