soft, unsteady pawsteps carry the babe across the threshold of an unknown land, thoughts swirling in confusion. her body is young, her mind restored to its original status prior to the madness taking over. she feels - renewed, more than she has any right to be, and yet a single glance at her paws explains why. somehow, she's alive again, and by the look of things she's back to being a month old. why this second chance at life has appeared, she doesn't know - and why her long-time bondmate isn't here with her, she also doesn't know.

blinking, the multi-hued gaze of the woodland dragoness turns to gaze at her surroundings, an inquisitive chirp escaping her maw. this doesn't look - or smell - anything like the lands of her birth, or the lands she'd come to call home with her bondmate and their children. frowning, she toddles on awkward paws in what seems like a good direction to go, snuffling around for any hint of any sort of familiar scent. perhaps, if she's been brought back, some of her family members might have been as well?

surely, even after four years of dragon madness, she can still remember the scents of her relatives. putting her nose to the ground, she makes her way toward a new life - falling here and there, unused to this tiny, chubby body. hopefully a helpful bystander will happen by and offer assistance; until then, she'll sniff around and hope she runs into a familiar face. hadn't mahariel's children gone off to explore? well, technically witcheri was starling's grandchild, but they'd been adopted by starling's brother mahariel.

sitting down abruptly, starbug taps her chin for a second and ponders how she's going to find the rugrats when she's got such stumpy little legs. maybe... surely she can find some nice people who'd be willing to help? fact of the matter is that in her current form, she's pretty helpless and reliant on the goodwill of any adults around her. it occurs to her in this moment that there runs the risk of being fought over - as naturally any adults running into her will assume she's in need of guardianship, not knowing she's actually much older than her body would suggest.

She knew wandering far from the others wasn't a good idea, but she wanted to explore these lands, possibly finding something useful for them in terms of shelter or food. What she did find was something completely different, but no less worrying: a lone cub. So small, even for her size too.

Faelyn approached quickly, looking around for an adult and not seeing one anywhere nearby. Oh no... had something happened to her parents?

"Are you alone little one? Do you need a place to stay?" she asked worriedly. There was no tribe for her to take the girl back to, nor any place concrete, but she knew Hanneth and Dero would want to help the girl as much as she did, and between all the adults of the jungle tribe they could make it work, tired as they were. But, only if she was alone to begin with. She didn't want to steal her away from her parents, if she had just wandered off from them.

@Starling

a pale woman approaches, and the reincarnated dragon takes a cautious step back - wariness is not really in her nature, but she's still uncertain of her environment. thankfully, the woman seems nothing but kind and concerned, and starling blinks up at her rainbow-hued pelt with interest. well - rainbow-hued to starling, anyways, due to her tetrachromacy. i... she trails off, frowning a little. i'm looking for my family. i don't know if they're here.

soft, high-pitched voice trickles out to hit faelyn's ears, multi-colored eyes searching the woman's face for reassurance. i'm starling draconia. a polite introduction, since she'd been raised to be polite - hell, she'd been raised as royalty, as a princess. it hasn't yet occurred to her that she probably ought to explain that she's a reincarnate; right now, she's just trying to be polite whilst gauging faelyn's true character and intentions.

She wasn't surprised when the cub tried to back off, taking care to stop a reasonable distance away so as not to frighten the poor girl. It was scary, being all alone somewhere, especially if you'd never seen it before. So far as she could tell, no one lived here and therefore they were all new to the place.

What was a surprise to her was the clarity with which the girl spoke, but she brushed it off. Perhaps she was older than her small frame alluded to, or perhaps she was smarter than most cubs her age. Either way, Faelyn wasn't going to question it.

"Okay, just be careful out here all alone," she cautioned. Sure, there were plenty of adults around and that made her feel like it was less likely anything bad would happen to her, but more adults also meant more possibilities for danger as well. "You're welcome to stay with my tribe while you look for them; I won't force you." She didn't like the idea of making others do things they didn't want, even if it might be in their best interest. That was just rude.

"Faelyn Vandiir," she replied with a polite nod. "It's nice to meet you Starling." Such a lovely name too.

@Starling

that sounds lovely, she says, accepting the invitation gracefully. if nothing else, it will hopefully ensure that she doesn't get taken off somewhere unfavorable whilst looking for her descendants. pleased to meet you, miss faelyn. have you met anyone by the name of melava? or witcheri? they might also introduce themselves by melly or eri. they both have folded ears and are very small.

though, at the moment, they're bigger than she is - which makes her smile a bit. ah, how the turns have tabled - though, to be fair, she wasn't ever any bigger than either of them anyways, except when they were still growing. extra small seems to run in the family these days, which is another source of amusement for her given that her father's side of the family always seemed to be large.

i'm also related to the freis, if you've run across any of them by chance? of course, she has no way of knowing if that side of her lineage even exists anymore, let alone if they're here in this strange new place. she hopes so, though - at this point she's just hoping to find one single adult relative to stay with until she's big enough to survive by herself again.

not that she'd ditch immediately anyways, as snuggly as she tends to be. peering up at faelyn, hope etches itself across her features, her soft smile turning to a gentle frown of worry. what if none of her relatives have found their way here? then what is she supposed to do? she can't let herself believe that, though, because otherwise - why would she have been brought back, and to here of all places?

@Faelyn

She's relieved when the girl agrees to come along and hang out with the former jungle tribe, not wanting anything bad to happen to her. There were plenty of adults to watch out for her, and other cubs to play with.

Hmm, she didn't know any of those names, and she shook her head regretfully. "I know plenty of Hodari," she mused, trying to think of the surnames she had been given. "I don't think I know any Frei though. Hanneth knows quite a few family lines though, perhaps she's seen some." Faelyn hoped so, because she knew what it was like to be without your family. She'd lost hers long enough ago that she didn't think she would find them again, but she didn't want that to happen to this girl.

"Did you make the trip by yourself?" she asked, impressed if so. That had been quite the journey for all of them, let alone an unaccompanied minor.

@Starling

@Faelyn says she hasn't heard of any freis, to her knowledge, and starling deflates a little - but the promise of this hanneth woman has the little dragon's eyes brightening once again. the question about if she'd made the journey here on her own, though, is met with a small grimace. i... woke up here. like this. i'm - i'm a reincarnate, i guess you could say. my body is a month old, but the soul inside it is very much not. she watches the bigger female carefully, gauging the woman's response to this news. so far, faelyn has seemed perfectly polite and helpful, but some people don't react well to things like this - so starling is being cautious.

the names i gave you - melava and witcheri - belong to my brother's children. i don't know why i've been brought back to life, or even how it happened, but maybe one of them can shed some light on the situation. had one of them done some sort of ritual to bring her back? and if so, why hadn't they brought xavier back alongside starling? confusion swirls, and with it, the urge to retreat back into the clouds she'd spent the last five years of her previous life living in. forcing herself away from that... addiction, she waits for faelyn's response - body tensed just in case she needs to try and run for it.

Faelyn was surprised, though the explanation given by the child certainly made things a lot more understandable. Ah, no wonder she spoke so well and had survived on her own for so long. Admittedly, Faelyn didn't understand the concept of reincarnation, nor did she know how it worked, but she understood it as it was explained to her by the girl.

"Ah, no wonder you've been doing so well for yourself," she said, still trying to settle it in her mind. "Though I guess it's hard to get food." Well, hopefully their tribe could help out with that, as they had plenty of adults who could hunt.

"Maybe you're being given another chance at life?" she suggested, having no idea how long the woman had lived before or how long she had been dead. It seemed a logical explanation to her, though.

@Starling

I just woke up here like this, the babe explains further, frowning. she hadn't actually been on her own for a month - she'd woken in a month-old body, and figures whatever force had brought her back had also fashioned her body to be exactly this age. perhaps... the little dragoness muses, brow crinkled. I hadn't thought I needed one, honestly. shaking it all away, the little one says, where do we head from here to get to where your people are? she can walk, though if it's a far distance, it may take her a while.

--exit??--

"Who knows. I certainly can't say what the spirits have in mind," Faelyn admitted. Maybe Hanneth could? Or perhaps her experience with them was solely with those who lingered in their former home. Well, bringing another mouth to the group probably wasn't the best idea, but she couldn't rightly leave the poor girl stranded, reincarnated or not. Who knew what might happen to her?

"This way," Faelyn said with a nod of her head. "It isn't far." Oh, she did hope Hanneth wouldn't be mad, not that she could imagine the lioness ever being angry. She'd just have to wait and see.

-exit faelyn-