come bless with me

@Philippa

^^

She stared down at the flowers with a slightly critical eye, they had been placed around the base of the tree as it withered, likely dying despite it's great age. "Perhaps you shall be saved, Old One," Kore murmured as she lifted a delicate paw to shuffle forward the winter rose - not one she would ordinarily pick due to how sacred but it was a fitting need for such an offering - , it's thorns ghosting against her pawpads as she then cast her gaze to the great tree, high above where it loomed. "I wonder what stories you might have to share, I imagine you have seen so many things in all of your years," imagine, being so old and being unable to directly tell people of what you have seen. Kore knew the trees could talk, the wood calling to the sprites and it made her jealous; her own ears unable to catch their whispered words.

"One day, old friend, might we share tales of our lives," the girl cooed as she stepped back, looking at her offerings, her beckoning for the fairies to come and see the dying tree and find a way to bless it back with life or at least, a worthy ending. It would not die soon, not completely, it was old and large and it would die slowly. That was almost the more heartbreaking part, she thought. ^^

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I imagine she appeared quite close to Kore/is within earshot

---

 Philippa sweat over a bubbling vat of stew. Turning with practiced grace, she pivoted to the chopping block to ready rhubarb for a pie. She shared the kitchen with another cook, less experienced but ever eager, as he fumbled through the dinner rush. The lad went for the stew, a threadbare towel his only defense against the fired iron.

 She didn't close her eyes in time.

 The boy yelped, and she yelped with him, dropping the knife with a clatter and gripping her hand to her chest. Tears welled, and she bit back a sob, hurrying outside to the alley through the back door where she sank into a gray bank of sooty snow.

 Cursed. That was the only word she had for it.

 Trembling with echoes of pain, Philippa blinked, but when she opened her eyes she was not in the alley anymore. When she rose it was not on two feet, but four. Her scream of surprise was a yelp, spinning in a circle to see -- a tail!? “What's happening to me?? What's going on??”

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^^

Kore wasn't a wolf that was easily jilted by surprise, if ever, so the sudden appearance of another did little to rise the fur of her back. Instead she would release a gentle, "oh," breathless and intrigued. What did the old Magiks have for her today? A yelp, a scream, confusion, frantic questions... they were clearly out of their element. As most were when they suddenly appeared somewhere, of course.

"Perhaps you might breathe for a moment," the girl cooed as she tilted her head, smile serene and youthful features open. "Many find themselves plucked from their existence and deposited here, a new land," it likely wasn't great reassurance but it also the truth. "Where were you moments ago, Earthen one?" Decorated prettily in warm tones, she reminded her of a wood nymph.^^

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 The voice that greeted her was as lilting and sweet as birdsong, and it came from a wolf. 

 Philippa reeled backward, as clumsy as a fawn, landing on her rump with a huff. Though quite impossible, she could do little more but answer the wolf's question. “I...”

 “I was at the Rose & Crown. The other cook burned his hand and -...” She did not know how to communicate her curse in the best of circumstances, let alone on the edge of some contorted reality. “This can't be real...I must have hit my head on the brick.”

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^^

This one felt new, somehow, as she seemed unsteady in her body and toppled back to her bum with an audible huff. Oh dear, she mused to herself, eyes glistening with intrigue. Reincarnation seemed to be quite obvious with this one as she spoke words that Kore could not relate to anything wolf. "I must confess I do not know what the Rose & Crown is though I should think anything named after the sacred Rose should be of good," Kore, though, could not think of what a hand was and how they might burn it -- unless one was playing with fire. "You are in a different form, then? You were not a wolf moments ago?" Kore inquired softly, looking to have her earlier thought proven.

"I can look at your head, if you wish, to see if you might have any damages," the girl cooed in reassurance though she thought that it would be futile; clearly this earthen wolf was one of the ones to have been brought here with a different body. ^^

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 She'd grown up with the stories all children had - of tales that taught with a twist of whimsy. This was less a twist and more of a wrench. 

 Wind ruffled her fur. Fur. “No I-I was definitely something else.” But when wolves and humans had so often been enemies, Philippa tucked that information away like a flower pressed into the pages of a book. It seemed, impossibly, she was done with that chapter, that tome and onto a different one.

 “That's nice of you, but I'm...fine.” Physically, she felt no pain. “I've never met a talking wolf before.” Or a normal one, for that matter.

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^^

Something else, she confirmed and Kore smiled. "You would not be the first to arrive in a body different to the one you wore in another life," she reassured, hoping that in thinking that she was not alone might settle her nerves -- if even a little bit. Kore could imagine it was more than unsettling to arrive somewhere new, not walking in the body you had known before. It would perhaps take the girl a little while to get used to it but in the end, things would work out. The girl had noted that the other had not mentioned what she had been before but little did Kore bother, thinking that really, it didn't matter. She had worn a different body before, too, though she had taken it with much more ease -- growing up with the culture ingrained from the Elders.

She would have been able to smell the blood had there been any and the other did not seem to be in physical torment, so Kore would leave it be. The girl would chime a giggle then, lips tilting into an amused smile, "well, you are one now, sweetling, so you will find yourself meeting plenty that talk." She mused, "though... some prefer to not talk at all, so perhaps prerare yourself for it all." She would certainly meet plenty types of wolves now that she was here. "My name is Kore," the girl had been tempted then to use her true name, her chest stirring with longing.

"Do you carry your previous name still?" The girl questioned warmly, it might do her some good to get used to talking wolves. ^^

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 That was as good a confirmation as any - she was a wolf. 

 There was a lapse, a space between words as she wrestled that fact as though it were an un-shuckable oyster, a reality that couldn't be cleaved.

 Kore. A pretty name for a pretty wolf. “I'm Philippa.” She replied, sure of that much. Her person, her being, her essence had carried over. It was the outer shell that had changed. “My friends call me Pip.” She added, offering the woman a shy smile. 

 “Are you - um.” What did wolves do? “Are you traveling anywhere?”

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^^

"Pip!" she cooed happily, "though perhaps I might give you some time to think of me as a friend, if you would prefer me to call you Philippa," the girl offered with a smile. Given how it was so very likely that this wolf was a first time wolf, if her body before had been something different, she probably needed time to adjust. Kore thought that she might be able to help her with that though it was only something she could do with time and not forcing her to view Kore as anything more than a stranger before she was ready.

Her question had Kore's ears perking as she shook her head, "I travelled for a while but I followed my path," Kore divulged, "I have finished my travelling and it is here I will make a home." She breathed in, the deep scents of floral and grass making her tail wag once again. "Alongside others that wish to join me, of course," she added. "What will you do now, with a new body and new land?" ^^

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“I don't know.” She answered, a sudden hitch spearing her lilting voice. She'd worked so hard for the life she'd had - letting go of that world and the people in it...tears stung her eyes and her ears swiveled to press flat against her head. 

 “Would it be alright if I stayed with you? If it's not too much trouble?”

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^^

She watched how she wilted and Kore stepped forward, her expression warm and sincere. "Oh sweetling," she murmured, "you would be no trouble at all." Once more Kore was reminded that things happened for a reason and that she was meant to be the one to find Philippa. "I would be honoured to help you navigate your new world," Kore reassured her with a wag of her tail. "You have entered a world with countless possibilities, though scary and unknown, the world is at your paws," she declared, there would be a whole new world for her to explore, learn and do as she wanted to in.

Kore was happy to be the one to guide her. ^^

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