"Others would be surprised to hear you talk like this," he chuckled. "They think you are so calm, so passive."
She shrugged. "I don't say a lot to them, but that doesn't mean I don't think a lot," she retorted. "I have a lot of thoughts going through my head and just don't waste everyone's time saying all of them, unless the people around me need to actually hear them. Why, I'd reckon I think twice as much as people who talk all the time," she continued.
The pack on her back weighed on her so that she was stooped forward, but still she walked forward along the Great Road North. She was miles, even countries, away from her home and people, running away from her past in fear of her future. She had snuck out like a thief in the night, leaving a small note on her sister's bedside table. Even now, without her knowing, her sister was looking for her only a few miles south.
"I know I've caused some problems for Jackie, but I know I can do better for myself than just wait around and be tolerated by the people around me like a burden. I think this will be worth it."
"Why do you think the other nymphs dislike you so much? Do you think they shun you for your appearance, or do they dislike your blatant disregard for the way things are that your people focus so much on?" he asked.
She grumbled again, but either was a likely scenario. She shared her golden skin and almond eyes with her sister, and most of their nymph community. But the starkly white hair that fell in curling sheets to her knees was unique to her, and her mother`s people. Though in her childhood she had worn it knotted and twisted as her father`s people did, she had long since given up on the style in disgust. Her hair was coarse and thick and was far too rebellious to hold the intricate shapes that her father`s people bore. Even when she gained a contractor and new magic had run through her veins, her hair had acquired some pale violet sections, where the other dryads and nyads gained green or blue power streaks through their thinner brown locks. She also could not simply veil her hair, as her eyes themselves revealed her as a stranger, a strong brown shade that was so different from the blue and green eyes that had surrounded her all of her life.
"I don't think it's the hair," she whispered back. "I think it's just a reminder to everyone how different, how wrong I am. My birth is an atrocity against my people, and they've reminded me of that my whole life." She twined her shaking hands through those hairs, locking her body against the tremors that threatened to shake her apart. "My mother's people break things; they burn trees; they pollute waters; they kill animals, and feast on the remains. I'm simply a reminder of everything evil in this world," she whispered in despair.
"I doubt that the daemons all think of themselves as the evil creatures those silly creatures paint them. Anyways, at least you don't have the horns or the fire," he joked, trying to cheer her up. "Besides, your sister understands you. So unlike many people of the world, you are not fully alone," he added. If he hoped to brace her with kind words, he failed.
"She doesn't," the girl responded dejectedly. "She's strong. When people push her, she pushes back harder." She saw an opening along the side of the road and moved over to pull her lunch out of the pack. "She's made allies with powerful people and all I can do is hide behind her," she sighed. "If it hadn't been for me, she would never have had to work with either prince, would never have even seen them. It is a painful thing to feel like the tool of ruin for the only person who cares about you."
"Well, I care about you," Dürin said. His actual body was too far away to give her a hug, but the warm words felt like a telepathic one. "Well, think of it this way," he said. "Now that you have run away, your sister will no longer have you held over her head as a threat to ensure her good behavior. Now she basically has the freedom to choose who she actually wants to work for, of if she wants to be a free agent. Your escape will probably free her too."
She set up camp there in the clearing. Priscilla had no plan for a destination, and she could easily grow a home hidden in the flowers and charm the plants to grow the foods she'd need, so she took the opportunity to stay there for a while. Day after day and night after night she did the bare basics to care for herself and spent the rest of the time relishing the new freedom to dance and play and enjoy her life without any of her people around to judge her.
A few weeks in, a vampire came upon her camp at twilight and hid in the shadows, watching her. There she was, hair and limbs weaving a spell as they twisted and turned through the fitful moonlight. He had been simply passing through the
