[Edited the history and race information in my bio just a bit, because some things were bothering me.]
"What. Were. You. Thinking?"
Lavinia was sitting on the edge of a tiny wooden chair in the kitchen of their hollow, her hands folded in her lap, eyes averted from her furious mother's face. Evidently the blast in the forest had awoken the entire village, because when she and Reya had arrived home, nearly everyone was outside, moving about in a frenzy of fluttering wings, light, and shouts of distress and panic. Lavinia could still hear a number of them outside, and every now and then someone would flash past the window in a hurry, heading off into the forest to inspect the damage. Her father had gone with them some ten minutes ago to try and find out just exactly what had happened, leaving her mother to scold her.
"Sorry..." she muttered, fidgeting.
"Sorry? You could have been badly injured, or worse yet, killed! I don't know how many times your father and I have told you not to stray from this house at night unless someone responsible is accompanying you!"
"Reya was with me." Lavinia said, glancing up and promptly looking away again upon seeing the anger in her mother's eyes.
"Reya does not have what constitutes responsible person any more than you do."
Lavinia thought of Reya, who was probably receiving a similar lecture from her own parents at the moment. She sighed, almost wishing she had waited until daytime to show Reya the footprints after all.
"What in heaven’s name were you doing out in the forest at this time of night in the first place?” her mother asked. Lavinia had seen this question coming long beforehand; the moment they had entered the village and seen everyone awake, she told Reya that if her parents asked her what they had been doing, to tell them that they had simply fancied a walk. Lavinia informed her mother as such.
“…You fancied… A walk.” Her mother said, staring at her incredulously. “Lavinia Glyn Pharis, that is possibly the most unbelievable thing I have heard you say all evening, and I have heard you say a lot of unbelievable things. You honestly expect me to believe that you risked your life out there tonight because you wanted a walk?”
“Well, it’s not like we knew that half the forest was going to combust twenty feet away from us when we went out there, that’s sort of the last thing you would expect to happen when you go out for a midnight stroll!”
At that moment, Lavinia’s father appeared in the enterance way of the hollow panting very hard, his face covered in soot and ash and his glow growing faint with exhaustion. “Dear, there is something I think you should see,” he said in a gruff voice, gesturing for Lavinia’s mother. “There appears to be a slight problem…”
Lavinia’s mother frowned, then nodded. Turning back to Lavinia, she pointed toward the back of the hollow at the entrance to Lavinia’s room. “Go,” she said firmly, “and if I find that you have gotten out of bed again tonight, you can gaurantee that you won’t be going off into the forest for a long time to come, even during the day. This had best never happen again.”
Lavinia considered arguing for a moment, but finally, sulking, flitted off to bed. However, she did not fall asleep immediately, but lay awake listening to the sounds of movement and voices outside of the hollow, wondering what was going on.
[Blah.]
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