Home is behind, the world ahead

[girlorgun]

April is out.

It's not like there isn't still danger, roaming the streets and all, but April is a pretty non-threatening person, at first glance. She's hardly five feet tall, slim, drowning in a too-large patched leather jacket, walking down the street barefoot, despite the cold. Hey, she's got boots! Slung over her shoulder.

She just doesn't

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[prince_stupid]

Ragnar is following her. Ragnar does not like the idea of young humans being out on their own, and Julian Sark has adopted this one. It is his responsibility to make sure she is safe. Never mind that April can more than take care of herself--Rags does not know this, and even if he did, it would not matter.

So here, April, have a very conspicuous cat following your non-conspicuous self.

[girlorgun]

"I know you're back there, your Grace," she says eventually, calling back in an almost sing-song voice. She feels him, dark and velvet in her mind as he follows. She doesn't mind, of course, but he is very much not with the stealthy

"I've got my own claws, you know," she adds, turning around to smile at him while she walks backwards, her feet padding along as silently as a cat's. "Quite capable of taking care of myself."

[prince_stupid]

Ragnar pauses in surprise, and then lengthens his stride to catch up with her. "There is not need for such formality, young human." He walks just behind her, looking mildly perplexed. "I think it might be best if you faced forward while walking. I have found that one is far less liking to collide with things while looking the proper direction."

[girlorgun]

"It's not formality," she says sweetly. "It's teasing. And I won't run into anything. I'm very good at that."

She proves this by neatly sidestepping to avoid a pedestrian, and then sidestepping again to avoid a mailbox. Her point proven, she turns back around and continues sauntering down the street. "I'm not a kitten that needs supervision, however."

[prince_stupid]

"You are under the care of Julian Sark. Though I agree, you are not a kitten."

That may have been a Ragnar attempt at a joke. He quickens his pace just slightly to keep up with her. "I must say this: it is not safe out here. I have been told as much by the occupants of the Kashtta tower and by the ghosts that live there. Regardless of your own abilities, it is my duty as one indebted to your..."

Well. Father. Brother. Thing. "To Julian Sark that I at least make some attempt to safeguard your way."

[girlorgun]

"He's my brother," April supplies. "I'm his mèimei. And I think I could probably safeguard your way more easily than the other way around. I am quite fierce when cornered."

She does, however, slow down a bit. Just out of politeness. After all, she doesn't mind having Ragnar follow her.

"You can talk to ghosts?" she asks, curious.

[prince_stupid]

Ragnar looks affronted, as cats are occasionally wont to do. "I am quite a capable fighter, April Sark. I was on the front line alongside Tag and the Majicou when we faced down the Alchemist."

He strides alongside her, his tail in the air like a black-plumed banner. "Yes. It is a skill which cats as a whole possess, not limited solely to myself."

[girlorgun]

"I don't doubt that you can fight, Lionheart, I just doubt that you could fight better than I can."

She ponders for a few moments. "I can't see ghosts. It's one thing I can't do. Can hear them sometimes. Not in a nice way, though. Hear the echoes of pain and suffering and death in a place." She shivers a little. It's not a fun thing to hear.

[prince_stupid]

Ragnar makes a little hrm sound. "Do you commonly provide nicknames to those with whom you are acquainted?"

He's quiet, though, in response to April's comment about the residue of suffering. "I have found that humans seem most susceptible to feeling those things which they fear most. Even if that fear is not a conscious thing. Few creatures enjoy pain. It is why cats are so often called upon in the old tales to banish the spirits that torment your kind--the weight of death rests differently upon a feline spirit."

[girlorgun]

"That is your name," she points out. "Coeur de Lion. Heart of a lion. Lionheart. See?" But yes, she does.

"I think cats must be the most noble creatures in the 'verse," she says solemnly. "I never really met a cat until recently. I think. Maybe I did when I was little, but I don't remember much before the Academy."

[prince_stupid]

"The most noble?" He considers this. "It is possible. Though I have seen many unlikely creatures act in unlikely and heroic ways. There was a magpie. One for Sorrow. A braver creature I have never met."

He tilts his head to look up at April again. "Academy? This is what your home is called?"

[girlorgun]

April shakes her head. "No. It was a... a bad place." She grimaces. "The doctors... They were like your Alchemist, I think. Lock us up, poke us, prod us, break us. Make us what they wanted."

She doesn't want to talk about that, though.

[prince_stupid]

Ragnar bristles. He doesn't change, but for a moment there's a massive psychic presence around him, prehistoric, predatory and furious. After everything that the Alchemist did to Pertelot, the thought of this girl being in the same sort of situation--

He shakes himself off and makes a low rumbling sound. "I hope then that those involved are dead." And then he tries to find a change of subject. Sometimes Ragnar has a brain. "How did you meet Julian Sark?"