🍓- one secret about yourself
“A secret? What, I didn’t offer any of those…”
Kyuusei sighed. “Fine. But we have to go to Stormwind.”
* * *
Walking through the pumpkin patch in Stormwind, the druidess explained.
“The Cenarion Circle didn’t recognize female druids until after the Third War. It doesn’t mean we didn’t exist, it just means we weren’t welcomed. We had no formal training, no acknowledgment, no voice. Most druids seek out Cat and Bear and other spirits as part of their training. Some are approached by those spirits before they’re ever trained, and the Circle takes them in to help them understand and adapt.”
Kyuusei stopped near the edge of the field. A giant Ancient of Lore stood in the distance, tended by a group of night elves. Refugees from Teldrassil, kaldorei and Gilnean alike, were scattered through the farm - helping the human farmers, resting in tents, sitting around campfires, conversing in small knots.
“Cat came to me almost two centuries before the Third War. But we were still in the Long Vigil, and the few druids awake from the Dream were of the Circle - they wouldn’t recognize me, didn’t care. So what should’ve been a gift was... confusing, terrifying, as Cat and I struggled with each other. I’m not sure how long we wandered through Darkshore, but we were tired and hungry and weak and still fighting with each other when we stumbled across an old Kaldorei hunter’s campsite.”
“He recognized us. What we were, how we were fighting each other.” Kyuu smiled. “He wasn’t a druid, but he knew beasts, he understood. And he taught us. He couldn’t teach me to be a druid, but he taught Cat and me, he taught us, to be me. Until the Circle finally relented, he was my only teacher.”
“He wouldn’t let me call him Shan’do, but Shan’da - I guess you’d use grandfather - that’s the only name I’ve ever had for him.”
Kyuu motioned towards one knot of refugees. A male kaldorei with visible signs of age and wild, greying hair sat at a campfire, playing cards with a grey-muzzled Worgen. Three young women, kaldorei and Gilnean, sat nearby - and the old Night Elf occasionally made some unheard remark to the trio that resulted in an outburst of laughter.
“I found a place for him in Nighthaven, but he won’t leave. He never minded living rough, and he says nobody plays cards there. I think the sly old coot just likes having an audience.”
Kyuusei shifted to four legs, a great cat bounding to the old kaldorei. Shan’da moved his cards to one hand and rested his free hand on the feline’s head as Kyuusei laid down at his side - a low, rumbling purr heard even at a distance.