Nymph

Button made by the lovely Jyxxie!

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A breeze in the branches; the swirl of the wind around a tree trunk. The forest is soft and glistening today. As an innocent dragon wanders into the springtime sights and smells for an afternoon walk, the tree-nymphs begin to giggle among themselves. The newcomer looks around, already lost, and they know they'll have some fun with them.

But this Nymph is different - she doesn't share her sisters' fondness for torturing poor lost souls, or stealing their packs or anything. She's simply in it for the joy of playing cat-and-mouse with a stranger, confusing them thoroughly until she's laughing too hard to stay in her tree form. Her sisters look down on this, sure, but she's never liked to cause real harm to dragonkind.

Fortunately on this day, for both Nymph and the stranger, the dragon walks close by her trunk and lays a talon against it. Today, this forest interloper is all hers. Nymph almost jumps, but keeps her composure - her scales are perfectly brown and rough like bark, her wings look only like leaves drenched in sunlight. This stranger doesn't seem terribly observant. At least, they haven't seemed to notice that every other tree in this forest has been walking around, completely reshaping the scenery every few minutes.

It's hard to blame anyone for getting lost in here.

Slowly, Nymph begins to shift, her bark turning back into scales. The stranger slowly removes their talons, looking confused. Nymph's eye flashes for a moment from behind her wing - bright green. The stranger is now definitely afraid - they're backing away, not realizing that Nymph, in response, is creeping closer.

When they're closing in on the edge of the wood, Nymph only showing any signs of being anything more than a tree in flashes, her tree exterior finally melts away. The color has fully drained from the stranger's face.

"Hi." Nymph's eyes are narrowed with mirth.

After that, the stranger doesn't seem to want to stay and chat. In fact, they take off screaming, racing out of the woods and from whence they came. Nymph's disappointed, admittedly - she has half a mind to chase them, but being away from her sisters too long would drain far too much from her.

Ah, well. They can't all be winners. Sometimes a little chuckle was more than enough to sustain a playful spirit, though.

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a few field notes on tree-nymphs

• seem to all be connected "sister" spirits through some sort of inter-tree communication
• very rarely seem to be outside of the woods for long

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Please do not exalt me! If I am no longer wanted, send to/notify Nightshadeling!