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Aleksy exhaled sharply, trying to catch his breath. "It is horrible," he said, his accent thicker than it had been since he was fifteen and embarrassingly small. "It looks like--"

A horror. He turned to hide his face in Finn's chest.

The thing ventures from the shelter of the trees, six pale green eyes on Autumn. It ducks its long, cervine head, all six unseeing eyes pointing at her face. It is close enough to touch, if she dares.

We will never harm

Our Heliodora

You cannot harm us

not yet you cannot

reach us

She is here in

the dream...

It doesn't answer Vespertine's question, but it turns its head away from Autumn to regard her. The feeling of that concerted gaze is odd, like plunging your hands into a bag of rice. Only you are the rice, and that sexfold gaze is the hands.

But then Alexis draws its attention. Its head swings up and away from Autumn, posture tightly coiled like an attack dog. A chill courses across the ground, pure white frost and a pale mist exuding from around the creature's many lithe legs.

Ice lances up Alexis's legs, freezing them in place.

Oh, snap -- things were getting real now.

Asiya's hazel eyes widened when she saw that Alexis was now frozen in place. That knife was only going to get them in trouble -- that much was clear. Making the deerman upset was obviously not the way to go. If it was capable of that, then who knew what else it was capable of.

"Her demense? Is this Heliodora's property?"

This question, of course, was directed at the deer creature.

If the forest was Heliodora's, that would certainly make things interesting.

She was eager to find out, even if it wasn't.

Her hands were shaking like leaves. For all that she'd seen horror movies, knew she was going to die if she ******** up... Autumn found herself equally as excited as she was terrified. It was so close... close enough to touch...

"Hey. Hey. Eyes over here," she cooed again, reaching up to ever so gently set her hands upon the beast. She didn't move, even if she trembled ferociously, keeping her eyes locked on the mysterious creature.

"Look at you," she whispered, still in awe and fear- even as it turned to freeze Alexis, Autumn (to her credit) only flinched a bit. The creature was... soft. Her hand sunk, but oh, oh this was something.

"Look at you, you're amazing." In the light, it was not nearly so frightening. But wasn't that how people worked? What you didn't know scared you more than what you did. It was why scary movies sucked after the monster. But this monster, oh. Her fingers were gentle and soft through the maleable material, and she looked to try to meet its six eyes.

"Hey. Hey, don't be scared. Look back at me, love," Autumn crooned, voice barely more than a whisper. Monsters? Monsters she could handle. Monsters weren't your brothers, drunk and bloody and angry. And besides all that, this was just a ******** up dream- it had to be. The most vivid, ******** up dream she'd ever had.

"I won't take Heliodora, I promise. I just wanna know- are you gonna take care of her? Make that girl feel special, and needed? Cause I've been there. I've been there, love, and it's the worst thing in the world. Just don't hurt her." And great, she was crying again. But that was okay. This was some kinda catharsis, or something.

"If we don't take her... can you show us how to get home?"

Jeremiah still did not turn, still stood with his attention focused on Alexis. Except that there is the odd feeling on the back of his neck, hair rising. The mist is what he noticed first, then the frost rapidly moving under his foot.

For once he moved - a near jump - out of the way of the frost and watched stretche across the ground and then up along Alexis's legs to freeze them in place. This was what he wanted to avoid. There was frost along his pant leg that left a chill in his bones.

(An idle thought for the word demense because that was old and the implications ...)

"You are a threat to yourself," he replied, still that steady even voice. "Drop the knife. Protect yourself." Perhaps he could appeal to self-preservation. Jeremiah stepped close, not quite in range of the swing of the blade if they swung. "It will be on the ground. You can get it back later but for now let it go. That could be it's only warning."

Then because Alexis had questioned. "Demense. It's saying this is her's. This land, whatever it is, is hers." And was't that a goddamn thought to be thinking about. What had Heliodora gotten into.

His attention flicked over his shoulder to the creature, to Autumn, to Algie and Zac who he wanted to be nothing but safe and this was the very opposite. Keep talking to it Autumn, maybe you could distract it.

"Dammit, kid," Leila hissed through her teeth, grimacing with rare frustration at Alexis. "You can replace your damn knife. Put it down before before you get something frozen off you don't want to lose! I don't think this is even the same being as the voice that was calling us here earlier, but it's clear they can kick your a** just by thinking about it, and probably would have already if they wanted to."

There weren't any of the overwhelming flavors or feelings with this one, at least not that she was experiencing.

At the other end of her peripheral vision, Autumn was up to some unbelievably heroic s**t. Leila was most likely on the girl's side with how she was interpreting the creature's behavior, but was still really hoping nothing bad was about to happen.

Alright -- enough.

The creature clearly wanted Alexis to give up their knife, and it was well past time for them to let it go.

Asiya walked over, a stern look on her face, and made an attempt to grab the knife out from their hand.

"You're making things difficult. Just let it go, so we can all figure out what's going on."

She was clearly agitated by now. Why couldn't they just let it go?

"I'm not a ******** she," Alexis shrieks, and if they didn't sound unhinged before they certainly do now -- scared, and confused, and angry. Anger comes first, before anything else. It always has.

There are tears in their eyes.

(Out of sheer stubbornness, although their hands are shaking, Alexis does not drop their weapon. But only barely -- their grip is loosening, fingers jittering, and it's hard to say if they'd stop anyone who took it from them. Having other people make the decision is always easier, after all. Even if it's only the slightest notion --

they don't want to die here.)

"I-if you're goin' to do somethin' t'me -- do it, stop with this bit-at-a-time s**t -" their voice cracked too hard to continue.