From This Moment, Forever I Can Hope.

Ah yes, her assumption was proven correct. Talyssa was indeed the offspring of a lead couple, but how big was this mighty pack that offered aid to outsiders they know nothing of? Absinth made a mental note of the surname, Carpathius. Perhaps having the knowledge could be of use in the future. “I’d wager not, seeing you here in the trenches with the rest of us.” The girl cackled at the princess comment Goldie made, thinking with mirth of how improbable it was that she would ever see a true princess being pampered like her imagination taunted her with. Stopping her laughter abruptly once she processed the rest of Talyssa’s words. “A diplomat? What a brave non-princessy thing to do. I hope all the strangers you meet are as good-natured as I am, if not more so.” She neither truly praised the dream of Talyssa nor cared enough to think anything negative of it. There was no telling if she would ever meet this girl again. What did it matter what she wanted from life? With luck it would not be ripped away from her, along with other things. The only absolutes were luck and misfortune, life and death, pain and peace.

“Maybe one day you will be the envoy between your pack and whatever dishonorable group I end up in, Princess.” Absinth mused aloud as the other girl had begun to step away in search of something to hunt. What would become of her now? What was she to do in such a new land with colorful strangers with odd mentalities.. Of course she had already given herself the correct answer. Find others with like-minds. Absinth was not an evil creature, though she wondered what she looked like in the eyes of Goldie. She knew she had what it took to do some immoral things, but a villain in any right? She wasn’t entirely sure what that meant.  However, joining a group that was her polar opposite would do her no good either.  

She was mulling over her next move when Talyssa returned with a bundle in her mouth, a gull and its nest placed before her. Absinth felt her stomach twist in pain from being empty for far too long, and with a great deal of endurance she shakily rose to her feet. “A beggar has no right to choose.” Her inky maw dropped down to the meal and with savagery she tore into the gull. When she was done with it she took each egg in her mouth and ate them too with crackling, oozing satisfaction.
wormwood