02-27-2017, 08:52 PM
She woke sudden, her eyelids rapidly wide though she still viewed the world around her with a sleepy grogginess.
Something stirred within her, beneath flesh and bone and fascia. It beckoned her to rise from within and she obeyed with no question. Upon sluggish legs she rose and stepped away from her redwood and the ring of petals she’d placed delicately in a circle around her. The magnetic resonance which pulled her forth from the core of her body bid her not to tarry, and so it was that Illae was tugged forward with a sleepy and ungainly gait towards the summoning.
She had awoken late it seemed, for many had already gathered in the sunlight. Amongst them there were some who were familiar, and others she knew of but did not really know. She cast her eyes to Reagan, and the strong pull which had summoned her here softened. She heeded Reagan’s words, she understood. She had used this forest, had taken and grown and become stronger. Gained strength both in body and mind. It was right that there should come a time when she must give back. Illae bobbed her delicate head, but there was more than just acceptance in that motion. Taiga was her home. Ruan and the forest had been her safe haven when she’d had none. She did not know who to fight a battle, did not know how to negotiate peace, but for Taiga, for its inhabitants, those who were like her, and others who were not, she would learn.
“I wish to help in all ways.” She spoke somewhere from behind them all. Her voice a soft trill, though let that not dissuade you from the steely determination she’d placed behind those words.