It just... makes sense that he'd be here. It's not fair, but that's just how it is. Because of the war, the challenge - everything she saw that day - Jazmin can't bring herself to walk across the water and sit upon the Lagoon's borders and call for him. She can't. But who else can she turn to now?

Not her family. Not for this - not right now. If anyone can do this... quietly, peacefully, it's him. Jazmin's pride has been swallowed up, devoured by the need to get out. To accept the offered hand instead of drowning.

But she still can't bring herself to go to Scilla, knowing who is there.

Instead, Jazmin paces the beach. The first place they met. It's disgusting sentiment that's brought her here, dragging her up and down the warm black sand, waiting on a man of all things.

Pathetic.

@Colsun

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Colsun is tired. The world feels claustrophobic and the walls are somehow still closing in, but the haggard man is far too.. what, honorable? Determined? He doesn't know what personality trait encourages him to keep going, keep pushing; he only knows that every morning he somehow still manages to force himself out of the den and break into the sunlight. Colsun may not be entirely present as he wanders the borders, but he does feel some semblance of reawakening when he strolls to the familiar black shores. He's pleased to have a moment without five cubs gnawing at his toes when he realizes there's a different sort of chaos awaiting him in the form of an agitated @Jazmin. He blinks. She's so.. antsy.

"You alright?" he asks, stepping towards her with the confidence of a man twice his age. He feels twice his age.

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Between laps along the water’s edge, he arrives. She turns around and @Colsun is there, looking bone-weary, cuts across his body from the recent war. She stops mid-stride, paw hovering above the black sand.

"Yes," she answers, standing still as the black lion walks to her. For the first time in so long, she can be truthful. She is alright. There’s a faint scent of blood on the wind, mixed with his scent. Blood and… something sweet and stale, familiar to some very old memory in Jazmin’s mind.

"He’s gone." The words fall out without lead-up, without thought. Excitement heightens her voice, pitches it. "He left - I don’t know. I don’t care. He can’t stop me." Gone is the ever-present feeling of eyes on her skin, the watchful dog of the Oasis intent on keeping her, or revealing her secrets. Jazmin could hardly believe it, half expecting him to reappear like a demon if she let her guard down.

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He blinks. All things considered, yes isn't typically the answer Jazmin gives him. Usually it's a more distant look accompanied by a shrug, something noncommittal that both invited him to pry and threatened his life if he tried. Jazmin has always been mysterious and difficult to understand, but this? This was even more unusual. He was accustomed to the sass, the attitude, but not.. honesty.

And then he understands. She's free, then. Colsun's lips twitch into a grin. "You're free, then," he says with a flick of his bobbed tail. "Scilla is now allies with Andal, too. I'll make sure the bastard is punished if he ever shows his face again." It's the least he could do, isn't it?

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Free. Jazmin beams. The word has never tasted more sweet, never meant more to her than it does right now. Freedom had been expected, taken for granted, until she did not have it.

"No," she says quickly, but not nearly as heated as she might have spoken, "no - I don’t want anyone to know." For her pride, but also because no one will punish him except her - one day, if he returns, she will be strong enough to face him. It will be Jazmin that makes sure justice is met.

And for that reason, Jazmin cannot simply challenge for her own release. This has to be done… delicately, as much as it pains her to ask this.

"You and - your queen. Can you ask Andal to trade for me?" If it means a few months in service to the Lagoon, so be it. She’d gladly live in Scilla to pay off whatever debt she’d owe them.

@Colsun

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Oh, he wants to ruin this moment so bad. Well, no, he doesn't want to ruin it, but he has a feeling that's exactly what will happen if he manages a comment about how cute she is when she's beaming like a kid on Christmas morning. Colsun has, surprisingly, learned that she doesn't want to be seen as a cutie patootie uwu. He's disappointed in that. Because she is, indeed, a cutie patootie uwu.

"As you wish, princess." Frankly, not having to hunt someone else down saved him a lot of grief. He wasn't going to complain. What he could do, however, was get her out of Andal -- and relatively easily, he thinks. "Shouldn't be a problem, I can head there now. Don't think a trade will be necessary." He hopes not, anyway, but he has yet to truly meet the Oasis king.

Colsun pauses to scratch an itch behind his ear. "Where will you go now?"

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Not requiring a trade would certainly make things easier, but there’s still little part of her that’s bitter that she is worth so little - and she has no right to complain about that, seeing as her writer never posted her in hunts she refused to pull her weight under duress.

"Oh -" Jazmin’s ears flick uncertainly. The question is well-meaning but… "I thought I’d join the Lagoon." And again, there’s a moment of selfish put-out, a mix of confusion and hurt darting across her pale face before she smooths it out. "As payment for trading for me, of course."

@Colsun

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Oh, now this is a turn of events he hadn't anticipated. Colsun's brow raised in surprise when she mentions joining Scilla, but his excitement deflates somewhat when she reiterates its only because she will be indebted to him. "Oh, Jaz," he says, frowning. "I want you to join Scilla because you want to, not because you feel obligated. It's not freedom if you're handing yourself over to a different sort of shackle. No, Jaz, I want you to go where your heart tells you." His lips pull into a thin smile. "And as much as I want that to be the lagoon, I'm not in the business of forcing anyone to join."

Besides Freja, but that was different.

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Don’t you ‘oh Jaz’ me. The princess’s brows furrow over dark, narrowed eyes. She doesn’t need Colun’s pity or his… whatever the fuck this is.

"Did you think maybe that’s what I want?" She asks, very barely managing to keep her voice level. "I don’t want to be in anyone’s debt. And don’t say I won’t owe you anything for this - that isn’t how it works." He can say there’s nothing owed, he can insist this is what friends do but Jazmin will still feel obligated, she will feel the shackles even if he doesn’t put them on her.

"Besides," the girl adds after a heartbeat, taking a slow breath to settle herself, "my fathers raised me better than that."

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"No," he replies flatly, arching a brow curiously. "Because you're a woman who isn't shy about what she wants. If you wanted to join, you'd just tell me." It's meant to ruffle her feathers, get under her skin. Colsun doesn't think there's a cuter lioness on the planet than Jaz when she fluffs up, seconds away from detonation and more than willing to lasso him into the blast radius. There's a thin smile on his muzzle, one that she will inevitably find infuriating.

He sighs. "Alright, alright, we'll do it your way. You can be my personal servant for the month," the lion replies with a haughty flick of his wrist. "I like my furs fluffed before I go to sleep, and I expect massages every night." Colsun pauses here, considering.

"Or just help fill the caches. That's always helpful." Colsun shrugs. It doesn't matter too much to him what she does, honestly. "Shall I take you home then, princess?" There's an edge to his voice that wasn't there before, buried deep beneath his baritones of play.

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