Celris had paid Mr. Black close attention as they'd traveled through the night and into the glorious sunny morning. As they'd ventured farther into the forest her unease had grown, and now, at this oddly quiet spring, her senses were telling her, without sense of reason, that danger was near.<br/>She kept an eye on Black as she dismounted and knelled by the water to slack her thirst and splash water on her face. They may be allies, but secrets were secrets, and her instincts were seldom wrong.<br/>Her ears pricked up as Black found a weapon in the shoreline. It was dark, and smelled faintly of smoke, though it had been in the water for who knows how long.<br/>Celris moved towards him, frowning as Black fell over some flowers and dove into the water without a word.<br/>She frowned, picked up the blade, retreated to lean against a tree and patiently waited for Black, questions bouncing about her head and near spilling out her mouth.<br/>This thing was fancy. Worth tons of gold, she could see that by the rare stone and metal framework. No one would just drop something like this. Not when it was taller than her when rested on the ground. She shuddered to think of the monster who could wield something as big as this - she could lift it fine but to throw or swing it? Ha.<br/>When Black surfaced, carrying what appeared to be a man in  full-body armor. Immediately Celris felt her tail curl by her side, her ears flatten. That couldn't be...<br/>The "man's" armor, though definitely a metal of some kind, mirrored the stone blade's color, and dark aura. Celris realized that the armor seemed to absorb light more than reflect it.<br/>When Black st it down and proceeded to heal it her eyes widened. Indeed, Black had quite a background, being able to fix such strange, alien armor.<br/>Celris stalked closer, fighting the urge to run away from the thing. "Black...what is it?"<br/>She needn't ask. She knew. She moved closer, staring at the plates and gears that covered the tall, foreboding figure, the halberd clutched to her chest.<br/><br/>"Osbourne of the HigherBreed...Restored, free." The HighBreed's body flickered to life, seemed to draw in air for the first time in ages. He moved his limbs,checking their mobility and nimbly got to his feet. He called to his halberd, and heard the answering hum from but a few feet away, accompanied with the gasp of it's captor.<br/>Osbourne examined his savior, who was surprisingly not of Shelune. The magic, he sensed as he continued checking his body for injury, was similar to Shelune's, but fundamentally wrong, alien in it's very conception.<br/>His wings opened and closed slowly, the "feathers" clicking as they moved over each other. "Speak, LowerBreed Feral and LowerBreed Alune."<br/>He called to his weapon again, and the Feral stumbled a few feet forward. She was still a pup by her size, but she managed to pull away from the force connecting weapon and HighBreed. The halberd buzzed in agitation, but the Feral gritted her teeth and kept it from returning to it's owner.<br/>"What form of sorcery healed something not of Life, something Higher than yourselves; and why does it deserve to remain in this world?"