Ciri
The disappointment in his eyes and the frown on his face is enough. Even if it hadn’t been, the words that follow next are. As he shrugs and admits that he wanted to see if her stars were more then decoration, that slow spreading dread now smothers her like a thick blanket. It takes a minute it for it to click, to understand that it is her friend that is behind the monstrosity that had just attacked them, no, attacked her.
The Gale she knows would never play on her fears just as the Gale she knew would have recalled her star shield. She remembers that visit to Hyaline when she had been unsure about the lake and the “monster” that lay beneath its waters. How he had soothed her worry when he recalled that she had fought her way from the lake once before. The similarity of the deer bones to the Leshen she had once faced are salt in an open wound as the little world she had started to rebuild all comes crashing down around her just as a star in the sky above them blazes across the sky as it falls.
“You’re not Gale.” She whispers and takes a defiant step towards him. The swirls in her cold eyes churn with sudden anger, alleviating her from the choking fear that rises in her throat. She still doesn’t comprehend the full extent of what stands before her. She’s had her run in with evil shifters before, the mark from that encounter still permanently slashed across her face. She assumes that this is some cruel prank or joke, someone in disguise or even an illusion. She has no idea that this is all that's left of the kind stallion she had once known.
“What have you done with my friend?” She snarls as she pulls her stars back around her and throws up her shield. This is a side of Ciri that Gale had never gotten to see and the one that had gotten her through the Underneath. At the heart of her is a fighter and she feeds off the strong emotions that roll through her now of worry, sadness, anger, and fear. She could fix this, she thinks, she can find the real Gale and they will talk of the heavens and the stars and everything will be just fine. She can fix this. She can.
Can't she?
all of time and space, everywhere and anywhere, every star that ever was
@Gale