the essential Saltes of humane Dust | Glowfic Constellation

"Perhaps. Yes." He turns his eyes back to the letters he's writing.

from-the-deeps

He will awkwardly sidle out to go be a fox. Somewhere else.

Joseph Dexter Ward

I-am-not-resigned

Oops.

with-lilies-and-with-laurel

When Eliza comes back, she takes one look at her fiance and asks, "So what happened while I was gone?"

across-time

She summarizes. Including Nereus's frozen reaction to the adoption offer.

with-lilies-and-with-laurel

"Ah. I...can think of several different ways to interpret that."

across-time

"I can as well, though - they were hard to read at the time."

with-lilies-and-with-laurel

"I guess we'll have to talk to them when they get back." She sits down next to Joseph and puts her head on his shoulder.

across-time

"I suppose so."

from-the-deeps

A fox, meanwhile, is sniffing off in the woods nearby the Derby household.

The fox can see lights on in the house, and vaguely the shapes of people moving through the house, but neither of the Derbys comes outside.

Martina does, though, creeping outside surreptitiously and looking around presumably for him.

from-the-deeps

Hello! This is definitely just your friendly neighborhood fox. Who isn't at all scared of human-Deep One hybrids.

She smiles at him gratefully, then sets down a napkin filled with something that smells savory and good.

"Thank you," she whispers. "I saved you this from dinner."

from-the-deeps

Oooooooooh.

Very happy snuffly fox! Who isn't sure if foxes are supposed to wag their tails, but that's a fairly common canid-to-human body language thing, right?

She smiles and waits until they've finished before collecting the napkin and sneaking back into the house.

from-the-deeps

Grateful fox will continue staking out the house, and patrolling the grounds.

Nothing happens for the rest of the night.

from-the-deeps

A very tired no-longer-a-fox drags himself back to the hotel room, having swapped out well away from the Derby house but still out of the city.

with-lilies-and-with-laurel

Fortunately for his ambitions to avoid awkward conversations, everyone is asleep.

from-the-deeps

Then he will go to sleep, too.

with-lilies-and-with-laurel

He's not the first person to wake up in the morning, though.

across-time

Nor the second. Amity is an early riser, by tradition, though not usually chatty in the mornings.

Joseph Dexter Ward

I-am-not-resigned

Actually everyone else is already awake. Sorry Nereus.

from-the-deeps

Then this is going to be a very socially awkward morning! Nereus rises a bit late but is bright eyed and bushy tailed as soon as he's up. Metaphorically. He doesn't actually give himself a tail yet.

with-lilies-and-with-laurel