Among the Grasslands ((Shea!))

[CastlesInTheSky]

The sun had risen high into the heavens and the earth was warm beneath Anya's paws. The sea of grass around her flowed like the ocean's waves in the breeze. It was a beautiful day in the sense of weather. Anya ran through the seemingly endless fields, but she was in no rush. Her swift movement took her past field and field, cliff and boulder, until she finally reached a stream surrounded by some trees. She took a moment to relax, lapping up some of the gently flowing water and laying down nearby peacefully. There didn't seem to be any sense of rushing about her, as if she had all the time in the world.

[miss_sanguine]

Ew, ew, ew. No matter how hard he scrubbed, he couldn't get rid of the feeling of being squalid.

The pool of the stream where he was bathing was deep and pleasantly warm, the current slow enough to be safe, but fast enough to carry away the mud from his body.

<I think it's a good look for you,> Maneki said, purring. She sat beside his clothes on the bank, watching him with her bright blue eyes as he tried to get himself clean.  

The day was not turning out to be a great one. In fact, it was terrible. The worse he'd had in months.

When he found the kid that had thought it was funny to fling handfuls of mud at him, he'd teach him a thing or two. He hadn't even been able to get a good look at the boy before the little maggot had run off in a fit of squealing laughter, leaving Monnayage standing there in horror and revulsion. It had even gotten in his hair. His beautiful hair!

With a repulsed and strangled sound of terror, he dropped back under the water, madly massaging his head and leaving no strand of hair untouched.

Unclean! He was unclean!

<If you scrub any harder, you'll have no skin left,> Maneki said to him. <You've been in there for half an hour. You're clean.>

When he surfaced, he said aloud, "You wouldn't be acting so calm if you'd been the one to have mud thrown at you. I'll have to burn my clothes." He couldn't wear something that had been tarnished with street mud; the worst kind of mud.

<Yes, well. You might want to get out before your skin starts to shrive—>

Both he and Maneki heard it at the same time: the sound of someone approaching. Whatever or whomever it was, he or she was upwind and he couldn't get a good sniff for identification.

And then a large tiger burst out of the trees some ways down. It didn't seem to notice them, instead lapping at the water and then resting itself on the bank.

Monnayage blinked, momentarily forgetting his obsessive cleaning. A tiger? Those weren't native to Serendipity. At least not Featherfall.

Now how was he supposed to get out of the water with a giant tiger settled nearby?

Damn. And they were downwind from it, too.

Worst day ever.

[CastlesInTheSky]

Hm, a strange smell?

With a lift of her head, she sniffed the air. A human around here? She turned her head, curious. As she glanced over to them lazily, her tail twitched to and fro. She seemed so calm, as if she was simply watching a movie. She got up slowly, stretching, and retreated into the bushes.

A bit later, she exited the brush quietly, right near where the man was taking a bath. It never occurred to her in time that she was in fact a tiger and was feared by people. She never realized such things until it was a commotion.

[miss_sanguine]

"Huh." That was weird. He had watched as the tiger had stared at him, holding his breath, and then it had walked away.

<You didn't honestly expect her to spring on you without warning, did you?> Maneki asked, turning her gaze back on him, nose held in the air a little with distaste. <She was a cat, not a rabid monster.>

"Not a cat! And how do you know it was a she?" Relaxing a bit, he lowered himself further into the water. He watched the bushes where he'd last seen the animal.

<How could you not?> His cat sat tall and stared at him, tail twitching behind her. <One as beautiful as that could be nothing but female. Maybe not as beautiful as I am, but still beautiful. And,> she added, <tigers are cats.>

He grinned and sank beneath running current, his nose just barely above the surface. <Yeah, yeah.> The shock had moved him on from his compulsive cleaning, at least.

<You might want to be a bit more respectful, considering.>

<Considering wha—> "Aah!" Looking in the direction that Maneki had been lead him to see the tiger, sitting there by the edge of the water and staring at him. His shock made his feet slip out from under him and he fell beneath the water, soon resurfacing with loud splutterings and his arms flailing around.

Waves of disapproval radiated from Maneki on the shore, whom he was apparently splashing with water.

When he was balanced once more, he moved away from the tiger, his eyes not leaving its own. <Wha—what do I do, Maneki?> He was experienced with normal-sized cats, not cats the size of a grown man when hunched over!

[CastlesInTheSky]

Well, the form of a tiger wasn't the greatest for friendly first impressions.
Anya watched the man splash about, amused but slightly concerned that he may have hurt himself while he slipped. As he resurfaced, sputtering and flailing, she discarded her concerns and would have chucked, had she been human. She took notice to the feline nearby. Much smaller than herself, and clearly displeased to be being splashed by water. She chuffed softly as a greeting and said, through her own form of telepathy, to the man, "What are you doing?"

((Felines and telepathy are the theme I suppose, haha))

[miss_sanguine]

"Ah!" The tiger could talk?!

Well, not exactly talk, but her voice rang through his head true as a bell, most definitely female. The tone had a hint of amusement to it.

"Wh-what am I doing?" he asked, eyes darting around at the water. He suddenly became conscious of the fact that this creature understood him, which meant she also knew that he was naked, and his hands went straight to his privates, shielding them to the best of his abilities. "I'm--ah--well, I was bathing."

A blush rose up on his cheeks, burning his face, and Maneki, sensing his embarrassment, started to purr. <Scrubbing all of your skin off, more like,> she said.

[CastlesInTheSky]

Well, wasn't he an amusing one.

Anya flicked her tail back and forth for a moment, then turned her head to look at the forest. Ah, humans were silly about nakedness, weren't they. She always forgot things like that. It had proved inconvenient when she hadn't taken on the form of a tiger.

"Bathing? Well, don't let me interrupt you."

She turned around and lay down gracefully with her back to him.

"Also, before you ask as everyone does, I have no ill will against you and do not want 'to eat you'."

[miss_sanguine]

He grunted. Kind of too late to not interrupt, considering she'd just scared the soul right out of his eyes. While he was naked, no less. But at least she turned away from him, in which he took the time to edge closer to Maneki, hands still shielding his package.

"Ha! W-what? Eat me? Who said anything about that?" he said at the tiger's next words, laughing nervously. Had she heard his conversation with Maneki somehow? "I didn't think you were going to eat me!"

Maneki curled her tail around her front paws, peering out at him with her blue eyes. He turned to grab his clothes so he could get dressed, but pulled back his hand as if burned when he remembered they were soiled with mud.

Great. Stuck naked and helpless in a river while a giant cat he didn't know spoke to him. "Ah, is there . . . something you wanted, miss . . . tiger?"

[CastlesInTheSky]

Anya snorted. "Of course you assumed I was going to eat you; all humans do."

Silly people. They always assumed things that weren't there, it seemed. "Just a simple conversation."

[miss_sanguine]

"Surely not all humans," he said, trying to keep the conversation going as he looked around for a type of covering he could use. "Some people are better prepared for a giant cat coming out of the bushes and speaking to them." He couldn't think of any at the moment, but there had to be some.

Bah. This might have come off a bit less awkward if he weren't naked. <You think you could go find me some pants or something?> he asked Maneki. But the cat just stared at him as if he were an idiot.

<I'm not your slave,> she said haughtily, wet nose in the air again.

Cats! All the same.

"A, ah, simple conversation?" he asked aloud, turning back to the tiger. What kind of conversation was simple to a tiger? "Like what?" Did tigers like talking about the things humans did?

[CastlesInTheSky]

Anya made a sound that could easily be taken for a chuckle. He was amusing.

"Yes. Well, what do you humans talk about? I've forgotten."

[miss_sanguine]

"Um. . . ." he stood there in the water, hands over his privates, at a loss for words. "Well, we, ah . . . we talk about . . . things."

How the hell was he supposed to carry on a conversation with a tiger? Talking to Maneki was one thing, but this was completely different. And he was terribly uncomfortable with his nudity. Why had that stupid kid chosen today of all days to throw mud at him?

"Look, I don't mean to be rude or anything, but I'm not one to chat with strangers when my . . . jewels are hanging out for all to see."

Maneki mentally snickered.

[CastlesInTheSky]

"Hm, I had forgotten that humans are so strange about nudity. Well, go cover yourself. I'll be waiting; I'm not looking at you."

She was facing with her back to him, tail twitching in amusement. She wondered why humans were so self conscious about it. Perhaps it was because they didn't have fur. She did not know.

Anya decided to try and talk though telepathy to the feline nearby, curious about her as well. It took a moment for her to switch between their minds.

"Don't you agree that humans are so silly about that? It's amusing, really."

[miss_sanguine]

Waiting? What did the tiger expect him to do, get up out of the river and walk into town naked, looking for clothes?

He stared sullenly at the sullied clothes on the riverbank. As much as he wanted to be decent, there was no way he was going to put those on. He had his pride.

But then an idea came to mind, one that made Maneki rise to her feet and back away with an indignant growl. He smiled at her wickedly.

<If your plan is for me top remove the parts you do not want showing, then you may follow through with that thought,> she said, ears pulled back.

And so the idea of using her as cover was negated.

"I have no clothes, tiger," he said. "You wouldn't . . . happen to have any, would you?"

Heck, if there were such things as talking tigers, then maybe said talking tigers had clothes in invisible pockets?

[CastlesInTheSky]

Anya did not put any thought to his dilemma; it had been much too long since she had been in human form for her to relate to problems such as that.

No clothes? A problem. For him, at least.

"Well...I don't have any clothing, but because I am a nature spirit, I could perhaps manipulate the surrounding plants to make something that would be able to cover you. What do you think of it?"

[miss_sanguine]

A nature spirit?

That explained some things. Though he didn't know much in the ways of spirits. Didn't technically believe in them. But if that's what the tiger said she was, then that's what she was.

"Plants?" he said, looking to the leaves of the trees around them a bit skeptically. Great. So he'd look like a wild, primitive man, dressed in nature.

But it was better than nothing, so he nodded. "All right. That'll work, I guess."

[CastlesInTheSky]

"Well, this might be a bit strange to you but it will work well enough."

Anya set to work on the plants that would cover him. Without further notice a thin vine quickly curled itself around his ankle, moving up to his thigh and transforming into a neat collection of leaves that seemed to form in patterns of their own accord, covering the important areas and wrapping a bit around his waist to ensure that they stayed in place. The vine snapped off from the ground and it was done.

Anya, in a thoughtful tone said, "Is that alright?"

[miss_sanguine]

The feeling of something slithering up his leg was not what Monnayage had been expecting--who would?!--and he cried out in alarm when he felt it, shaking his leg like mad in the hopes of dislodging it. When his flailing failed to extricate the vine, he could only watch in stunned fascination as it snaked its way up to his middle and bloomed around it with leaves.

He didn't realize his heart was pounding until the ordeal was over, and he looked up at the tiger with his arms spread a little. "I . . . ah . . . a bit of warning would have been nice," he finally said, relaxing his shoulders and giving a small smile. "But thank you--er, do you have a name, spirit?"

[CastlesInTheSky]

Anya turned to face him now that he was decent, sitting with her tail curled around her paws. It amused her a bit that he had been frightened by the plants, but she did feel a bit bad for that as well, as it hadn't been her intention to do so.

She calmly looked at him, with a nod of her head. "You are welcome. I am called Anya. What is your name?"

[miss_sanguine]

The air was cool on his skin as he climbed out of the water. Rivers ran down his body and puddled in the dirt at his feet. He could feel the sand sticking to his soles when he climbed out, gathering in clumps. Normally a refreshing feeling, since he loved to swim, but this felt uncomfortable because he knew he had an audience--a non-human audience.

Leaves felt weird against his bare skin. Not like clothing at all. And he didn't even like the feel of clothing to begin with.

"Anya. Nice name," he said absent-mindedly, sitting in the grass beside Maneki. "Mine's Monnayage. Any reason to came to talk to me, Anya?"