In the midst of the stars, wolves howled and crickets chirped. An empty cave somewhere up on a mountain, lies five tired souls.
"Kriek…Kiek!"
Esmeralda woke up in the middle of the night, she rubbed her eyes a bit, only to realize that her dragon nails were too large and hit her nose. She let out an annoyed shriek, but luckily no one was disturbed and woke up from that.
Her eyes panned around the cave in an unusual curiosity. Everyone was still sleeping. They couldn't get their usual clothes to change, so they're resting their eyes while in those bulky burning outfits meant for fighting and adventuring.
Luckily, the breezing wind from high above made this a bit more bearable.
"Vel?"
A calming, young male voice called her name— more specifically, only one person called her that: Marc Omal.
Her head turned towards where the voice resounded, Marc was leaning on a wall with one of his knees up.
Esmeralda's four smol tottering legs jogged towards Marc; which put a nice smile on his face. Marc held out his arms for her to approach.
"What's wrong Vel? Are you cold?"
Holding Esmeralda tight in his chest, she nuzzled against Marc's chest, as if she's warming him up.
"Keik…" Her voice was unclear, but the tone suggested a calm and resting expression.
With Esmeralda on his chest, Marc walked outside and sat down at the cave's mouth. Since the cave is located on a mountain, everything below them was ominous and mysterious as it's being covered by dark green leaves— giving a feeling that they're very tall above, like heavens.
Marc dangled his feet on the cliff of the cave, one push and he's down to the unknown below. Esmeralda was a bit afraid of heights, so her initial reaction was to close her eyes.
"I spy with my little eyes… a beautiful sky." Marc said, childishly. Which caused the curious little Esmeralda to look up.
In the quiet night sky, the stars dangled playfully with each other— creating what we know as constellations, gates to heavens where the dead lie, beautiful and sad, a lonely feeling in the rain of individual alikes.
The stars on the vast skies felt like lonely boats on the vast sea. Silvery white moonlight sprinkled on the ground creating illusory colors, tricking the eyes into seeing something both beautiful and mischievous. Yet it's not easy to remove ourselves from infatuations.
"Kirk!" Esmeralda's eyes crinkled at the edges and the corners of her lips turned upwards; she happily expressed her amazement in her voice.
In her previous life, night time was the worst for her, she'd always get negative thoughts, frustration and a heartbreak knowing that time was passing by… Maybe she just needed a night like this— bitter and misty yet beautiful in its own ways.
"Lay down and, imagine, snow mountain, on glacier, silent night, quiet night, there's one man, with the moon…" Marc quietly sang something, but it's more like a bad poet with rhythms to Esmeralda. The whole thing didn't seem to be grammatically correct and he paused every three syllables.
Marc took a deep breath, stopped dangling his feet and lay down on his back, with Esmeralda sitting on his chest.
"Do you know what it feels like to break a promise… No, two promises at once, Vel?"
"Krek?" Which translated to "Can't say I don't, but not promises that haunts me."
Haunting thoughts, ravages of time and reminiscences of the past, all coming together and formed a memory on Marc's mind as he closed his eyes.
…
"Trust me, it will be fun!"
The dawn showed upon the skies as a voice resounded inside the forest. Marc with only a leather outfit to protect himself was following an annoyed elf.
"For the 4th time, human, I'm not getting in your adventure team! I know how to hunt, not kill!"
"Oh come on Rina! If you disable it and your companion put it out of its misery, that's still killing! Basically...? I already explained to you how badly I wanted to have an archer."
Exhaling a deep sigh out of her nose, the elf named Rina turned around and grabbed Marc's shirt collar.
"A no is a no, if you come to me one more time, my arrows will make sure you're disabled for life!"