He appeared out of the jungle, shrouded in shadow, and Charybdis squinted at him, the dappled pools of sunlight she passed through serving to dim her eyes. She could not help but recall Fritjof happening upon her, when she’d been seeking solace much closer to the sea. He had been an unknown entity then, quietly offering words that rang in her ears with a wisdom that she hadn’t been in the mindset to grasp in the moment.

This was not Fritjof. In the darkness of the jungle, he appeared black as night in the eye of Charybdis. “I am missing everyone.” The words slipped from her lips before she could stop them. She wished immediately that she could take them back. Her mistakes were hers to own, and she’d bear her loneliness alone (here, in the shadowed jungle, near the very heart of Atlantis), far away from the eyes of her neighbours, and those she managed to convince, in time, to reside here with her.

The silence weighed heavily on her, and as Charybdis twisted her head aside to better see him with her good eye. “Where is it you come from?” she asked, and though there was a measure of apprehension in her voice, there was no bite. This place was her home, but he did not know it, and she would not mete out aggression upon him for this.

It seemed there was no fresh trace of the ocean upon him, which led the splashed mare to believe he was from some other part of the island. The Harbour maybe. Or the Paradise she had yet to behold. It was also possible that he had come from Fritjof’s shores, but Charybdis didn’t think so. The dark stranger carried the scent-traces of many, and none were familiar.

Desperate to get some sort of read on him, to perhaps discern the purpose for his roaming, Charybdis watched, and waited for any answer he deigned to give. The jungle was alive around them, and the mare was not ignorant of the fact that she might well appear vulnerable. (She was far more capable than her tears might imply.) But… Perhaps her judgment was impaired by her emotions, or she had drifted ever further out of touch with the reality of life… She sensed no malice in this tall, dark stranger, and she hoped - she hoped he wouldn’t try to hurt her, because then she’d be forced to respond in kind, and wounded as her heart was, Charybdis didn’t want to bleed anymore today.

So it was with bated breath that she finally broke her silence again with a murmur. “Who are you?” The words were soft, carried on a sigh, and Charybdis prayed that he couldn’t hear just how desperate she was for company. That he wouldn’t see it still written across her pale face.