Summary:Diana and Thor pause in their travels for dinner, but can't have a true moment of peace. A supernatural spy brings trouble to the two! Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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The travel was long, though it wasn't hard; Thor is very capable of filling the travel with talk and stories. His stories tend to wander a little bit, as he comes up with side-stories he needs to share, and digresses, but all of it is in Thor's very upbeat and earnest manner. He loves to describe and regale of past battles: his own, or others', and it passes the time well. He doesn't take over the conversation - at least, not intentionally, but is more than willing to be the entertainment.
As the pair drew near the boarder into the land on which they cannot tread, the pair decided to have a break. Some rest was in order for the horses, as well as the heroes: there is no reason to not pause, to regain full strength. Foraging brought about a happy hunter in Thor, and he has since come out of the woods, with wild duck in proud offering for a meal, approaching their little temporary campsite.
Diana is tending to the fire when the Asgardian prince reappears from the low-lying marshlands tucked next to the beach. Her own mount, Kachi, has been left to browse of her own devices; the trailing reins are looped trustingly over the horse's mane. From somewhere, no doubt a small tuck perhaps at the back of her belt, the Amazonian warrior has procured a thick woolen cloak, deeply-dyed in color to something nearing charcoal. It's bundled up on a log she's pulled over.
Looking up as he arrives, Thor is rewarded with a small smile. "I see you were successful. Well done." Spread on a flat rock beside the fire is a collection of tubers rooted up from the beach-side along with a handful of clams dug up from the sand. "You will have to forgive me, I do not usually eat fowl. Please, enjoy it."
"Indeed; there was a boar as well, but that would have been wasteful in amount, as we do not have the time to dry and …." Thor trails off, as he takes in the reality of what she just said. Oh. Probably not a meat person.
"I will make a guess that wild boar are also not to your liking?" Thor asks, uncertainly. He isn't offended, and there's nothing in his tone that shows judgment, either, not even a shred of annoyance. He is accepting the information about her, and attempting to adapt.
"I have failed to find proper spices, as this area is unfamiliar to me, and I did not want to accidentally poison you, Princess of Wonders," Thor admits gravely, while bringing his bird closer, and without making any big deal of it, rapidly begins to remove the feathers and treat it efficiently for roasting. There's some use of a short hunting knife that rested in one boot, he doesn't use his larger weapon for this.
"You are correct. I would not have eaten boar either." Still, Diana pauses in trimming the excess growth from the tubers she's collected at his comment. Her smile deepens into something immensely kind. "Allow me a few minutes and I will see what I can find to better suit your fare." She lays aside her own knife, hung at her belt, before rising from one knee. Turning, she then travels away into the waist-high sedge grass waving in the warmer wind. Thor's good-natured bantering and sharing of tales did improve the weather immensely. Diana's hair is all but dry even by the time she returns a scant handful of minutes later, holding a collection of small green growths.
"These are herbs here," she explains as she walks over. The thin leaves and brown stalks are pointed out. "One is akin to cinnamon, the other to black pepper. This is wild garlic." He might recognize the whitish bulb. She indicates a more yellowy bulb next. "Here, this, a wild onion. It is small, but strong." She places them beside the Asgardian on a flat rock brought with her and returns to her tubers.
"I am not much for cooking, but I make do," Thor chuckles in a conspiratorial loud whisper, after attentively learning all he can from her about the plants. Despite his lack of cooking knack, he did seem to fully show a lot of interest in everything that she told him. Until she moved away to her tubers, and he gives the herbs a sort of thoughtful puzzled look. Which one was which? Well. He got the last ones, the garlic and the onion, and selects them for use. Good enough.
"Excellent! My quest improves ever so with your presence!" Thor says brightly and loudly. He's stripped the duck and has moved into separating the sections to mix with the flavor offerings he's picked out, pausing to sniff the onion.
"Do you feel we are close to our destination?" Thor questions. "It is tempting to me to eat and continue on, despite the darkness."
His compliment earns him another knowing smile across the flickering reach of the fire. With the sun setting beyond the horizon, the air is losing some of its midday warmth, though not to an appreciable degree. Diana takes the time necessary to set up her collection of shellfish and tubers upon the rock before carefully reaching to slip it onto a deliberately-framed section of the fire to cook.
"Yes, I do." Her dark-hazel eyes break from him to consider the treeline Thor emerged from earlier and beyond more yet, to the distant dark shadows of low-lying hills. "I would not wish to risk the horses in the night. We will need to traverse the marsh you experienced earlier. A twisted ankle is a sad fate for a trusting steed." Kachi is given a glance. The mare is standing lazily nearby now, one back hoof cocked up, eyes lidded. "I think a night's rest and we depart at the first light of dawn. I do not need more than a handful of hours of rest at most. What do you require?" the Amazonian princess asks of Thor.
"My stamina is well renown; I do not require rest until my quest is complete," Thor says, in his strong way that leans into boastful: or perhaps just what the prince is very used to doing. Not showing weaknesses.
"Well. It is not /required/: I am stronger when I have rested," Thor adjusts, in a lower volume. His boast was not intended to come off as a lie or to mislead, and he fixed it, a bit belatedly. "But I would not expect my full strength to be required on this quest, as Midgard monsters are usually not prepared for such as Asgard." Thor wrinkles his nose a little and grins at her, while …tearing a piece of the duck apart barehanded, clearly forgetting that duck dismemberment might not impress her.
The whole of the behavior may come across as slightly fumblingly aimed to garner her approval or interest. He nearly drops part of the duck during it, and grabs at it, managing to snare it before it hits the dirt. "A-ha!" Thor says, waggling it. Such reflexes!
Diana's dark eyebrows rise up nearly into her hairline as she adopts a patient expression. It might chime up a distant memory of a royal Asgardian mother very quietly wondering at whether or not a particular decision was most appropriate in the heat of the moment.
"I expect that creatures beyond that of…Midgard may be attracted to your Mjolnir," she replies quietly, her gaze returning to the flat rock hosting her meal. She eyes the color of the tubers; not quite done yet. "As such, a rest would benefit us both. This land was ancient when I was born and is touched by the gods." Her attention rises upwards into the darkening sky, where streaks of cloud glow orange against a purpling backdrop. "They make jest by inventing creatures to cause fear in the people of these lands. Not all legends were slain by the legendary."
Thor is rarely put into check, and the echo of some distant memory only seems to encourage the boisterous Thor. His proud smile remains, though he does go back to treating his meat with seasonings, now, on the provided rock. Discouraging Thor will take more than a patient stare.
"Indeed? I anticiapte a great challenge, then," Thor says, with clear excitement in his tone, though perhaps he is trying to contain it to some degree: it is best not to get /too/ excited if it turns out to be a let-down. "I am well versed in strange entertainments created by the gods. My brother Loki is very fond of such things. Did I tell you about the snake story?" Thor asks, pausing. He did share it earlier, but who can really keep track? "You see, I love snakes," Thor begins clearly going to regale her again with a repeat of the tale. He puts the duck meat over the flame to cook, and approaches to see what she's doing.
It is with some bemusement that Diana looks up from her seat upon the log. She had been checking the color of the tubers once more, reaching within and wincing as she turned them upon themselves and flipped each clam. Thor's arrival has her giving him an expectant little smile.
"Snakes can be charming when they are not involved in making one second-guess their intentions," she agrees. "I'm quite fond of the little striped species, myself. Their small pink tongues are tipped in black, did you know this?" It appears she's going to allow him a second telling of the tale, if only to see if additional details appear in this next rendition. There is empty space on the log beside her.
"Might I assist with turning your potatoes?" Thor offers, pointing, as he spotted her wince, assuming it was due to heat. "This low flame does not harm me." As would be easily already known by how he placed the duck meat into the fire manually and positioned rocks before coming over. He then reconsiders. "I have duck blood on my hands, it appears," he says, distracted, halfway into sitting down. He considers his broad hands, and goes traipsing off towards the fresh water they'd found.
"I adore snakes, always!" Thor says over his shoulder loudly. Good thing their quest isn't stealthy. "I have not seen a snake with a tongue-tip of black, no. Do they speak of different omen than the silver-tipped kind?"
The wash won't take long, and Thor's coming back, to take up a lot of the empty log space; Thor's big physically, and his personality lends to even more social scale.
Thank goodness indeed for this being a portion of the quest involving little need for stealth. Even Kachi shies in place at the cheery volume of Thor's voice as he speaks back over his shoulder. Diana merely blinks. She does wait for the Asgardian to return from cleansing the offal from his hand and does scoot down the log an appreciable amount to allow him his space as he sits. It means picking up her cloak and setting it upon her lap.
"Last I spoke with a black-tongued snake, it told me how pleased it was to find rats in the grainery. I let it know it was doing the humans such good and they thought well of it for preserving the take of their crops," she explains of the serpentine friend she'd made last week. "I have not met a silver-tongued snake — at least, not a real snake." Thor is given another small smile. His brother seems to be the sort to fall under the appelation. "Thank you for the offer in regards to my food, but it is done. The fire may be hot, but I am not burned."
To prove her point, Diana reaches in and plucks her flat stone from the fire and sets it aside to let it cool further on the sand.
If Diana was seeking to impress Thor, she's done so. His expression leaves no mystery to it at all, but a clear pleasant surprise as she declares that fire also is not harmful to her, and proves it. "I am unused to meeting those of power outside of the Avengers, or their foes," Thor declares, aware that he was staring. Maybe. Because he's still staring, though he did sit up a little.
He hopes his offers of assistance were not offensive, but pushes that aside. Clearly his intentions are good and chivalrous. "You remind me of our Valkyrie," Thor declares, as the thought enters his head. "Long have I admired their qualities," Thor adds, though he looks back over to his cooking duck, checking on it visually from where he sits. "They are amoung our fastest warriors."
"I have heard of the Valkyrie, if only through story both written and told. They appear to be the finest of warriors. I admit myself a little jealous of their winged steeds. Kachi is the fastest horse I have the pleasure of befriending — I cannot imagine her with wings." The mare is given a loving glance over Diana's shoulder. For all appearances, Kachi is not offended and whickers quietly back.
"But you need not worry, Thor. I have strength to share with the people I protect. Very few things will stand to cause injurous damage to my person. I suspect that we could, perhaps, move a mountain if we put our minds to it." Her tone implies a gentle tease as she then looks away from him, reaching to test the temperature of a tuber. Still a bit too hot for her liking.
Thor follows Diana's glance over to Kachi, and smiles as well, to the catchiness of the pleasant quality of Diana's loving glance. Thor can appreciate the connection with the horse; he feels similarly towards Mjolnir.
"I would not have you injured on my quest," Thor answers, more solumnly, with a firm nod towards her. "Should we encounter one of those few things, do guide it into my assault," Thor requests, with a sparkle of battle hunger through his gaze. He's a fighter, there's no question: the adventure is in his blood, as much as is the honest cheer he'd shown not long before. "As this is my duty to recover Mjolnir, it is also mine to take the brunt of what we encounter. I am honored to have you at my side, however." He inclines his head towards her, the sides of his blonde hair coming forward against his shoulders.
Thor has a solemn, kingly quality when he comes to this other side of himself: shadows of his father, of Odin, pass through his features, the son of a leader of gods.
Diana gives Thor a lingering look now, the kind intended to do some weighing of words against countenance and actions. Firelight gleams off her armor and contours her face. Whatever judgement she levels is kept to herself for now, given she reaches to bring her rock to her lap. The clams are easily cracked open and redolent of being cooked in their own juices.
"I will certainly not pretend that I do not need your aid if we are attacked. If the creatures I suspect to be guarding your Mjolnir are present, they do require more than one warrior to defend against. The people of Earth are no match for their claws and teeth," she murmurs.
Thor gets distracted, scenting the slight burn upon the duck meat. He climbs to his feet and crosses to it, though the short distance hardly interrupts their conversation: they're easily in proximity to still chat - let alone with Thor's tendency to project his voice all the time.
"It is always best to have another warrior watching your back," Thor says, perhaps defying what one might have expected: he doesn't have an arrogant view of fighting alone. "My best battles were fought alongside my closest of friends," Thor continues. His expression loses some of the happiness. "I do miss them; I lack ability to contact them, while I am restricted here." He busies himself with the duck now, blue eyes focused on the task.
The tubers are free of spices and smell mostly of cooked starch, sweet and somewhat gritty on the tongue. Diana pours extra shellfish juice upon the roots' meat and sets aside the empty shells on the sand as she enjoys the clams.
"You will see your friends soon enough." Thor gets another smile, this one cajoling if mild. "If I see any particular fighting moves that may benefit me, might I ask for you to teach me them in turn? I know well the battle-dance of my own people, but it does not bode well to become complacent or too used to what I know."
She said some magical words, even as he's partway into eating the duck he'd pulled out of the flame. He pauses, chewing, and beams. Thor is a god of beaming, it seems! "I am happy to spar or teach; of course!" Thor agrees. "I enjoy teaching the warriors around me in Asgard, and I am curious of your style of combat. Knowing what to expect should only improve our power against the foes to come," encourages Thor.
"But I would say it should wait until the dawn, it would be an excellent warm up before the continued ride," Thor appends, recalling that they were /supposed/ to be resting. He nods once, sternly, as if mostly to himself.
The addendum is enough to entice a low laugh from Diana, her lips closed as she enjoys her meal. "Of course," she replies once her mouth is clear, "Not until we have rested. It would be unfair for both of us to attempt it the night before a potential skirmish." She finishes up her repast with a dainty, efficient grace to bring to light her royal upbringing. Even sans cutlery, she makes a minimal mess as a whole. Once the rock is devoid of food, she collects up the clam shells and rises to her feet.
"There is no need to build any form of shelter. I feel the weather will be favorable this night? There is little moisture in the air and the fire shall keep away the worst," the Amazon warrior opines as she pauses, looking at Thor — not necessarily down at him, given he's tall even seated.
"If you'd prefer storms to cover our travel, I can summon them," Thor says, apparently misunderstanding her request. Then a little smile teases his lips, and he nods a little. No, he wasn't serious: he understood. He's brighter than he lets on, perhaps, despite how easy it might be to assume that his simple honesty also means that he isn't very deep.
Thor is a little messy with his eating: it comes with a tone of enjoying the simple things in life, such as putting hands into food. "I am quite enjoying this garlic! An excellent notion, princess of wonderful seasonings!" Thor declares.
Diana does, at first, lift an imperious princess-ly eyebrow at the Asgardian royal. Is that a smile on her lips? Maybe — mysterious as always, her right. Then, as she's walking away to return both rock and clamshells to the edge of the waves, she replies over her shoulder, "Perhaps to cover any escape that might need to occur, you could summon up a storm? I doubt we will need to retreat." And she sounds very certain of this even as she turns, walking back up to the fire and dusting off her hands of sand.
"And you are welcome, Thor. I regret that I could not find wild carrots. They would been pleasurable additions to each of our plates." Diana sits down once more and spreads her cloak across her lap. The fire shifts and resettles as she moves branches around. "I think we will need another large log to keep it burning through the night."
"When in battle, I prefer to draw a storm, it brings me additional power, as I do not have Mjolnir; you should expect to fight in the rain," Thor answers. His tone is matter of fact. "Escape? Bah," he scoffs a little bit at the idea of needing to run away, but doesn't directly argue the point, either. It isn't impossible, considering he lacks Mjolnir. "And often destroys the resolve of my enemies, when they realized that which they will fight," Thor continues.
Thor has, by now, finished up the duck: he ate it on his own, as the amount was not terribly large. Had she wanted it, he would have shared: but as it is, he wastes none of it.
"A dry one, at that," Thor observes of the fire, and begins to look around, his sharp Asgardian senses seeking intently. He spots a candidate, and is on his feet and off, in long strides, into the dark.
"I will wear my handband then," the woman murmurs to herself. Wet hair is an acceptable if vaguely frustrating state of being in battle, with how it wraps about her neck as is. Diana doesn't watch the disposal of the duck carcass, still mourning in her soft and quiet way in a corner of her heart, but does glance up when the Asgardian royal suddenly rises to his feet at her commentary.
"I — yes, it will need to be dry." She turns in her seat to watch him go and frowns to herself…and then nods thoughtfully. The soft scrap of her greaves against the log can be heard as she shift back to face the fire once more. Her eyes rise to the heavens and considers the stars, now fully on display with time's passing.
The weather suddenly flexes, a ripple of electricity passing above, and a following roar of challenge in the trees. Thor, most obviously, found something that he met with considerable ire. There's a sound of sharp growling, and movement, as Thor gives chase in a parallel pattern across the trees, working to cut off the strange thing he found.
A few moments later, the shade of the thing passes along the edge of the clearing as it attempts to evade Thor: a four-footed slippery thing, made of shadow and chilly night, fur singed and burning along a flank, as unnatural paws clamp footholds in the still-moist dirt.
Kachi immediately bucks and dances off down the beach, closer to the waves. Diana's quick to her feet and metal sings as she draws her sword from its scabbard at her hip. On her arm is her buckler, the staple defensive shield of her people, and sand kicks up beneath her boots as she quickly takes up a mirrored sprint. She can catch the bobbing blond hair of Thor even in the starlight and can see too this eerie creature still smoking.
"What — did it attack you?!" Her voice travels easily enough. An extra burst of speed puts her ahead of the creature and Diana plants herself, readied in case of a lunge.
"I am not injured, just blinded," Thor replies, storming out of the bushes towards her voice. He walks into a tree — and splinters it into pieces as he does so, while shoving at his face where the rat-like monster threw some kind of awfulness into his eyes.
"It shall not escape; I still hear," thunders Thor, though it's somewhat ineffective: the creature is rushing along the edge of the camp now, avoiding them but not seeming to actively be leaving. It is more like it is circling, silent, studying them for weaknesses.
The sight of the tree succumbing to Thor's impact is, indeed, a sight, but it doesn't make Diana stare for more than a second. Rather, his observed constitution is for discussion once this creature is no longer a bother. Kachi continues screeching and braying down by the water; this — this, the Amazonian warrior takes to heart. The animals of the earth know their own kind and the horse is very certain the oily being is not.
In a blur, the Amazonian warrior dives in after the creature. Her shield upraised for an initial bowling-over impact, the swing of her sword follows through in an attempt to lodge in a lethal location. Starlight shines off the blade in its arc.
Thor is attempting to help, and does have other senses. He wasn't making a joke about being able to hear the thing, and orients. His hands bristle with electricity even as he still paws with a broad palm at his eyes, and he orients towards where Diana and the creature are. On the upside, he is a light source, though he's holding back, having heard Diana's motion: he's not going to electrocute his ally. "Face me, cowardly shadow monster," demands Thor dangerously.
The inky black 'animal' splits into two smaller ones, though it is not in time to entirely dodge the Amazonian's deft strike: with a hiss of air leaving the empty space, one of the new creatures takes a deep blow; flecks of fog escapes from it as the lower body is torn, and the light from Thor and the stars seem to corrode the insides of the shadowy beast.
The other one, that split, attempts to dodge below Diana's arc and rush towards Kachi.
Upon seeing how the creature dissolves under the presence of the ambient light, Diana shouts even as she jinks a hard right to chase the second creature,
"It does not survive your lightning's shine! Brighter!" Sand flares up again in great fans as she tears down the beach after it. Poor Kachi — she provides an excellent distraction for the approaching komodo-dragon-rat abhorrence. With a flying leap and war-cry to set the stars to shivering, Diana nails the sword down through its mid-section from the spine in. The blade splits the sand after passing through the creature. Kachi gallops farther away up the beach before swinging around wide, her eyes rolling to show their whites.
Thor can do brighter. At least, to some degree. His radiance grows, and he stalks out of the broken tree area towards the sound of the skirmish, fingers curled but not firmed into fists, allowing the electricity to bridge across his fingers and palm to his thumb, and up forearms. A bit of it attempts to spring towards Diana's metal, but only a flutter of mild shock would come from it, like static; he's containing the worst of the electricity. It also helps clear Thor's eyes out, as the electrical pulse burns away the goop from his eyes somewhat.
Thor's horse is in a worse state than Kachi's, bucking and moving the opposite way, in a mixed panic, fearing even more as Kachi reacts so strongly.
The creature sags to the sand, innards exposed, and melts into sticky goop, that boils away when exposed to the strong light. Thor approaches, and spits near it - clearly still somewhat blind, his spit wasn't really all that close to it. "Well struck. Peh! Ambushed me, it did."
Panting lightly, Diana rises from her crouched landing and watches the inky blackness evaporate under the presence of the lightning's glow. She looks up and beyond Thor for a second at the golden horse in a panic farther down the beach and thins her lips. "I will need to fetch her," she murmurs under her breath. Thor's radiance is thankfully enough to also boil the effluence from her sword's surface. It's clean in naught but a handful of seconds and Thor will hear it slide away into its scabbard again.
"It seemed to be made of the shadows itself. I do not blame you for being taken off-guard. Here, can you — !!!" Her voice briefly rises in surprise as she sees a lick of static dance to the pommel of her sword. "Do you need to be led to the water in order to rinse out your eyes further? I believe the freshwater pool to be clean enough to merit this use." An expression of deep concern darkens her countenance now as she looks him over for over missed wounds.
"No, I recall where it is; handle the mounts, I will be fine," Thor declares, drawing his hand back from her, with some awareness of the electricity. It ripples and folds into his body, with a crackle of static, though his hair doesn't suffer at all from it. The radiance from the electricity abates, as Thor navigates with some care towards the water, where he'd washed earlier. He's not doing it in a speedy way, but seems to be navigating.
Once he finds the water, he kneels to it and washes with some care, and glowering annoyance. Grit in the eyes doesn't please anybody, really: but at least the sky hasn't exploded with emotional overreaction.
The softer, natural fall of starlight takes his place as Thor diminishes his powers and leaves to cleanse himself. Diana pauses long enough to be certain he's headed in the right direction and not full of bluster before she turns to make her way up the beach towards Breccha. It takes enough time to settle the mare down enough to claim the swinging reigns and to collect Kachi as well that Thor could well be awaiting them.
"Hush now, hush-hush," she soothes the two horses as she swings them up both nearby. They're calm enough and linger despite their ears flickering back and forth. "Are you alright then?" Diana walks over to the Asgardian royal, her brows still knitted.
"Yes," Thor answers, in the manner of any number of warriors that are having a difficulty but are too proud to admit it. "It is merely sticky," Thor attests, and rubs his eyes once more. The water doesn't seem to be very helpful overall, but he did get somewhere with the actions of rubbing. It is clearly more in one eye than the other, as he squats at the water and looks up towards her. His blue eyes are piercing in the dark sludge and the reddish irritation, but he just looks messy, not actually harmed.
"It would take more than dark tar to stop Thor," Thor blusters, with an upset frustration from the enforced humility. "I suppose my point was made about having someone at my back, should the enemy prove cowardly enough to throw glue into my countenance." At least it didn't get in his pretty hair.
"Could you use a portion of your cloak to scrub at it?" Sympathetic, Diana walks over and kneels down beside him, squinting. "I am glad I was present to assist you, yes, this seems as it might be an issue otherwise. I would say that sand might be useful, but the substance is too near your eyes to risk it." A fingertip reaches out and attempts to brush at a portion of his skin still gummed up.
"Ugh." The sound is heartfelt from the woman.
"I think it was headed for the horses," Thor says, attempting, without much tact, to move the subject away from the gross stuff on his face. "Perhaps it cleverly sought to block our progress," he suggests. He does pull his cloak forward, though he wets it in the water first, before using it to try to rub some of the gunk off. It's sticky to her fingertip as well; Thor doesn't flinch from her, he saw enough of that she was reaching to brush at it such that he wasn't startled by it. Besides, he's been washed by servants a large number of times.
That's primarily what causes the behavior of giving way to let her try to brush at the gummed area near his left eye; he has more on one side than the other, since the creature didn't hit him square in the face.
"Daylight should remove it all," Thor hopes. "And I can still keep watch for half the night," he decrees firmly. Eye problems or no, he'll pull weight!