we are not an orphanage | Glowfic Constellation

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"--Okay," Liushna says, and takes him. She wants to immediately flee, but actually the horrifying conditions here make this part more important. She shifts Roderic into one arm, digs through her bag, and grabs the purse with all the coin she's withdrawn from her account at the Temple of Abadar. "Here," she says, thrusting the money towards the orphanage worker.

"- thank you very much ma'am may all the gods of Heaven bless you," recites the woman, counting it immediately.

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"And you," Liushna says, fleeing immediately. There are a handful of gold in mostly silvers in the purse.

Roderic is remarkably stoic about this whole thing so far, pouting but not crying.

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Liushna takes into the air as soon as she's outside.

"WAU," yelps Roderic.

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"It's alright," Liushna murmurs, running a soothing hand down his back.

The wings twitch when she touches them. They're very small for his size.

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That’s concerning but she can’t bring him back there.

She finds a nice tall building to land on and sets him down to get a better look at him.

He keeps hold of a fistful of her clothes, looking down from the height. He's got curly hair and big dark eyes and sliiightly pointy ears and sliiiightly pointy teeth (eight of them so far) and no shoes on.

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Liushna scoots the both of them away from the edge.

”Can you understand me?” she asks, slow and clear, in Chelish.

Slow tentative nod.

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She smiles and pats his hair. “My name is Liushna. I’m your new Mama.”

He blinks at her, solemnly digesting this assertion.

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“That means I’m going to take care of you now. Is it alright if I look at your wings?”

She spreads her own a little bit, to emphasize that she is also a wing-having person.

He shrinks a little bit but the lumps shift.

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Gently, carefully, she removes the shirt.

He has wings! They are black and battish, each not much bigger than his (normally proportioned compared to the rest of him) hands even when he stretches them out in response to the shirt's removal.

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…Yeah those won’t be able to lift him if they stay proportional to his body like that.

On the other hand, they don’t look atrophied or anything; aside from their size, they look entirely healthy.

And she knows more about membrane wings than she would if she didn’t have a bat familiar, but still not much compared to feathers.

She’s going to need to look into things while she’s here in Westcrown, see what she can pick up about encouraging growth and entirely magical means of flight.

”Beautiful,” she says, because they are despite their delicate smallness, and because he probably needs to hear it.

"Nuh-uh."

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She boops him lightly on the nose. “Yuh-huh.”

He crosses his eyes watching her finger approach his nose and looks nonplussed about it.

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She giggles and pats his head again. He’s so cute!

He reaches for his shirt.

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