The trek back is grueling; when they finally arrive back at camp, a little after sunset, the adventurers have been walking for close to seven hours without a break. They are greeted by the welcome smell of roasting meat. The camp is much the same as they left it, although someone has apparently spent the day weaving mats and baskets.
Gelik, Alkas, and Jade sit outside near the fire. Jade is turning meat on a spit. Aerys is leaning against one of the shelters, occupied with a book--in fact, with Kovack’s logbook: she is writing in it. One of the jars of wine is snuggled in the crook of her arm like an affectionate cat. She looks up as the group arrives, her gaze meeting Hú Lí’s with a mixture of hope and apprehension.
Jade greets everyone with obvious pleasure. “It is good to see you are all safe. Sit down, it will be cook soon--Sasha go out earlier and hunt.”
At the sound of voices, Sasha emerges from a shelter. She is even more scantily dressed than usual, because there is a bandage covering most of her left thigh. “It’s not serious,” she says in answer to the questioning looks she receives. “I fell onto a rock. Alkas and I were exploring north along the east coast, and we found one of those nests that Kane was describing--with the flying reptiles. I don’t think they’re dragons, though. I’ve never seen an actual dragon, but they don’t look like pictures of dragons.... Anyway, it’s a big nest, and there were young ones in it, and I just had to get a look, so I climbed along the--well, anyway, that didn’t turn out so well. So after Alkas helped me with my leg, we went around the nest and kept going--”
“You kept going after you’d hurt yourself?” asks Gelik.
“It’s just a cut,” says Sasha, a little crossly. “I can still walk. There’s no need to be concerned.” (She smiles fetchingly at Noriaki, indicating that she perhaps would not mind if he were to become concerned.) “So we continued up the coast, and eventually got to where we could see that little beach we washed up on--”
“I seem to remember something about a promise to stay close to the camp,” says Gelik dryly.
“Well...” Sasha’s face goes through a series of rapid contortions, as though she is considering various justifications and possibly outright lies and swiftly rejecting each in turn. “Apparently I can’t be trusted,” she says finally with a laugh. “But you should have seen those little ones! They were so adorable--and not that big, either. I wonder whether it would be possible to train one. That would be useful, to have a trained flying whatever-it-is, don’t you think so, Captain?”
[sblock=ooc]Aerys, of course, has a big question mark floating over her head. The map has been updated in the first post, so you can see where Sasha went.[/sblock]
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