A/N: this follows my oneshot "Forever Waiting" by just a few months. For those interested, there are character sheets for both Anjula and Melas on my DA account (same name) and a picture of Anjula on the account of MischiArt. A picture of Melas by Mischi is, hopefully, forthcoming.

For those wondering about Anjula's speech pattern: they're speaking Zandali in the beginning, and I don't imagine her having an accent in her own language (or Melas having an accent in the language since he's spoken it for 8,000 years). When they switch to Darnassian, she remembers much of it from the past but it's incomplete so the accent comes in.

Roots competed with one another, vying for space over top as they twisted, entangled and tied together. Vines and leaves provides ample shade and filled in the gaps that the temperate wood did not; a dome formed, and the inside remained dark despite the fading light of the late afternoon. The soil itself reached up and partially engulfed the enclosure, sprouting ferns until any inkling that the natural formation before them had only recently been formed, and in a matter of hours.

The clearing had been mostly dirt before, but the canopy was so thick that very little light escaped below. Their latest campsite hadn't been difficult to find; there were many such places in the region, and it only took a few days of travek and sleeping out in the open whenever they decided it was time to move on. Their longest record was still only six days...in that lifetime, of course.

She watched him as his arms came to rest, violet covered skin contrasting against the light brown kilt made from a deer they had skinned together. The way his eyes glowed just a little bit brighter whenver the green swirls wrapped around him fascinated her, but not in the way of something new; all of it was familiar, if only in bits and pieces. He remained standing for a few more minutes as he rested, a slight rustling in the lower canopy from the relatively rough storm above the only source of noise. He never grew tired of waiting, even as his soul felt the reminder of death and inevitability; how he could feel so comfortable at rest never ceased to confound her. Some things, she'd never grow used to.

Two pairs of feet lined up next to each other as she moved forward to stand next to him; she was slightly taller than him if she didn't slouch though not by much, but her two toes on her right foot were visibly larger than the five toes on his left. To top off the obvious differences, the royal purple hue of her hide was darker than his violet skin, though the fact that he had so many toes always struck her more. Sometimes she'd count again and again just to be sure he still had five on each foot; that, she was used to in a sense, but it still caused those two thick lips to curl over her tusks in a childish grin.

As if he knew she were looking again, he stretched his toes out, and his thinner lips curled over fangs as he grinned right back. "They're still there," he told her in a clear, relaxed voice, speaking her language as fluently as anyone else in her tribe.

It took her a moment to realize what he was talking about. "Still?" she asked, images flickering through her mind.

Though he continued watching their new hut he had just grown via his spells, she had his full attention. A hum of affirmation escaped through his smaller nose, a subtlety she'd grown to focus on quickly; living with him always felt like a two way observation, both intriguing but also a very exposed feeling. "You would always comment about the extra toes I have on each foot. Sometimes you'd do a double take to check if they were still there."

She couldn't quite put her finger on the reason, but her cheeks blushed an even darker shade of purple. Inside her, a combination of familiarity and closeness mixed in with the feeling of being exposed. Even if so much of their relationship felt old to her, the reality was that the images in her mind were mere recollections of lives past spent with him; any images and pieces of their past in his mind, however, were very real memories. So many details of the characteristics she'd retained and the experiences they'd shared across the cycle of her deaths and rebirths and his now-lost immortality were immediately available to him if he but reminisced, giving him an edge beyond her. At times, she felt as if he were observing her every action, recognizing mannerisms and behaviors she didn't even recognize in herself. Added to the fact that they lived alone together in the woods, only a single mountain range away from the Hyjalian den of her birth, and the sense of both intimacy and lack of privacy were overwhelming at times.

Not that she minded anymore. It had been months, and his patience as uncanny; he never pushed her toward anything she wasn't ready for. Even as she felt him so subtly observing her cheeks out of the corner of his eye, he didn't turn to face her fully, sparing her much embarrassment. If she truly was what the images told her she was - the reincarnation of a woman who had already lived countless lives for millennia - then it felt unbefitting that she grow shy around him like a young lady in her late teens.

But that's exactly what she was, at least in this lifetime. Unable to bear her increased pulse any longer and tortured by his almost teasing patience, she decided to be the first to stir. "There's no reason to wait before moving in...dear," she stammered hesitantly as she moved to collect the mere three spiderweb bags that contained all of their belongings. "The rainy season is over but there could still be scattered showers."

"There's no reason not to wait, either." He collected the rest of what they owned - just the bare minimum of handmade tools that two semi-nomadic people would need - and set it all down in the earthen hut he'd grown with his spell despite his protest. "One of the beauties of living out here is that you're never in a rush unless you want to be."

Seating herself down on the floor of the hut, she leaned against the wall opposite him, the door to the side. When vines grew from the roof on their own accord and covered the doorway to shield them from the outside, she fidgeted slightly but retained the feeling that she'd seen it before. His sly smirk as he unlaced one of the spiderweb bags he'd woven himself over a decade ago informed her that she'd seen him grow such vines before, and he'd probably seen her fidget like that before.

Opening up the single bag she had in her lap, she began to inspect what it contained to ensure they didn't need to replace anything. Flint knives of several different sizes were the easiest to feel out, and she laid the wolfhair string wrapped around their respective hilts out in front of her and counted the blades.

When she noticed him watching her again, she tried to play it cool this time and didn't look up. "Am I rushing to count only six blades too fast?" she asked cheekily.

"No, just right. Is it a crime if I enjoy looking at you?"

She didn't need to see the expression on his face to know that he was smiling in a manner even cheesier than hers. It was a rare occurrence from him and she stopped momentarily to wait for a second wave of increased pulse to wash away, taking a page from his book. She normally hated waiting.

"I can slow down."

"It's up to you."

"I'll slow down and take a break."

Recomposing herself, she's at back up to face him, keeping the large bag in her lap like a sort of security blanket. He hadn't even opened his bag yet, content to watch her with those amber eyes of his that glowed like all members of his tribe. Unable to ever win a gazing contest with him, she forewent the pleasant if nervous silence and tried to probe more for the shared memories of which he had more complete knowledge than her.

"Tell me one of my names in a past life," she demanded.

He smiled and looked down; this had become almost a game of theirs over the past few months as she got to know both him and herself a little more. Always happy but cautious as well, he'd refuse to tell her about more than one of her past selves every few days, ever fearful of overwhelming her. The patience drove her nuts, but not in a bad way, and any bit of information about who she had been previously made her feel more complete in the present.

"I've told you forty three out of the one hundred and six names so far," he began softly. His gaze fixated on his lap already as if he were sharing their memories by himself, and an illogical pang of jealousy shot through her as she felt the desire for him to look up at her again. "Do you remember all of them?"

"No, but I remember every picture in my head and every anecdote you've told me. And I remember that I bore the name 'Zeina' in four separate lifetimes and 'Dewi' in two. And that you won't tell me of my names in the first few lifetimes."

Sighing in a way that made her want to jump up and down and demand to know why, he took his time choosing his words. She'd long ago learned that prodding him wouldn't speed him up, and merely waited along with him as he considered what to tell her. "Nothing from our origins...yet. You've recalled so much, and you're dealing with the visions so much better, but...let's leave the more sensitive moments for later." Finally he met her eyes again - an old, wise gaze she'd seen through so many different eyes - and she knew he wasn't simply teasing her or being overly cautious.

"Alright...I understand," she conceded. "But it's been four days, and I've remembered and retained so much. Please, I want more."

"I understand too," he chuckled. "Hmm...have there been any more pictures in your dreams? Or maybe even while waking? Anything you don't yet recognize?"

"Not so much...once you start reminding me of things, the pictures aren't as intense or random. Most of them are from the lives you've described to me most recently. But..." Tapping her shin for a second, she remembered remembering a memory. "A day and a half ago, when we descended that really long hill with all the trees growing out of it...very briefly, I saw a picture I didn't recognize. But the ground was so steep that we had to focus on where we stepped and I didn't say anything."

"What did you see?"

"It was very brief, like a flash, but it was the ocean. It definitely wasn't a lake, but you told me we rarely ever leave the woods. And you never mentioned the few specific instances when we did, so it felt strange."

"What else did you see? We never sailed, but we swam in the shallows a few times."

Closing her eyes, she found the image to still be elusive, the dark areas from the edges of her peripheral vision concealing too much in the memory. "We weren't in the water. I see white sand, or very very light beige, and no islands. It's night, and the sky is overcast, but there's no rain. It's very dark without the stars." She continued to hold her eyes closed as her thoughts were interrupted by a sound from far away outside her hut. Her long, sensitive ears twitched and she could hear his twitching, too.

"Is that in my mind, or is someone really crying?"

Her question hung in the air for a moment and she opened her eyes to find his closed as he listened. Off in the distance the sound of an injured person reached the hut again, and he opened his eyes, which bore a sense of seriousness to them. "Someone is crying for help, in my tribe's talk; he's far and he sounds desperate."

Blinking and looking at him, she didn't know what to do. In her tribe, men made all the big decisions; in his tribe, women did so. In the small handful of crises they'd faced during the past few months, both of them often assumed the other would take the lead only to find silence between them. After having spent so many millennia together, however, they'd rubbed off on each other enough that he'd eventually make the big decisions, which she felt comfortable with given the haziness of her still growing mind.

"He sounds desperate, but not like he's being chased. If we smell too many predators then we can return, but if not we can help him until he's on his way," he declared before standing up. She stood up after him, the worry written on her face; her tribe rarely contacted the outside world, attacking strange people just as they'd attack strange animals. Strangers meant danger. As if he already knew what she'd say, he spoke again before she could as he led them out of the hut. "Your tribe marched under the banner of my tribe's priestess in the war that ended our immortality. If he is from my tribe, he will not be hostile toward you."

Nodding but picking up one of her wooden spears regardless, she followed behind him as they both crept slowly in the dark of early evening. If the man truly was injured to the point of fatality, then it was beyond their control; if he wasn't, then he could wait. Either way, even she understood the need to be cautious this time, and the two reunited mates stalked silently through the endless woods as they followed the voice.

It couldn't have taken them more than ten minutes of stalking until the injured man cried out again. "Help," he yelled in the familiar yet still elusive language. The man's voice had become hoarse from previous yelling, as if he wasn't in mortal danger and bore only scant hope that he'd be found.

Which wouldn't be totally out of the realm of possibility considering how far from any signs of sentience they'd set up their latest camp, she thought to herself. The two of them walked a little further until they could clearly see the man yelling as if he were desperate, yet in a rather in-desperate situation.

Bearing glowing eyes but silver in color, he obviously wasn't a Druid. Deep purple skin stood out, along with the color of his robes, against green hair in an unappealing way. Like all of his kind, he lacked tusks, had too many digits and was of smaller stature. Most telling as to how he ended up in his current situation, however, was his clothing; fine, regal clothes of a style she'd never seen before but which she knew belonged to a society unlike the tribal one she'd grown up in. A society of inequality and material wealth, where people intentionally trapped themselves into a cycle of schedules and ritualized work to care for oversized dwellings and too many possessions. It didn't make sense for him to be so far from any villages or settled areas, and judging by his appearance he was lucky that he lasted so long out there.

His silk pants had caught on a tree branch in a thick area of brush at the forest floor, and he'd tumbled in a way that caused him to become stuck between a few fallen logs. Were he not so bundled up in so much clothing it would have been easy for him to free himself...then again, someone so foppish might truly be incapable of caring for himself out there.

Finally, he noticed the pair looking at him from behind the numerous ferns. To her relief, the man himself looked relieved and displayed no hostility due to her being from a different tribe. To her chagrin, he began waving and yelling like an idiot. "Please, over here! I've fallen and I can't get up!" he shouted in his taxed voice, flopping like a fish.

"Quiet down!" her mate told the uninjured but panicked man in their dialect. "We'll help you, but quiet down!"

Scanning the area for any predators, the pair found none and she hung back as her mate helped the smaller man out of the underbrush. Despite his seeming difficulty doing so, the silver eyed man found his way back to his feet and dusted off his now torn pants. Keeping a respectful distance from her, he looked the two over as he tried to calm down. "Thank you so much, I was afraid I'd starve if I'd been caught there too long. These parts are so dangerous!" The man looked around at a loss, and both his embarrassment and his question already became apparent. "I don't suppose you'd...know how I can get out of this place?"

Patient but nearly vexed at the man's stupidity, her mate pursed his lips before answering. "You managed to find your way here; don't you remember where you came from?"

Looking like a scolded child, the smaller man's ears drooped. "Well...no. I know I'm a day or so worth of travel from the nearest town. I left for a...quest. And I don't think I'll be able to complete it now. If I could just find me way to the nearest road, I'll be fine."

"That's also more than an entire day's travel from here. Do you have any food or water?"

"No," the man replied, his eyes downcast. "I guess I could forage, if I were just pointed in the right direction..." His reluctance was apparent, but so was the fact that he was fishing for them to offer help before he asked.

Lacking the patience to see the man further embarrass himself, she took half a step out from behind her mate to speak. "We have some food and water back at our camp...ya can have some and then be on ya way," she told the man in the way of speaking of his and her mate's tribe, her accent thick as she struggled to remember words she hadn't used in several lifetimes.

At first, the man's eyes widened but he quickly returned to his previous downcast state. "I'm...sorry. It isn't often to see a dark troll, especially one that speaks our language. And thank you, thank you both so much; I won't take too much of your time." Although the man looked eager to leave and his lips looked parched, he didn't make any move to leave before they did, obviously not wanting to appear greedy. "I'm Triton, by the way; I wish we were able to meet under better circumstances." He bowed very lowly in a show of respect, and it was embarrassing for the couple as the stranded stranger tried way too hard to show his humility.

Patient if she didn't have to deal with the stranger any further, she stepped mostly behind her mate again, letting the two men speak. "I am Melas; this is my life partner, Anjula," her mate replied with a bow that wasn't so low. Hearing his name caused images to creep up in the back of her mind, but her distrust of strangers due to her tribal upbringing led her to push them to the side. Hearing her current name, in contrast, felt less and less familiar as time went on.

Melas led the three of them back toward the camp after refusing gold coins Triton tried to foist upon him. Living in the forest, the couple had no use for money at all and would have considered it a shame to charge a lost townie for help anyway. In lieu of payment, Triton regaled tales of his travels he likely assumed were entertaining to the nomadic couple. If anything would be difficult about extending help, it would be pretending to be interested in the endless stories, and Anjula began to realize that they needed to get rid of the man as soon as he was capable of traveling on his own again.