Marianne yawns before slowly opening her eyes with a groan. She must have fallen asleep.
"I'm sorry, Bog. I didn't mean to go to sleep and ruin our hunt," Marianne murmurs as she sits up. "Bog? Bog!"
Looking around the empty niche, she curls in on herself as a touch of fear creeps into her as she stares at the briar patch in front of the niche. She hasn't been alone while outside the castle for three months and she can't help as her mind drifts back to that terrifying day.
What if the death hound returned?
Without her sword, she's at more of a disadvantage than last time. She won't be able to hold off the beast with only her knives and daggers. She couldn't even flee because that would leave her people defenseless and at Cu-Sith's mercy.
What if it brought one of its brethren with it this time?
Cu-Sith was hard enough to fight but one of the other fae dogs would be impossible to escape. She won't have a chance against more death hounds. If someone came to rescue her, they would die.
What if Bog...
"Marianne?" Bog calls worriedly.
Marianne turns her gaze as Bog finishes flying between the briars and heads toward her. The tears filling her eyes blur her vision slightly and she can't help flinching away as Bog reaches out to touch her. Tears fall faster as he recoils at her rejection.
"Marianne! Why are...oh," Bog mutters before groaning and kneeling before her. "I'm so sorry, Marianne! I didn't think. It's me, I swear. You can even hit me to prove it."
She chuckles waterily at his offer and instead reaches out to cradle his face with both her hands, the emotional blue eyes staring at her is all the proof she needs of his validity. This time she welcomes his touch as he reaches out to her and pulls her against his chest, the rhythm of his strong heart offering her more proof.
"I'm so sorry," he repeats. "I didn't think about what would happen if you woke while I was gone. After I woke and found you sleeping so peacefully, I just didn't want to disturb you."
"Where'd you go?" she questions.
"Flew around to make sure no one got into any trouble. Don't worry, everyone is fine," Bog reassures. "A few have already caught their kill and are doing their own celebrating."
"We celebrated early," Marianne chuckles. "How long was I asleep?"
"Not long. Here eat some of this," he suggests, pulling a small loaf of bread from the satchel he brought with him and handing it to her. "Nex had it packed for you. He said Junco had you eat something when you returned but he was concerned about how quick you ate it and wanted to make sure you had something available when you get hungry during the hunt. You still want to hunt, right? You're not too tired, are you? I didn't mean to pounce on you like that but you were so beautiful and tempting and..."
Marianne rolls her eyes at her fretting husband and smirks as she tears off half of the bread and stuffs it in his mouth. She makes a mental note to thank Nex for his thoughtful idea as she finishes the rest of her half before drinking some of the blackberry juice that was packed as well. She really was hungry. She reaches out for the other small loaf of bread in the satchel but holds back instead.
"If you're hungry then you should eat," Bog remarks, finishing the piece she used to shut him up.
"I don't want to eat too much and make it hard for me to hunt, so we'll eat it later," she comments.
"You'll eat it later," he corrects.
She chuckles at him before grabbing one of the daggers and checking her appearance in the polished steel. Nodding in satisfaction once she puts her bilberry eye-makeup and hair to rights, Marianne quickly straps all her blades back into place and stretches out her wings. The briar patch is too narrow for her to fly through and she relaxes in Bog's hold as he flies the both of them through the prickly maze.
They might need to save this place for a later rendezvous spot. Bog's dark chuckling as she voices her thoughts is all she needs to know of his opinion.