Days of nothing but tramping through the mud and rain. Long nights spent staring at the sky and waiting for it to brighten. Moments of flaring terror whenever imagination broke through her concentration and whispered terrible possibility in her ear. Fuel. All of it. Tossed into the furnace of her heart, stoking the flames and bringing her back to life. At last, she has an answer. She knows [i]something.[/i] Melody is alive and well and rescueable and every muscle vibrates with coiled energy and now’s the time for leaping and racing off to go get her!

Or, it would be, if there wasn't a comforting arm wrapped around her and a voice telling her nice things in a warm, familiar tone. Somehow, she just. Can’t quite. Work up momentum. Mrgh.

So she sits. So she quietly burns. 

(And burn she does, Giriel. As you read the perilous fate that's befallen her poor Melody, she never broke with your breathing. She kept the pace, even as her chest swelled to take in larger gulps of air. The fire deep within her rose higher and higher until you could feel it on your arms; a prickling heat that only grew with each passing minute. Until you stopped. Until you held her tight. The earth rumbles and steams, but it does not erupt. Not yet.)

"Yeah we are." Grin, snort, and is that a puff of steam? "Nobody's going to lay a finger on her. Not if they don't want it bitten off." In addition to any bitings already owed to the terrible Ven, who definitely had it coming. "But, huh. Really? A goddess? So priestesses [i]can't[/i] all walk on water? Damn. I was gonna give sis an earful over that one..." She still could, though. It's not like she warned her that goddesses sometimes signed up to be priestesses. Who forgets to mention a thing like that?! "Still..."

(She sighs. Lava roils.)

“Gonna be a pain running with...ugh, [i]knights.[/i] Sure would be a lot quicker if I went and kicked the crap out of Ven and those demons by myself."

How does that sound to you, Giri, when your little Han speaks it like she was telling you “if you go outside, you'll get wet?” Hard facts, without enough room for braggadocio to play. (Though if you give her a minute, maybe she'll have some more boasting lined up too. Just as soon as she puzzles out the the possibly literal punchline between Ven and Ven-geance.)