Douse This Fire

Ezra didn't look like he fully believed her words, and she couldn't blame him—even she didn't feel fully convinced by her statements. But at least it was enough to get him to turn back around and come back to her. Syanna gave him an apologetic smile and risked a few steps closer as they both closed the distance around the pool of water, still a few yards between them while she resumed her herb gathering. She saw how careful he was with her, considering every move he made and how close he got to her. Her ears flicked back, feeling a guilt twisting her heart to know that he was tiptoeing around her because of her. She didn't want him to feel like he had to walk on eggshells with her. Frowning as she stowed another piece of valerian, Syanna took a deep breath to steady her jittery nerves, then made her way around the pool of water until she was on the same side as him, still a few feet away, but no longer keeping him at bay. This was Ezra; he was her friend. If she couldn't trust him, who could she trust?

All the while she was gathering herbs she kept trying to ignore that nagging alarm warning her to keep an eye on Ezra. She had her back to him and her guard was down; it would be so easy for the massive, muscular dire brute to just come up and grab her and have his way with her and there'd be nothing she could do to stop him. A tremor ran through her, but she shook her head to snap herself out of it. Ezra wouldn't do something like that to her... would he? She tried to distract herself by focusing on the herbs she was looking for and the soothing white noise of the falls. It helped, and she'd even managed to snag some rare ginseng growing at the edge of the moist soil! Just as she was celebrating her small triumph and stowing the herb safely away, Ezra spoke again, his words broken by embarrassment. Her ears perked and swiveled to catch his words. Had someone been bothering her since...? Oh. OH! Oh yeah, he'd noticed for sure.

Cringing inwardly, Syanna let out a heavy sigh of defeat and turned back to face Ezra. The gentle dopey boy was such a sweetheart, threatening to beat up anyone who had bothered or harassed her. It did make her smile a little, but her flattened ears and tense posture betrayed her nerves. "You're very sweet, Ez, but no, it's nothing like that," she tried to reassure him while she sat, her bushy tail curling around her hip to cover her paws, looking like she wanted to shrink into herself. "I'm just... I'm sorry..." She turned her head away while she tried to gather the words to explain her emotions and anxiety in a way that wouldn't make him paint himself as the bad guy. "This is my first heat... I'd known it was coming, but I was still so nervous, because... Well, I..." A hard swallow to keep the nerves at bay and a slow exhale while she did her best to keep looking at him and hide the shame and embarrassment on her face. "I was raped, Ezra. There's a lot you don't know about me, about my life before I was alone... I didn't tell you any of it, because... because I didn't want you to think I was weak or not want me around anymore."

There. She had said it out loud for the first time in her life. She exposed the cracks in her that the bravado covered up, the trauma that had ruined her life and set her on this path she had never chosen. She looked away from Ezra, not confident enough to be able to look in his eyes when the words finally sank in. She didn't want to see what his expression would look like when he realized she wasn't this indomitable force of a wolf and was just a broken little girl who had been abandoned by all those she thought cared for her. She knew how this conversation would go. He'd ask for the grim details, silently judge her, tell her she was no longer welcome in the pack, then leave. She was too weak to carry around like an invalid. Maybe she could at least give him her satchel to take the herbs back to Gwynevere before he cast her out, one last act of good before she had to start all over again.

"Syanna Alluráin"