She hadn't really allowed herself time to decompress since she had crossed back into Boreas. Fable was making good time, only stopping long enough to hunt and feed herself. Although the battered leather satchel she carried had some rudimentary spices and supplies, she hadn't allowed herself enough time to really set up a cook fire and the art of her passion. In fact, before this grand escape, she actually couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten raw meat. It had happened slowly once she'd been appointed head chef of the King - the larder she had access to and the sheer space dedicated to culinary innovation had made it easy to prepare small snacks here and there. Then a few weeks passed before she'd had a quick and dirty meal. Then months. Then... had it been years?

Well. Shit, she thought glumly. No wonder it had been so hard to choke down the first few bites of shorebird she'd nabbed when she was starving. That explained that. As darkness swallowed her nearly entirely in the tunnel, Fable felt her pace finally flag. Had she put enough space between herself and the border? Could she finally afford a morsel of rest? She squinted into the dim light, trying to make sense of the shadows in front of her. Maybe just a quick cat nap and then she'd move on. Fae staggered to a stop and let her haunches finally settle to the mine's rocky floor before allow her paws to sliiide out in front of her. Even though it was extremely uncomfortable, it was some kind of rest.

Though he often didn't act like one, Kuroki was a hunter and a pretty good one too. He was one of the few wolves still knocking about who could claim to have brought down a mammoth-not that he knew it was called that- and had feasted on its flesh. Tasted pretty good, lots of fat. Point being, when he stumbled across a familiar scent, it near knocked his socks off, felt like the last few years slapped him upside the muzzle. Too many familiar faces emerging out of the wood work, first Onyx and now Fable.

Wasn't hard to find her, she'd scurried away in some dark, glum hole in the ground that very much didn't suit the image of her he had in his mind. He always pictured her by a campfire, the glow of the flames warming her coat as something tasty simmered. She looked tired, skinner than he remembered, always tasted her own dishes as any good cook ought to.

He moved to flop down beside her, all too familiar despite the years that had passed between them.

"Been a while."

If she hadn't been acutely aware of every aching bone in her body, Fable might have thought she was dreaming when she felt Oki flop down beside her. Her heart did a strange flip-flop and crawled up into her throat, like it was a living creature separate from her own biology. Fable groaned. The feeling was enough to make her nauseous, and she already was suffering a dreadfully empty stomach. In fact, just as the passing nausea rolled through her body, her stomach growled. Loudly. Fable set her chin down her extended paws and glanced at him from the corner of her eye, a glimmer of amusement hiding there. She hadn't seen Oki since that strange sickness had erupted across the land. It was no wonder she'd left Boreas shortly after to forge her own way in the world.

"Hello, friend. I hope this doesn't mean I've died some time in the past few moments and it's taking my brain a bit longer to catch up to this fact," she said quietly. In the yawning silence of the cave, she sounded dreadfully loud. Nothing was muffled here. Ahead in the darkness she heard the scuttle of an unnamed creature and the soft drip, dripping of water. The more time that passed after he sat down beside her, the less she felt like this whole situation was real.

Oki arched a pale brow as he heard the rumbling of her belly, would have thought they'd disturbed a hibernating bear for how loud it was. Fable had never been the sort who couldn't feed herself, so a guy had to wonder why she was so down in the dumps. All morose and mopey, even asked if she'd died and hadn't even noticed it just yet. The thought made his lips quirk in a smile, now he weren't no thinker and that line of thought was inching dangerously close to that existential stuff. Reminded him of questions Maki would sometimes ask, head tilted, thinking about her stories and how she could really make them pop.

"I don't reckon so." But even then could anyone be sure? Dreams often felt real enough in the moment, only when he'd woken up did he start to notice the cracks, how they didn't quite line up with what he thought was reality. "Flatterin' that you'd think of me like that though, like I'm some guardian angel there to whisk ya off to wherever it is folk go." He was insufferably smug, all teeth and eyes crinkling in the corners.

It was funny how though so much time had passed, he was the same creature he always was. Just stretched out into the shape of an adult. Fable would have liked to think she'd changed quite a bit since they'd last seen each other - she was older, yes, but braver. Sharper. No shame or insecurity limned her. She no longer presented dishes and waited with big, round eyes, begging for approval. She had cooked for kings! And kings had died eating her food.

Which, of course, led her to this murky cave, slumped over on the side of some rusty tracks while Oki's warm body lent some much needed comfort. How did she begin to explain how she'd wound up here? Fable settled by just relaxing into his banter, giving it back the same as he gave. "Oh, yes, we could all only be so lucky to have an Oki greet us with a cheeky smile before our souls are so rudely snatched from our bodies. Or whatever it is in there that makes us tick, makes our heart beat and our brains have wonderful ideas..." Being on the run for your life had a way of making you wax poetic, she supposed. Fable shrugged off the worn leather satchel she'd brought along on her grand escape and nosed through it. There were only scraps left now and a small container of salt that, by some miracle, hadn't shattered. She wouldn't debase herself by licking the crumbs out of the bottom of the bag, no matter how badly she wanted to. "You wouldn't happen to know where a girl could get a decent lunch around here, do you?"