Welcome to Gaia! ::

Audra pulled her long hair up and twisted it around her head. The sun was beating down on her, making her skin glisten with sweat. It was the early afternoon, and all she could see around her was grass, trees, hills, more hills and in a very far off distance, a boulder. She continued to trudge along the path before her, knowing that sooner or later it would take her back to Hyrule city.

As she neared the boulder, she finally realized it was a landmark, signifying a for in the path. Sighing, she walked a little faster to reach the boulder. It was somewhat large, meaning that it would offer her a short respite from the heat if she rested in the shadows.

As she reached the oulder, she sighed and collapsed under its shadow, with the rock looming above her. Not that she minded, but she had finally come to a conclusion: never ever attempt to walk back to Hyrule if you have no idea where you were.

Scathach emerged from the shadows and she eyed him resentfully. He stared back at her, his golden eyes never blinking. Sighing, she looked away, saving her strength for the walk to Hyrule.

Audra looked up at the voice, seeing a blonde-haired man accompanied by a Phantom. Pretty horse, and the man looked very resigned, as if he couldn't believe what his esper had just done.

She shrugged. "By all means." She answered. "Can't stop you, since this is a public place." She sure had been running into a lot of people lately, no? She sighed, since her loner-ish tendencies were already ruined by Scathach, but was now further ruined by people she met all the time. And she thought that finally, in the vast Hyrule Field, she could get away, but nope. Just her luck today.

Scatach shifted around her and flickered in and out of sight. Irritated, she turned to him. "Go ahead, sheesh!" He faded out of sight, having been on the wrong side of her temper once before, and knew that it was not pretty.

Audra sighed softly as the Phantom came to sit next to her. It was pretty, with a soft mint coloured mane and tale, with sprinklings of said colours all over it's brown body.

"It's okay." She sighed. "A little bit of company won't kill me I guess." The blonde-haired stranger was attractive, she supposed, but not really her type. She noticed the sword around him and his apparent Hylian heritage, though she obviously wasn't if you looked closely. She shifted slightly as the man sat down next to his esper.

Scatach chose that moment to reappear again, and she shot the poe a dark look. He blinked at her innocently, his golden eyes wide. Shooting him a look that meant that he would very probably be in trouble later, she turned to the stranger. "I'm Audra, and this is Scathach." She said formally, introducing herself and the poe.

Audra noted the shocked expression on the man's face. Maybe she shouldn't have told him about the mercenary part. But the damage was done. "You're welcome," She shrugged. "But these are just rumours, and who knows if there's any truth in them." As shadows suddenly engulfed them, Audra got up and whirled around to see Scathach twitching in fright. She sighed when she noticed the Phantom's face in the poor poe's own.

Scathach twitched violently and jerked backwards, having unconsciously called on the shadows to aid him and hide him in their dark embrace. The horse had frightened him, and he wasn't about to hang around to be terrified. Retreating to Audra's shadow, he faded away until all that could be seen were two golden orbs in the darkness, but that too faded away within minutes. Poor Scathach. He didn't take to having someone's face in his own very kindly, and he had reacted instinctively. She snapped her fingers and used her own strength to dissipate the shadows until all was it what it had been a few minutes ago.

As the last of the shadows disappeared, Audra surveyed the scene before her. "Sorry about that." Audra apologized. The horse was shaking and had buried her snout in the crook of her pact maker's arm. "He got scared, and well..." She ran her hands through her hair. "Things get out of control if he lets his emotions get the better of him." She explained, feeling bad about it, even though the phantom was the main reason Scathach had been terrified.

As she sat down again, she decided she would go do some asking around to see if the rumours were true. Though she wasn't sure, she may have seen the girl during a mission or in a tavern before. Not that she was going to mention this to Volare.

"I can go check out the rumours if you'd like me to?" She offered. "There may be a grain of truth in them, but don't get your hopes up." She warned.

"Okay then. Scathach should be fine. He probably need to calm down." Audra shrugged. "It's your call. I can look them up if you like, it won't bother me. But if you don't want me to, I won't." She watched as he petted the green mane of the mare which now had her head in his lap. Taking her hair out, she redid her braid and wound it in a bun to keep the flyaway strands away from her neck.

"Mercenary or not, she's still your sister. Situations can drive people to do things they would never imagine they would do." Her voice held a note of sadness as she contemplated her own past. She would never have been happy, married off to a man she didn't love and who didn't love her in return. Instead, she had traded everything for her freedom. And she didn't regret that. Except for the estrangement from her family. Circumstances changed, and they forced you to stand up, take a step and try again, even if you fell a million times.

But the reward was worth the struggle. She was now an independent, mature woman, with plenty of experience in dealing with the world. She couldn't believe how naive she had been. But that had changed. She was now jaded, perhaps a tad too much, but that didn't matter too her. It always saved her from getting her heart broken.