Yeah okay sorry I suck at titles - Luna, the Ice Princess (1/5/3 Hylian) [Blonde Panther] Reward: TBA - Pippin Harby, the Vulture (5/1/2 Hylian) [Darth_Slaverus] Reward: Botany 1 and 2, Pungent Defense Elixir, +4 Rupees. Owww... The first thing Luna had to do when she regained consciousness was to clutch her head. It pounded as if she'd hit it on something hard; if that had happened, that would explain why she had lost consciousness in the first place. More concerning was that she had no idea what she had hit it on and how. Supposedly, whatever had happened, had happened too quickly for her to fully register. She sighed in frustration; she hated holes in her information. Sitting up, she stopped clutching her head so she could instead palpate it. She felt no wetness and when she drew her hand back, she saw no blood clinging to it. So at least her skin, and more importantly, her skull, were intact. That was a victory, even if she felt a large bump on the back, slightly off-centre to the left. Ikana's treacherous terrain spun around her whenever she moved her head too quickly, though, so she elected to remain seated on the ground, supporting herself with two hands, as she turned her gaze upwards. ...ah. Yes. Falling from that cliff, which had given out under her feet judging from the debris around her, would have resulted in a landing that would have knocked her out. That was one mystery solved. Fortunately, there had been no monsters around to take advantage of her prone form. In fact, her direct surroundings were quiet. ...too quiet. Why wasn't Horus yelling at her that she had no business scaring the shit out of him like that? ...because Horus wasn't here. Horus wasn't here. Both her hands flew to her mouth to cover it, her eyes widening in terror. Her fall had separated her from Horus. And if he hadn't leapt down after her, he must have been hindered- that had to mean he was in trouble! She scrambled to her feet, grabbing hold of her head as it spun hard at the sudden motion. No, no. She didn't have time for this nonsense. She had to find Horus, the sooner the better. Every second she was apart from him was a second too many!
Rocks crunched underneath Pip Harby's boots as he trudged along the ridge, a little louder than the erstwhile mercenary would have liked. Wincing, he double-checked the Compass he currently held in his left hand (his right was occupied by Kingkiller) to make sure he was heading in the right direction, then resumed his march at a slower, more stealthy pace. This whole damn place made his skin crawl. He'd the stories about Ikana- how ReDeads, Stalfos, and worse haunted these mountains. Were it an option, he'd have given this place a wide berth and never looked back. But it wasn't. Pip had already spent one winter in the Lower Wilds, and that was not a mistake he cared to repeat, no sir. Prancing about the snow, trying not to freeze or starve to death, while packs of hungry Moblins and Lynels did their damndest to make a meal out of you? Not his idea of a good time. And unless he grew wings, Ikana was the only other place he could go. So, he'd make like a bear and find a cave or some ruins, stockpile supplies, and wait out the winter in the mountains, trusting in the undead nation's fearsome reputation to keep the savages of the Wilds away. That being the plan, Pip had decided to be proactive and 'get the lay of the land,' as his Deku mentor would have said, so that he would know the terrain ahead of time. It paid to be aware of all the best foraging spots... as well as all the escape routes, in case he ever needed to get in or out, sharpish. Surveying the area was a time-consuming job, but when the alternative was stewing in a Moblin's cauldron come the colder months, Pip would gladly do a bit of scouting. ... And if he got jumped by any bloody skeletons, well, he could always take up whittling, Pip thought as he idly twirled his knife in his hand. The wind was picking up, howling like a choir of banshees as it passed over the peaks. Such was the gale's volume that Pip almost didn't hear it- the distinctive sound of boots on uneven stone, not unlike the noise he had been making minutes earlier. Movement. He wasn't alone. Immediately dropping into a crouch, his blade at the ready, Pip stalked toward the source of the sound, his survival instincts taking over as it grew louder. The shuffling was erratic, but near as he could tell, only coming from a single creature. Good. If it was one of those shambling corpses, he'd close in and- He saw her. There, situated on a plateau just ahead of him, was a pretty young girl with icy blue hair, staggering about as if in a drunken stupor before a cliff face. Pip blinked. His eyes wandered to his Compass, then back to the strange woman. Sure enough, the Compass pointed straight at her. Damn. Did he really miss the company of women that badly? What the hell was this, a fairy tale? No scrawny waif would survive five seconds in Ikana. Zannah could have... not this girl. Was she a mirage? The desert was on the other side of these Din-forsaken mountains, but... Well, there was only one way to find out. Slipping his Compass back into his pocket, Pip plucked a pebble from the ground and hurled it close to the girl to get her attention, then began to make his way toward her, calling out as he did so. "Oi, if I said you had... a beautiful body... would you hold it against me...?" There, that would separate fiction from reality in a jiffy. A real woman would storm over and slap him. Not the best introduction, but he'd get to feel her hand on his face. He prayed she was real... he kinda missed being slapped. It was an odd thing to hope for, but a year of utter isolation did things to a man. What would have once been an embarrassing and slightly painful ordeal became one of life's simple pleasures, when magnified by the lens of loneliness.
Luna jolted when two stones clanged together less than a foot away from her. Oh, god. She'd been separated from Horus for what, five minutes? And already, she was in trouble. She'd rarely felt more vulnerable than at that exact moment. Worse, when she turned around she found herself approached by a man who was most definitely not him. The man was at least twice as big as Horus in any dimension but height, would certainly not win any beauty contests, unlike her handsome guardian. The only similarity between the two was the colour of their hair. Worse, what did he shout at her? Something about her beautiful body and holding it against him? Luna's eyes widened again, this time in recognition. When the number of people Horus called Tourists had started increasing in Ikana, Bertrand and Frederick had warned her about people who said such things. They wanted things from her that she could not, and most certainly should not ever give them, and Horus was entirely within his rights as her protector to beat these people within an inch of their lives. She, for her part, was perfectly entitled to unleash all the magic she had upon them. Anything to avoid having to give them what they wanted. Still, her head spun and she didn't think she could cast a spell right now. Fortunately, Horus was the only means of protection she'd been separated from during her fall. She plucked a leather coil from her hip, giving it a good swing to her side to uncoil it, and immediately lashing forward with it. The man was not within her reach yet, but the loud, threatening 'CRACK' the leather tip of her whip made when its speed surpassed that of most sound, should alert him that she was armed and capable. "Don't come any closer!" she screamed, "D-don't touch me!"
Once again Pip found himself blinking in utter disbelief. A whip? By the twice-blessed tits of Din, what had he gotten himself into? He raised a gloved hand to massage his temple, trying to stymie the oncoming migraine these new circumstances threatened to create. Well, at least he knew she was real, now. Sure, she hadn't slapped him, but if she were meant to be an enticing illusion, she had chosen the wrong fantasy to entertain. Normally he wouldn't have minded the presence of a dominatrix born of delusion, but this was neither the time nor place. A demure damsel, begging to be swept into his strong arms and spirited away to shelter for a romantic Razor Seed dinner would have been more appropriate... Not that his taste in imaginary women mattered, given that this was a genuine, bona-fide, in-the-flesh female. That wasn't the problem, per se... No, the problem was that he could tell at a glance that this girl was greener than grass. No sense of self-preservation whatsoever. The first rule of survival was not to make a lot of noise... and this dame was giving the wind a run for its rupees. He needed to shut her up, pronto. "Now... hold on just a minute..." Pip wheezed, rendered slightly breathless at the prospect of being near an actual woman, "Don't scream like that... You'll bring the whole damn mountain down on top of us... or worse... a horde of freakin' corpses..." Chancing a step closer, Pip slumped his shoulders in an attempt to appear hurt. All the crappy novels he had read suggested girls liked vulnerable men, so maybe the whipped dog routine would help win her over. Though, given her weapon of choice, he would be doing a spot of method acting if he were wrong. "I was just... jokin' around, havin' a laugh. Didn't mean nothing by it. Look..." In one fluid motion, Pip sheathed Kingkiller and put his hands up. "Put my knife away, see?" She didn't need to know that he had been his squad's quickdraw expert, able to palm his daggers in a heartbeat. "Let's... start over, huh? Name's Pip... Pip Harby, at your service..." He made an exaggerated bow to punctuate his introduction, only to stumble as his precarious footing gave way underneath the treacherous terrain. Recovering awkwardly, he looked back up at the girl and smiled in a manner he thought to be sheepish, but would more accurately be described as unnerving. So much for first impressions. Of course, he already knew how this would unfold. Civvies were always difficult. She would start yelling again, about how she couldn't trust him, about how he was ugly, about how he smelled, about how he was a mercenary bastard who would stab his own kin for the right price. Then again, he thought grimly, there might be some merit to that last one...
His attitude changed almost immediately after he saw her whip, so Luna tried to relax a bit. Now that she was alone, with no one to watch her back while she missed out on every detail that could save or end her life, panicking would do her no good. She drew her whip back, hesitating. What... was next? They'd established that they were both armed, ensuring that neither would act out against the other. But what now? Horus and the others always took care of these things. Luna always just stood back and waited for them to finish so they could be on their way. She wished she'd paid more attention. "Well..." she said, drawing back her whip and lowering it. "D-don't get too close. Stay there." At least her head had slowly stopped spinning and her focus was returning to her. And with it, her ability to sense danger. Her attention was immediately drawn to the cliff above her, where she knew Horus remained, and fear gripped her as she realised the danger she sensed wasn't aimed at her but at him. What a time for Cryo to be at the ruins, injured! Without the Ice Loftwing, Luna had little hopes of climbing up to where Horus was under attack before it would be too late. And even less so if she dawdled here. She'd wasted enough time. "I'm going," she said, turning around and looking at Pippin one more time to assure herself he wasn't going to jump her. Feeling secure, she looked ahead of her and started running, leaping over large rocks and cracks in the ground with ease as she looked up at the cliff, hoping to find an area with decent footholds or, heavens be willing, a path to the top.
