Vern flashed her a grin that could only be described as dazzling as they thanked her for the compliment. They dragged her along behind them toward the woods around the camp. They smiled as they turned to look back to her, a pleasant smile on their face and their voice as smooth as silk.<br/>"You know, you really are quite pretty. Are you a daughter of Freyja perhaps?" they inquired, glanced back the way they were walking to make sure they didn't back into a tree. The clearing was coming into sight, a field of purple flowers being revealed betwixt the thick tree trunks that surrounded the two.<br/>"Look, we're almost there!" they exclaimed. They released Valorie's hand and ran excitedly forward, twisting between the trees and suddenly vanishing from Valorie's sight. They popped up from an overgrown patch of flowers a moment later, emerging from the blossoms noticeably female all of a sudden. They had formed a habit of disappearing from sight for a moment before shapeshifting as of recent. They'd discovered the hard way that while not everybody was very accepting of their shifting sexes, even the most open-minded people tended to be put off by watching their features actually shift and morph during the process.<br/>They reached down toward the ground, plucking stem after stem of lupine from the earth. They inspected the bright blue blooms for a moment before going back to pick more, seeming sated with the number when they were clutching a set of about 8 racemes. They began quickly weaving, skilled fingers twisting, bending, and twining stems without somehow breaking a single one. The deft precision supplied the idea that this was something they'd done many a time before. They spoke as they worked, seemingly excited .<br/>"You know, most people don't like to go off alone with me like this. Nobody at the camp actually likes to be around me much at all. That Josh kid that was fighting with his sister seems to tolerate me, but I don't know that I'd call us more than vague acquaintances. You don't seem to fit in much yet either, maybe we could be friends? Being alone is a whole lot less lonely with somebody to be alone with," they proclaimed with a sparkling grin that they didn't really feel. They smiled and blustered and pretended not to care, but they'd been getting really lonely recently. Nobody at the camp seemed to really enjoy being around them at all. They looked up holding out a ring of lupine, the flowers already woven into a crown within a minute or two.<br/>"Want it? It'd look really pretty with your eyes," they said with a smile. Mentally they kicked themself for probably coming on way too strong. They kept up the grin, softening it a little, hoping they hadn't already scared off a new possible friend.<br/>"I'll show you the way back if you want," they said, trying not to let their nerves get the best of them. A slight waver wormed its way into their voice however, despite their best efforts.