Lyracion

I sigh slightly, staring out into the dark woods. The thought hadn't really occurred to me before, but I began to wonder why Lucas hadn't returned yet. I lay my still-trembling-body onto the ground, facing the woods. What if something had happened to him? I'm not sure what I'd do if something did happen to him. He's the only other escaped Hellborn.

No matter how much I tried, I worried too much to sleep that night.

"I can't believe I have to hunt for some stupid rabbits or deer with my fine weapons. It's ridiculous. It's like Jarus doesn't understand a fire would hunt and cook them for us." Lucas sighs, glaring over at the dead rabbit with one of his worse arrows in it. At least he could be happier once the thing actually made a meal. Fortunately enough, he enjoys deer meat enough, but the rabbit meat just wasn't his favorite. He glances over at the day's catch and at Hope before removing his arrow from the final dead rabbit and placing it with the other carcasses. "You know, Jarus will get to clean all this out, lucky him, I suppose." He chuckles and walks over to the bare spot on the ground where he had made a campfire the previous night. Deciding it best to not leave so late in the day, he worked on getting the fire back up, still wishing he could just let it ravage the entire forest. Cooked food would be plenty then, surely.

Once the fire was stabilized, he glares at Hope once more before moving a little ways away from their clearing. He has a small pool of water nearby and plenty of brush to sleep on. Now, if only he could figure out a way to not have the annoying griffin always in the way... then it might not be so bad. It's not that he heavily dislikes her specifically or anything of the like, he just... despises griffins. Unfortunately, she was their only escape and, besides that, Jarus had allowed himself to become attached to the dumb thing. It wasn't a matter of discussion, really. Hope stays. Scuffling his feet as he sits down on a boulder, Lucas wonders how animals could all be so inferior and incredibly stupid. "I mean, they can't even really talk." He grumbles, picking up a stone and throwing it into the forest in front of him. "They're just... animals. Sheesh, Jarus thinks we owe her something for getting her out, but isn't that what animals are here for? To serve?" He asks himself, pushing his feet on the ground while grinding his hands into the boulder before thrusting himself off of it and stomping back over to the fire and plopping down next to it, not even noticing Hope nibbling on a few of the rabbits.

After a few moments, however, he simply could not put up with her making slobbering noises and glares over at her to demand her to knock it off, but, instead, sees her nomming happily on his most recent catch. Bursting with anger, he growls numerous insults at the creature, such as "flea bag" and, essentially, "fake eagle" and "fucked up mix of bird and mangy cat." After insulting Hope who, with wide eyes, had stopped eating and sat down by the fire with her bird head on her talons, Lucas shakes his head and determines it safe to leave the rest of the food with her while he goes to shoot a few arrows into a tree and cool off.

Shooting a few arrows makes him far more pleasant and slightly less pissed off at the world. After all, he couldn't shoot the mangy cat-bird to just rid himself of the problem, so killing a few trees is about the most he can do. Besides, he no longer felt like hunting. Pulling his arrows out of the tree for the millionth time, he plops down on the ground by the pool and looks down into it, seeing his reflection in the water. "How can I look so disheveled?" He wonders, attempting to understand how only a month ago he would have been sleeping in his bed right now with every intention of waking the next morning to battle with his brothers and sisters for practice. They had all been training their whole lives. That's all their lives had ever been, so he isn't really sure what it is now. After a moment of staring at his reflection, he slips his hand into the water before making a fist and pulling it out again, now chilled and damp.

For a few seconds he watches the water droplets drip, drip, drip from his hand before he shakes it mostly dry and closes his eyes, sitting straight once again before opening them. Across the pool of water... "Is that a..?" He whispers to himself as he watches it for a moment. "It's magnificent... large, black, bat-like wings with a smoky black body... long, black mane and tail..." The pegasus glances over at him before leaning its head down to the water and gulping down a big slurp of the pure water which it called its pool. Lucas continued to watch it, admiring its magnificence before scoffing at his own thoughts. "Damn animal. Only good thing about you is you don't like rabbits." He grumbles, beginning to turn his head away, but the pegasus jumped slightly and whinnied charmingly with a slight hint of frustration, drawing Lucas's eyes back to it. The winged-horse bobbed its head at him with an air of nostalgia which he could not place with its whinny.

Confused by the animal's odd behavior and by his own over-reading of said behavior, he pulls himself from the ground to draw out a bow and arrow with a determination to kill the beast and rid it of whatever evil spirits lie within. Panicking, the horse flaps its twenty-five foot wingspan, raising itself slightly from the ground as it throws its head and strikes its front hooves into the air. Feeling incapable of destroying such a magnificent creation, he hides away his arrow once again and throws his bow back over his shoulder. "You would do my arrows justice, though." He thinks aloud with a smirk over at the animal. "Rabbits just aren't worth my arrows like you are."

Shaking his head, Lucas sits back down on the ground, continuing to watch the black horse flap its wings in the clearing and light on the ground or flutter in the air. "Why do you jump around like that? I've never seen a bat flutter like a damn bug, yet you flit about like some daylight-moth as if you're afraid I'd actually shoot you. You're ridiculous, horse." Raising an eyebrow, he glances over at the creature as it forces itself to stand on the ground and stay there, no longer bending to the will of the human who insulted him. "Huh, you stopped. It'd be funny if you were actually sentient enough to understand me." The horse bobs its head while pawing the ground in an unappreciative manner after Lucas makes this comment and narrows his eyes at what he considers to only be a beast. "Oh... You can understand me?" He smirks slightly before continuing, "That means that you'll understand when I call you inferior and like every other creature to be used by the true sentient beings. You know that, don't you?" He chuckles more, watching the horse rear up and strike the air five times with his front hooves while aggressively beating his wings against the air. Sending out an angered whinny into the woods, the horse falls back onto its fronts, still beating its wings and flicking its tail from side to side impatiently. After both their acts of violence, the pegasus and the man become silent, watching each other across the pond, and allowing their bodies to go still as the air around them grows tense, but just as motionless as their bodies. The only sounds being that of the night creatures coming out from their dens and hollows to scavenge for food.

Nearly an hour later, the man and the horse still found solace in each others' eyes, not wanting to look at the weapons or the bat wings of the other, not wanting to know of the other's advantages. Finally, a frog croaks in the middle of the pond, a deep croak, breaking the air and forcing it to move again as both the sets of eyes are drawn to the pristine water. Suddenly feeling small in comparison to the beast across the way, Lucas stands and allows his eyes to lock on the pegasus's wings; beautiful and magnificent like the creature. Bowing its head slightly, the horse pushes itself off the ground and seemingly floats to the other side of the water where it lands next to the man and watches his every motion from the occasional twitch of his eye to the scuffling of his feet as he kicks at a rock. The man finds himself doing the same to the muscular being he finds in front of himself, finally breaking and bowing his head as a sign of acceptance and equality to the being. Without another message being sent between the two, the horse-being paws his name, Noir, into the sandy ground beneath their feet and hooves. "Lucas." He states, reaching a hand out to touch Noir who, in turn, nuzzles the hand with his nose. After this exchange of names and acceptance, Lucas turns to go back to the camp, realizing it to be nearly two in the morning, and Noir plods along beside him until they reach the clearing where Lucas and Hope had been staying.

The next morning, still a little before the sun was to come up, Lucas wakes up and gathers all of the food left, makes sure the fire is completely put out and wakes both Hope and Noir. He quickly exchanges their name and looks between them as they seem to be in deeper understanding of each other than he certainly could be of either of them, but, he knows they need to get back to Jarus. "Let's go already. It's gonna be morning and we were supposed to be back before dark yesterday. Sheesh, he's gonna worry. Hope, you know how he gets." Lucas rolls his eyes a little at them before placing all the food on Hope's back and ties it down firmly so it won't shift as she runs. "You can't fly today because you're still hurt, but you can stay on the ground, okay?" He asks her, realizing he's asking an animal to do something. He shakes his head before bowing to Noir, hoping that will be acceptable enough to be allowed onto his back for faster traveling. Noir pretends momentarily to not accept, but does eventually allow his new friend onto his back to fly through the air. "We'll be right up above the treeline, so keep us in sight. If you need anything, just call out, ya know... or whatever..." Realizing how idiotic he sounds, Lucas shakes his head again and points to the sky, allowing Noir to take the lead from there. "I doubt Hope even understood." He sighs, hoping Noir would help him out on understanding her, but he doesn't and only begins flying. Luckily enough, Hope doesn't want to be left alone enough that she begins running, following after Noir and Lucas.

Finally making it back to their main stay of camp, Lucas has Noir drift down into the clearing as Hope appears and immediately runs over to Jarus. Smirking ever so slightly, Lucas jumps off Noir a little before they even hit the ground. Curious about the other people there, Noir went over to the girl in fox form and nuzzled her face while pawing at the ground, but he also makes certain to lick her awake, nickering slightly at how odd her fur feels against his tongue and lips. However, he can tell she isn't fully fox because of her non fox-like sleeping behavior. Foxes often run in their sleep like dogs might during a dream, but this fox is still in comparison. The only explanation was that of her being a human that's not human. Lucas takes a deep breath before flopping onto the ground, not even sure why the heck a random fox was asleep at his camp, but not particularly caring with so much sleep deprivation on his eyelids.

My ears flattened back against my head as I woke up, feeling the tongue of a large animal licking me. I tried to duck my head further down before I backed up and glared at the animal, almost instantly losing my glare as I see that it's a dark pegasus with leathery wings. I back up towards Jarus, moving around where the embers of last night's fire still glow and making sure not to remove my vision from the large animal.

As I reach where Jarus slept, my hind legs pressed up against a new person and I immediately whirled around to see who was there, relaxing slightly as I notice the person was laying beside Jarus and his scent filled my nostrils. I recognized the scent as the second one on Jarus from when I first met him and so I relax, though still wary of the pegasus and curl up next to the fire again, watching the large animal.

I wake up a bit confused as Hope stares down at me, an excited look in her eyes. "Hey there big girl." I grin lazily, petting the side of her face with the palm of my hand. "Where's Lucas?" I ask the animal. Being an animal, it obviously does not respond. I get up slowly, scanning the ground and instantly spot Serra in her lynx form next to Lucas' sleeping body. I follow her intent gaze to a large, majestic looking creature. Great I thought, something else that wants to kill us.

I subconsciously reach around my back for my bow, but get nothing but a handful of air. Oh right, it's still laying over in the dirt... right where the Pegasus is standing. I instead draw two throwing knives, raising my hand to throw one. I stop myself before I throw it. It wasn't attacking...

In fact, it looked as if it had known us for years. I immediately walk a few feet to where Lucas lies on the ground, crouching down and nudging him with my hand. He, no doubt, had brought this creature back with him, which was odd given that he had a strong dislike for animals.

I exchange a quick glance with Serra, then turn my attention back to Lucas. "Lucas, what the hell is this?"

Waking up before he is even touched, Lucas jumps slightly at the touch of his dear friend. "What the hell is what? Noir? He's a pegasus, sheesh." He replies, sitting back up while figuring out when he had passed out. Had I really passed out? He wonders, as he pushes his hair back and fixes a metal earring. "Thought he would be more of a challenge to capture than kill. So, I gave him a name and wallah, now he's here." He finishes, forcing himself to stand up and look over at his friend's bow, Noir, and the random dog-thing which had invaded his camp. "Would you like to explain the new dirt bag? Or can I burn it with flames and blacken its white spots around its eyes to match the rest of its fur?" He points over to the fox as he raises an eyebrow before stumbling over to where the bow was and half-heartedly tossing it over to Jarus.

Noir hadn't even moved while Jarus threatened him, knowing Lucas would probably kill the man before allowing that to happen. However, with the threat subsided, he paws his hoof at the ground and begins racing around the clearing and occasionally darting at where the fox is, wondering however it could be a fox, but not at all. What is the explanation for this? Whinnying more, he attempts to get Lucas's attention focused on the fox's odd behavior, but eventually notices his failure and gives up, plodding back to where he had been before, only to flap his wings and nicker at the fox and shake his mane as if to say, "I know you're not a fox, d*mmit."

Having not paid any attention to Noir acting oddly until that moment, Lucas only shakes his head slightly and with more curiosity than anything. Glancing up at the sky with now evident brilliant shades of golden and pinked sunlight dripping from the occasional cloud onto the ivy green tops of the trees and through their canopies to the dark forest green floors as much as it can. The yellow greens of the clearings receive the most sunlight and also have various plants that, when blooming, accent the sunlight perfectly. Besides that, the cave along the cliffside was dappled by shadows which created a camouflage of sorts during the early morning to mid morning light.

I grin a little as I catch my bow with ease. "She is an ally. I met her last night, you know, when you were supposed to have been back?" I sigh slightly remembering the worry I had. He doesn't know it, but I care for him. Not in a 'good friends' way, but almost in a 'love' way. It's hard for me to deal with it, because I'm pretty sure he's straighter than a flag pole. Besides, even if he wasn't, we grew up together, we're more like brothers than anything. It's weird that I even feel this way, I've never found a guy attractive before, only women. It was all just too confusing to think about.

I try to change topics in my mind as I look over to Noir. "I thought you hated animals, with the obvious exception of Hope," I grin a little, I knew he despised her. I couldn't see why, though. She's majestic and loyal. As I say this, Hope gives a small caw of agreement. And I dare say that I could see a smile on her beak. I grin a bit wider.

Everything seemed so... peaceful. Having Hope seem relatively happy given that her wing is still broken. I'm back with Lucas. The forest was alive with all sorts of lovely animals. The scenery was beautiful. Everything was just so perfect, and for a moment everything seemed to stand still, as if the entire world was waiting just for us.

But then I realized, it wasn't. Lucas was still oblivious to the task at hand.

I stand up, still in my lynx form and pad over to Hope, giving the Pegasus "Noir" a wide berth and I examine Hope's wings. After a couple minutes, my fur glows softly and I shift into my humanoid form. I stretch out a hand towards Hope and pause. "May I?" I ask the animal.

His gaze shifting between the amazingly stunning human-dog-fox-thing and his friend, he smirks and chuckles a little. "Ally, huh? Sounds like Noir, just met him last night too. Found out some animals are fun to capture and break, that's all." He shrugs, glancing over at Noir who snorts in disagreement at his comment before going back to glaring down the human that had just been a fox, now understanding everything. "Anyways, Jarus, I wasn't back because I had to deal with your bird-cat eating all the rabbits I caught every time I turned my back! Not that I mind, but I thought you might want more than deer meat. Besides, I only shot two deer, so not very many. I had to make up for it with fish and rabbits which isn't necessarily easy to do." He scoffs, squinting his eyes at the griffin before looking back to the girl.

"Do we really have to keep you around?" He chuckles at her, glancing at Hope's wing. "If you can really fix her, then I guess I shouldn't complain too much, really, but I still don't care for cat-dog things with puffy, black tails and weird eye marks. So, just avoid it, okay?" He asks to confirm, pushing away some of his thoughts which he probably shouldn't be having. Without even waiting for a reply, he looks her over once more before lying down next to the fire and lying back on the ground to get comfortable and maybe rest some more. "At least it's daylight now so you can already clean out all the meat. I hunted it, you clean." He says, directing his comment at Jarus, but without making that in any way evident.

I snap out of my daze and run over to Lucas, placing my hands on his shoulders, shaking him more violently than intended. "Screw the rabbits! We have to get to the Capital City! My little friend here showed me that everything we know about Forneus is a lie! There was never any real threat outside The Rim, and we have been sending Hellborns to their ultimate demise for centuries! This means that we can both stop this madness and become heroes!" My eyes get a bit wide as this information dawns on me. We'll be heroes!

I stand up, hurriedly looking around the camp. "Of course there's the matter of Forneus himself, which we will undoubtedly have to deal with ourselves, and perhaps the other Hellborns. But, we'll save all that for later. As for now, we must pack up and head out if we want to stop this before it all goes down." I twitch nervously, tossing everything into the small leather bag that I carry.

"Hurry up and do something about Hope's wing, would you?" I demand, looking back over to Serra, not waiting for a response. A few cooked rabbits get tossed into the bag, along with a few twigs and leaves, a canteen half-full of water, a full bottle of a strong mead, and wooden eatery. I sling it across my back after snapping it shut, a large, but flickering, grin on my a face. I turn back around, sliding the chain mail hood over my head. All of this is done within about a minute.

I look between the two, a 'Well, what are you waiting for?' look on my face.

I blink, watching Jarus packing random materials and I just burst out laughing. "Do you really think we're going to need some twigs and leaves there, Jarus?" I ask as I play with Hope's wing a little after calming down some, still chuckling, and snap the bones back into place. "Anyway, hope won't be flying anytime soon... and I need something to splint her wing with." I say, all the humor gone out of my tone. "Do you even know which direction we need to head to get to wherever the capitol for this place is?" I demand. I turn my gaze towards Lucas. "As for you, I am not a cat-dog thing, I am a Lynx Kitsune and Hope is a Griffin." I remain still as I hold Hope's wing in place so that the injured bones and muscles don't shift out of position.

After Jarus grabs him and rants hurriedly about lies and Forneus and everything else, Lucas watches him scamper off, still on rant, to pack everything and prepare for going to the capital city. "U-uhm, not that I wanna burst your bubble... but we're kinda wanted right now. If we just charge into the Capital, they're gonna catch and take us to the Rim... No offense, but I don't wanna die." He sighs, raising an eyebrow as his friend asks them both what they're waiting for, wondering if he had even heard him. "It'd be better to devise a well thought out plan first..." Lucas mentions, looking over at the cat-dog and sighing.

"Hope's an animal who's a lion-eagle-hawk thing, you're a cat-dog-human thing." He states bluntly, smirking slightly over at her. She might as well get over it because he's not about to stop calling her that and really could care less what she is. "Besides, I'm tired and it's more important that we continue our training and store up energy by eating what you just sent me out to catch." Lucas glances over at Jarus before shutting his eyes again and drawing in a deep breath from the air. Noir steps over to him and stands by him to watch the others, every now and then tossing his head at the lynx kitsune.

I sigh. What part of urgent don't they understand? None of it, apparently. "We don't exactly have the leisure of time on our side." I mumble as I walk over to the rock next to the dead fire, placing a rabbit on it, angrily skinning it with a throwing knife. "If we don't work something out, soon, then we'll have an entire army to deal with. The king will start sending out patrols or something for us, no doubt. And if we end up getting to the city still alive, at this rate, it will have been well past time for The Reaping. And you know what that means?" I pause for a moment as I examine the rabbit, the skin now gone and it's organs hanging out. I have to hold myself back from ripping them out and eating them whole.

"It means that the castle will be on lock down, and the entire province under tension. This is because they will all be expecting demons to come rushing from The Rim and plunder their homes. There's no other way to do this except for quick-" Thats when the bells rang inside my head. A convoluted scheme had just hatched inside my head. I set the knife down, immediately heading over to my bag.

I shuffle around it until I draw out a map, studying it closely. "Guys, I may have an idea that involves us leaving tommorow morning." I say as a grin creeps across my mouth. This had to work.

I look at Jarus, slightly annoyed. "Hope's wing will take at least two days to mend and after that she won't be able to fly for a week."
I grab a branch and whittle it down to splint size, carefully burning a shape into the wood before I tie it to Hope's wing carefully. "Lucas, you should really learn to call things what they are, not by what you think they are." I sound slightly irritated as I say this before walking over to Jarus and his map. "And what could you possibly be thinking, leaving so quickly?" I ask him as I stand right behind him, looking at the map.

"Don't be ridiculous..." Lucas grumbles, keeping his eyes closed rather than even looking over at his angered friend. "Don't you know they're already looking? Hah, they've been panicking since the moment we disappeared. Honestly, we're lucky they haven't found us yet. Besides, even if we do get in somehow and try to tell them that they are all being lied to..." Drowsily opening up his eyes, he looks up to the sky, reaching his hand up to it. "How do you think they'll react? Do you think they'll instantly believe all of what we say? Realistically, they'll not listen and take us captive instantly, locking us away for Forneus." He allows his hand to slacken and fall back to the ground.

Not even bothering to look at the map, Lucas ignores them discussing it, feeling absolutely exhausted. Never having truly slept well, he should be okay with not sleeping well, correct? No. That first night of freedom, he slept more soundly than ever before, but the nights following that, he was out hunting more than he was sleeping. He had hardly had any sleep besides that first night. "I don't even have the energy for this." He grumbles, blocking out the annoying girl-fox-cat-dog's voice. He could really care less on her opinion, even if she agrees with his view on it.

"Can we just do what we need to for right now and just fucking figure this out later?" He curses bluntly, becoming more annoyed by the argument by the moment. All of this sort of infighting would only result in problems later, so he sees it as a better idea for them to all do what they need to do immediately, then focus on infiltrating the city and dropping rumors of the lies. "I mean, seriously, just charging in there isn't about to work anyways. Sorry." He grumpily grumbles, clamming his eyes shut, not planning on opening them up again until he had fully slept it out. Noir nickers softly in agreement to what Lucas had said, but, of course, who of them could understand that other than Lucas himself who is no longer even paying much attention. If anything, he's just rambling on his own about nothing in exhaustion.

I sigh. "I don't suppose we have to leave tommorow. Just know that I have a plan." I set the map away with a slight feeling of defeat. "So, right now we have to let Hope heal up, and we need to store up our energy and what not. I'm still a bit tired, so I'll skin the rabbits and get them cooking." I say, glancing over to Lucas then Serra, nodding slightly.

I walk over to the stone once more, sitting down. I grab the throwing knife from the rock and continue up with the rabbit. I make incisions at the legs and stomach area, licking my lips as blood drips from it. I grab the top of the skin, yanking it off with ease given the strategic cutting. I set the pelt aside, using the knife to gut the rabbit, tossing the heart casually into my mouth.

I finish gutting it, setting it next to a few of the skewers. I do this process a few times, setting aside a few of the guts for Lucas. When there are eight prepared to be cooked, I set them up as Serra did the previous night. I let out a slight yawn. "I may take me a nap while these cook. Mind watching them, Serra?"

I begin to walk over to where Lucas lays, sitting down a few feet from him.

I watch as Jarus skins and guts the rabbits and nod when he asked if I would watch the rabbits, setting up some wood in a tent above the embers from last night's fire and gently blow on them, getting them to ignite with flames once more. I watch the rabbits while both Jarus and Lucas rest, turning the rabbits as each side darkens. While I wait I watch the flame dance before me, a gentle smile on my lips before I think to use the flames to scry my home settlement.

I finish scrying and let the flames resume their natural shape and dancing, smiling more as I continue to watch them and turn the rabbits to ensure equal cooking. As each rabbit finishes cooking, I pull them out of the ground and set them onto a flat stone to cool. I sit and watch the fire as I let the two boys sleep and rest, the rabbits all cooked and cooling.

"What do you want?" Lucas grumbles after hearing Jarus flop down next to him. At this point, he just wants to be left alone so he can sleep, but Jarus seems determined to make that impossible. "At least we have food for the moment, and some weird fox person thing, I suppose... but Noir is far gentler than her. She's kinda a bitch." He huffs outwardly, but more chuckling inside because he finds her interesting. He'd always had a thing for bitches, like the girls who were hellborns... yeah, they'd always been a lot like the fox-dog humanoid. "Heh, not always a bad thing, I suppose." He comments, still distracted by his sleep deprivation from the hunting.

I sigh slightly, a bit irritated at Lucas' blunt complaining. "She's not a bitch," I stretch a little bit. "And I'm tired too, so quite god damn complaining before I shove a foot up your ass." I huff, laying down on my side, facing the fire. As much as I care about him, he can be quite the royal arse at times. I go over the plan in my head several times, each time picking out and changing some flaws. It was coming together good. I just don't know if I can wait a week. I've always been an active person, Lucas...

I look over to him, he's obviously pissed at the world because it won't let him rest.

... Not so much.

"Wow, you're defensive today." Lucas chuckles, glancing over at his friend a little. "Not even complaining and you're getting hard over some girl. Shit, man." He smirks, closing his eyes again, but continue to smirk a little. "Calling a chick how she's actin' and complaining are two different things." He sighs and stretches his arms a little, just wanting to take a nap.

"Hard over-" That infuriated me. I stand up, my face going red. "I don't see why she shouldn't be acting like a bitch, considering how much of a dick you're being. I mean, what the hell has gotten into you?" I glare down at him, my demon blood beginning to come to a boil. "And who the fuck says I'm hard over her? I don't even know her that well. And if you must really fucking know, I am 'hard', as you so call it, but not over her."

"It's over you." I freeze. Oh shit. What have I just done? I blink a few times before stomping off into the woods. Had he even got the message? Probably. I try to sigh as I walk through the forest, but it comes out as more of a grunt. I don't know if I can go back to them. Or at least, not now.

I look up as Jarus exploded at his friend and stormed off into the woods. "What... did you say?" I ask Lucas softly as I watch the spot where Jarus had disappeared, having been startled out of my fiery daydreaming. "And who brought up being hard over someone?" I turn around to look at Lucas, who is still laying on the ground.

Lucas opens his eyes as his dear friend begins to get angry, but attempting to get a word in was nearly impossible as his dear friend flipped into a near rant. "I-" He attempts to start, but Jarus' glare only lasts a slight moment, not nearly long enough to get any more than a word out. As his friend continues, he props up on his forearms and goes wide-eyed at him. "What the-" He starts again, but yet again being cut off by him with his final statement. "What did you jus-" He stops, watching as his friend goes hotter than he was before simply racing off into the forest.

As he sits up, he realizes what his dear friend had just confessed to him. "Oh my... I haven't even done anything..." He sighs and watches as Jarus leaves. "Had I really been that much of a dick?" He asks himself, shaking his head before laying back down again.

However, the dog-fox thing comes over to bother him after only a moment of him being deep in thought about this unwanted and slightly crazy confession. "Well, I mentioned how he was hard over you... but he's not..." Lucas sits up again to look over at her. "He wants me to be less of a dick too." Lucas sighs, looking down as he brings his knees up and drapes his arms over them.

I blink and look at Lucas, a little dumbfounded. "I thought your scent on him was a little strong... but I didn't quite imagine that..." I turn back to look at where Jarus had disappeared. "And your thoughts on that, Lucas?" I ask, trying not to give anything away.

"We're friends, that's it." Lucas grumbles, shooting a glare over at her as he tilts his head slightly in her direction. "My thoughts are that I'm being who I've always been. He can get over it." He shrugs while rolling his eyes and returning to his drooped-over shoulders with head held low position. "You should really just stay out of it..." He adds on before standing up and pacing a few feet away to where Noir stands, only to mount up and gently kick his sides to let him know he wants to fly up. Before they lift off the ground entirely, Noir flaps his large, bat-like wings to prepare while Lucas wraps his hands in some of Noir's mane hair in order to use it like one uses a halter.

I sigh softly and wave dismissively at Lucas. "Alright, I won't poke my nose into your erm... business." I stand up and draw the energy out of the fire, putting it entirely out. "It's probably best if we move to another location anyway, with your government looking for you two." I set about packing up what's left of the camp into the packs that had been left behind.

I look at Lucas. "You'll be able to scout out a sufficient new campsite, won't you?" I ask as I place the packs onto Hope's back. "As well as get Jarus to the new camp." I finish as I lead Hope out of the cleaned up site.