High above the world, malevolent gray clouds roil, hanging heavy with their stormy load. Down here, beneath the fanned open forest-frond canopy, even mid-day finds the jungle floor dark and rippling with shadows. The falling rain pitters, patters, drips and trickles irregularly where it reaches the forest floor, feeding into a stream that courses through a shallow ravine. ravine. There are other sounds here: the hush of water striking leaves partially masks it, but there is a moment of clearly heard canine barking. A deep, big-dog 'ROUF', then silence again, broken a second later by a franking flapping sound. Ellen is kneeling beside the stream, heavy-set body in a green jerkin, one heavy THUNDER thigh visible through a pragmatic slit-skirt flexed where she's bearing a knee down on the neck of a wherry, thrashing with its foot caught in a snare. Nearby, a large black mastiff, all boxy-faced and loose-jowled, is hanging back in HELPLESS play-bow, eyes FASTENED on the thrashing animal, but too well trained to rush into the fray. YET. "Easy, easy, easy," Ellen's heavy-husky voice is muttering.

The wildling huntress watches and waits. She is a stoic, narrow shadow of the forest, invisible in her position, perch high in the trees. Ellen will not see her amid the dark green shadows, but she may feel eyes upon her back as she watches the young woman with the struggling wherry, and that large black canine. She watches all with proud destain. The rain strikes the leaves, and there is a loud BOOM of thunder in the sky. She deftly locks an arrow onto her bow. A fiercely sharp wooden arrow with white feathers shoots out of the sky, and, with perfect accuracy, sinks directly into the brain of the wherry. Dead. Two fingersbreadths to the right, and it would have hit the woman's shoulder.

Though there are likely other jumps in muscle, Ellen's more flat heavy planes than sculpted tone - in this, there's only two motions visible: her head jerks, to where the wherry's head is pinned fast to the wet forest floor, and then she's digging bared toes into the ground and throwing herself into the nominal shelter of brush nearby. Sadly, this puts her at a greater distance from her own bow and quiver of arrows - set aside while while she'd been working. They're less savage in style; festive, embellished with colorful feathers and beads. "Ssk!" She hisses at the canine, reaching out and seizing onto the loose neck-skin behind his head and DRAGGING him into the shelter as well. He has that quintessentially canine confusion, like 'but! but but but!', ears all perked yet towards the wherry, only reluctantly crouching down alongside her. After a long moment's silence, her voice carries out, full-throated and absurdly cavalier, even if it's a little breathy-winded and tense, "Wheeew, nice shot! Dead on!" Hidden from sight, you can hear leaves rustle. She's movin' around in there.

Perhaps it is the sport she enjoys - terrifying weyrfolk and non-wilding alike, or maybe she was just putting that wherry out of its misery. Vella watches as the husky one in green makes a dive for the bushes, frowning as she is no longer in view. Still, she follows her progress by the movement of the leaves. Chin lifts and she adjusts her position, leaves shimmering with heavy raindroplets. "I never miss." Comes a rich, regal voice, as cold as it is cruel. "You have forgotten your arrows. Are they so unimportant to you?" Perhaps she means to taunt her out into the open. At any rate, she isn't giving up her position. The voice has a way of sounding like it comes from everywhere. But up high.

"Hoo," Ellen says this quieter, more muffled - like she'd turned briefly to comment it more to her canine, "She sounds fancy, huh?" There's a rapid series of tail-thumps suggesting the response is 'nervous tailwag?' She could be trying harder to not be heard, and mixes into her thick-burred contralto the sound of a person both gritting their teeth and smiling simultaneously. Shuffle-shuffle. She's moving around again, heading towards the thick trunk of an ancient tree and the better shelter it might provide. Her voice raises to answer back, "Eh, I can make more, fear'nt. Got a few things I reckon I value more." After a moment's pause, just slightly strained from whatever position she's crouching in: "What aught I call ya?" Hers is no Southern brogue; it's foreign, weighty, irreverent.

"Normally I would not bother to speak with your kind." Comes the dismissive, fancy', arrogant voice, completely different from Ellen's husky, weighty accent. It is clear the owner of said voice believes this is beneath her, talking with someone whom she thinks is a weyrfolk. (Or at the very least, not a wildling. And most definitely, not of her tribe.) There is a long silence, where the rain falls down, leaving ripples in puddles, raindrops on foliage. Such a dismal day, but wonderful for dark, damp shadows and mysteriousness. "Has the madness of the curse overrun the Weyr?" Commanding. "We have heard of a murder." She ignores the woman's asking of a name, and stating that she has more things of value than her arrows. The mysterious stranger has an agenda.

There's actually a coarse, rough series of laughs - just three, hah-hah-hah, and Ellen crows back, "Y'know s'possible t'shout 'what news' without notching an arrow!" The rain stretches long, yawning quiet between each spoken volley - isn't not really an answer to the question. Then again… it wasn't really a question, was it. "—I dunno what you think 'my kind' is," an abrupt movement - she throws herself across the brief gap between her brush and the tree trunk, landing in a roll to take her the rest of the route. Her back lands heavily against the treebark, shoving a chunk of air from her lungs, "But near'n far as I seen, madness never leaves a Weyr. S' bread an' butter amongst 'riderkind."

There is a silence so long, Ellen might wonder if the arrogant one has left. Then: "I merely ended the creature's suffering." More rainfall. "You walk with dragons." The voice suggests there can be no greater sin. It is not in Vella's nature to laugh, but if that were so, she would have at the idea of madness never leaving a weyr. "Perhaps you are not as dim as I originally thought." Another long silence. The blunt ends of pale hair can be seen floating on the wind, far up in a jungle tree. "But you have not answered my question. Perhaps you do not know the answer."

"'f ya mean I make trade with 'em, bet your ass I do," Ellen's unapologeticly blunt voice echos through the sheets of mist into gradual silence, "I'll walk amongst any any man, woman or child I damn well please, and say thank'ya." Just barely visible, the edge of a blunted bare shoulder and one-quarter view of profile can be seen leaning around the side of the tree - peering towards the dead wherry first. The directional angle of the arrow incriminates Vella's position more than the echo of her lofty tone. She glances upwards, and perhaps surprisingly grins, a rough pitbull-esque exposure of teeth, to see those gossamer whisps of pale hair. And quickly withdraws again. You can see just the faint shape of her shadow, where she's… almost casually drapping her arms over her drawn up knees, staring forward at the empty forest while speaking, "If y'tryin' to bait me, woman, I toss ya up a bag of shit t'eat." A longer pause, during which time she might be going through her pockets. "…do ya oldstyle, fashion of the road. Trade ya. Thy name, 'n exchange for the name of the man murdered."

The fair hair is suddenly gone, the woman with it. Vella is a master at hiding, at deception, and she slips away, sliding on fae feet down her tree. She has grown tired of this conversation, and this person, who clearly has nothing of relevance to tell her. Another flash of pale hair, while the woman is busy with her tree, and a slender woman appears, fae-quick, over the dead wherry, a slender hand reaching out to pull the silvery arrow from its carcass.

In the time it takes to climb down a tree, to creep down the ravine, to cross the stream, the rain and giggle of flowing water mask the sound of many things. The patter of rain - falling harder now, soaking into the feathers of the dead wherry, washing its alien blood into the thirsty soil - puts a lively, ominous movement through the jungle floor. Leaves shift and shudder, thickening mist climbs up the stream bed. And just short of that slender hand reaching the silvery-white arrow, there can be heard… an ominous, wet growling. From the dark shadows beneath the shrubbery, a set of large, white teeth are bared. Ellen's canine has not moved far from his mistress's kill - crouched beneath the shrubs, his characteristics become more clear: black as night, and massive. Huge paws, wide forehead, emitting strings of drool. His growl is wet, deep-chested and velvety. Thmp - the end of a stick, straight as a staff, drops heavily down in front of the wherry, it's other end leading up to a pair of mannish tanned hands. Ellen rising up from behind the leaves gripping it, her hair and clothes growing damp and wet. In contrast against her canine's dead-serious eyes, her own expression is eased into a cornerwise grin, body tensed up like she's just eager for Vella to make a move. "I'd not," she says. Almost casual.

Vella holds out a pale slender hand to the canine, meaning to calm him, her head proud and strong on her long neck. As the stick comes down, she does not look concerned in the least, but dangerously calm, severe. Silver-grey eyes move in her still face and meet Ellen's green in silent challenge. She pulls the white arrow out, chin lifting as she does so. She says not a word, pale lips set in a grim line. Not many have challenged her in this way. She straightens to her full height - she towers over Ellen at 5'10, her long gold hair shining like silver. She looks both beautiful and terrible, dressed in white doeskin, bare legs leading into bare feet that disappear into the rainwater. Her arrow is returned to the quiver on her back. It is the same arrogant voice as before, only it escapes pale lips, coming from a body instead of the treerops. "I have no interest in your kill."

It's a study of contrast, the two - Vella, taller certainly, slender and savagely lovely; and Ellen, indelicate and heavy-duty, load-bearing broad, wher-faced and boulder-built, calloused bare feet spread against the mud as though she'd welcome a grapple with a dragon. The canine beside her ignores the Wildling's calming hand - a seasoned hunting hound, his training is evident in the way his growling only ceases at an absent gesture from one of Ellen's hands. "Then I reckon it's about time y'move along." Ellen mildly raises her brows, "Or d'ya not know. A wet bow's got as much use as damp kindling."

A knife suddenly appears in Vella's hand. Ellen's keen ranger eyes probably saw her grab it from her belt. She does not brandish it, merely holds it, and is not put off by the hunting dog's growl; she merely ignores the beast, or appears to. "I do not take orders from cursed dragonfolk." Even still, she fearlessly steps backwards, keeping her silvery gaze locked on the shorter woman. If one was to look down, they would see just how filthy her feet are, although some of the rainwater has helped clean away some of the dirt. She continues stepping backwards until she's in the safety of the trees, and holds the other woman's gaze a moment longer before she up and disappears into the trees. Gone.

Ellen's own teeth come out, in a slow-widening grin that pays no heed to drawn blades. Her unblinking gaze remains steadily on Vella's eyes - pale green bearing against pale gray like frosted-grassy earth against a press of fog. "I ain't dragonfolk."

The only answer is the hardening pitter-patter of rain which has just picked up, and the trees rustle with a sudden wind. Somewhere nearby, a feline growls, a heavy reminder of the dangers of this area of the jungle.