She is a hurricane of emotions, a fact she is none too fond of. Astrid was used to the stability of her life, before with her brother and wandering from place to place and now settling in to her role as lead hunter of Taviora. Change was not something that came easy to the pale woman and emotion even less so, and so with all of this confusion and feeling seeming to grow inside her chest it feels strangely akin to going insane. She likes the feel of his touch, the strength of his shoulder pressed in to hers, and yet at the same time she hates that she likes it. She should not need another, should not wish to be close to them. How had that worked out with her own blood? Her own brother had abandoned, her so what was to stop Zaphkiel from doing the same? She wasn’t sure she could survive that ordeal twice in one lifetime without becoming unrecognizable even to herself.

She is too blind to read the signs that perhaps Zaphkiel was having a somewhat similar inner battle himself, emotion as a whole being a rather foreign feel to her. What she does note is the deepness in his voice as he rumbles his appreciation at her view of his ‘disability’, but she does not need thanks for this. She doesn’t do it to give him a false sense of ability, but merely because it is what she knows to be true based off of his abilities. He is a great wolf.

What comes over her in the next moments she isn’t quite sure, perhaps she is caught up in the hormones that the winter brings or it is a residual effect of her attempting to play this game with Zaphkiel, but she cannot seem to part herself from him. Even as she is suddenly bashful, looking up at him through her thick lashes with whispered words she almost does not recognize herself, but she hangs with bated breath to see what his next move will be. And suddenly he is there with his warm muzzle pressed against hers and his brilliant golden eye boring in to her own. For a moment the world freezes, his words a rumble of thunder between them even as her heart seems to skip. She gives herself a moment, a moment to surrender and give in, closing her eyes and pressing in to his touch.

And then the weighty reality of the situation comes crashing in like electricity running over her ivory body. In an instant she is rising, leaping away from him suddenly even as part of her longs to return to his side, to feel the warmth of him pressed up against her. Her eyes are wild as they stare him down her sides heaving as she inhales and exhales rapidly as if she had just run across all of Moladion to come to this point. Then again, perhaps she has. Ever he has the ability to disarm her, to pull the proverbial rug out from under her feet and leave her searching for air. She didn’t know what to do, never had she thought she would find herself in this situation and it filled her with consternation. Where someone voluntarily wanted to be with her, wanted to seek her favor in all things and tie themselves to her. She wasn’t shapely and feminine, she wasn’t witty and genial, she was rough around all edges and abrasive in most things. Yet here lay the star-painted man who for some reason was asking her for a chance at something more.

She shook her wide head, beginning to pace in the small clearing around them muttering to the trees about insane ideas and the eventual failure she didn’t doubt this would all come to. What if he left her? What if she drove him off just like her brother? What if she was never the same? That final though stops her. She was already not the same for knowing him, she had already changed much after crossing the borders of this world and perhaps, she considers, she is better for it. Finally she stills standing straight in front of him, her golden and ice gaze boring in to him to make sure this was not some harebrained scheme of his, though then again it was definitely exactly that.

“Okay,” she says, the word barely more than a breath past her lips. “Okay,” she repeats, slightly louder as if more to reassure herself that this is actually happening. “I’ll try… I’ll try to let you and I…” she can’t find the words, never fathoming that she would have to in a situation like this. Finally she simply steps to him, ears laying back and pressing her thick head in to his chest so the black of her eye patch might mingle intelligibly amongst his own midnight fur. She inhales deeply, breathing in every fiber of his scent and being and trying to hold on for as long as she can.