Van woke with a start from the arms of sleep, and immediately sat up with a gasp, the bed linens rolling off of her. Something wasn't right! But... But... what?! She looked around, wide awake and bewildered as anything. It was... it was! A room. She was lying on something soft and quite warm. A lift of the bedsheet revealed that not only was she sitting on a sort of... thing made of packed fluff in a bag that smelled vaguely of animals, she was quite comfortable, and quite naked. With a squeak and learned modesty, she hitched up the linen again and looked around the room.
And it was a room. Peaceful, clean, and bare of snarling monsters trying to drag her off or tear her apart. The pale-skinned blonde flopped back in the bed with a PLUFF and a heartfelt sigh of relief. It had been a nightmare. Again it had been a nightmare, that was. The fifth this week, in fact, and it was only tuesday (for as far as she cared, which wasn't very far.)
To minute detail, Van examined the ceiling, and let her mind take its time working through the details of the night.
She'd come in from the mountains a couple nights ago, and she was in Serendipity.
She was hungry.
She'd been having nightmares about her former pack for days now.
She was hungry.
She'd gotten fed up with sleep deprivation and things to eat that squeaked when she caught them, so she traded some furs so she could stay a week or two in a place with a bed of comfort and eat hot meals.
She was hungry.
She was... hungry. The other thoughts sort of fled as her wolf chased them, curious to see if they tasted nice. Sleep could wait. Food time was now. So Van started her day, clutching the soft, pleasant bedsheet to her body as she wandered over to where she'd set her stuff.
Some moments later, the hallway gave a creak as she pushed her door open and stepped into the hall. You'd need quite a large crowbar to part her from her hide and fur clothing - it was comfortable, functional clothing and she didn't need to do much anything with them - besides, they smelled like the forest, and the nectars and pine saps she used to treat the skins, and old campfires, the combination of which reminded her of happy times.
Entering the Inn's publican area, Van took in the clientele, both with her eyes and with her nose. Fresh tilled earth marked one or two - old men, and her bright blue eyes met theirs. They twinkled at her, and she smiled at them as she gave them a respectful little nod. Then there was a new scent - a pleasant one, too -female, clean (as she'd come to identify it), and healthy. Van turned to look, and got an eyeful of serenian beauty.
This one emanated quiet, confident power, and her staggering beauty made Van stop dead in her tracks. She'd heard about nobility, right, but the way she'd heard it described didn't do a creature like this justice. She found the elven line of the chin visible from the back amenable, but more than that, Calyse had a figure like a panther - lithe and athletic, muscular but not brutish - someone built to move and keep moving. Breathtaking. In comparison to those braided black locks, interlaced with exotic silvery blues, those fine clothes and her quiet confidence, the blonde-haired, fur-clad, feral-natured Van felt quite plain indeed. But instead of transmuting into envy, Van simply wanted to curl up at her feet and happily take whatever crumbs of kindness would happen to fall. It was a curious sensation, one she'd felt only once before, under very different circumstances and for entirely different reasons. In any case, it was damn close to worship.
The werewolf sat quietly beside Calyse, and just... watched her, her eyes wide with an unhidden expression of awe, no thought given to the idea that she might be being rude. This was the first time she'd seen a pure, platonic example of true nobility. Some part of her must have had some decency, because she heard her own mouth saying.
"You are beautiful." she said softly and quite simply with sincerity ringing on every word. She immediately felt ashamed, without quite understanding why.
