eyes in the dark

Perhaps it was the enjoyment of the calm and quiet leading up to the moment, but Rylee did not immediately snarl at him for speaking. Blue eyes flicked up from her task to the shem. But it was only for a brief moment that she looked at him, sadness creeping across her gaze until she ducked it away and back to her task.

She finally answered, breaching a silence she'd let settle again: Because darkspawn took my husband. Her words punctuated by the tearing of skin from flesh as her knife pulled through the last bit of her kill.

Normally she might attempt to save and dry out the pelt for use later. Something to be said for not wasting any bit of the animal, but Rylee had not the resources or the patience to do so tonight. This was a brief pause in the trip and she preferred to travel light when Perun was not at her side.

Setting the pelt aside, she continued to separate the pieces so they might cook faster. Silence followed her words and she offered little else to explain herself or her reasons for being a Warden. It was as simple as an act of revenge. The shem had not earned the right to know it actually took a week of Taeven wasting away. That he'd begged her at the end to put a knife through his chest. That all the anger behind her violent, desperate attacks against the darkspawn came from the immense, festering pain of loss.