If there was a reaction Aether was expecting, it was not this. His cheeks flamed at the girl's teasing, and he nervously licked his lips, brain scrambling for an appropriate response. Finally he managed to quirk a tiny smile.

"Uh, no," he said, confirming that he had not, in fact, meant to ride a small landslide downhill toward her. He swallowed and cleared his throat, conscious of his hoarse voice. "I'm Aether."

A few heartbeats passed. Red dust from the rockslide hovered in the air and almost seemed to reflect the golden light of the sunset far to the west. It settled in his nostrils, and he snorted. Impera's eye contact seemed to burn into him, so he took an moment to pretend to admire that sunset, and shifted his weight, testing the stability of the ground beneath him. Thankfully it was stable.

From his peripheral vision he also took a moment to assess Impera's body language. Too often, in his months spent as a wanderer, he had been chased or even attacked by the horses that had stumbled upon him. Just being near another horse now made his blood rush in his ears. But he could detect no outward hostility from Impera, only bemused confusion, which was a different kind of unsettling.

He managed to look her in the eye again. Wherever she was from, it had looked after her: she did not share his unkempt, malnourished frame, which made him feel almost freakish, like a big, gangly skeleton.

"Um, so, I don't want any trouble. I can keep walking. Wherever you're going, I'll go in the opposite direction."