"Yeah, well, that's fair," she conceded, then fell silent, glancing up towards the stars.
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
James followed her gaze, for once, dreading the flood of silence that came after a conversation ran dry. He didn't want to return to the inner dialogue of his mind just yet.
"I used to have a horse," he announced suddenly, a little too late after her response to feel natural, and a little to quickly to seem comfortable.
"What happened to the horse? Stolen or eaten?" she asked.
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
She raised an eyebrow. "Did this valued steed get a name, then? Sounds like you must've liked him an awful lot."
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
James looked over to her, mustering something of a grin as he tried to reciprocate the emotion. "He is. I spent all of my spare hours working with him; training, bonding, getting him acquainted with other people besides myself. He... he kind of reminds me of Nightmare, in some ways. Had a bit of an attitude, even when he got older."
"Those are the best kind. Never did have a horse without spunk that lasted long. This one took me a good long time before I got her to work with me. Even now sometimes she'll get in a bit of a huff and try to throw me," Tasha chuckled. "Certainly keeps you humble."
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
Nothing was wrong with the conversation, but suddenly he was growing very tired of talking, very fast. And yet, the alternative of silence was a looming threat in his mind.
"Yes. Yes it does," he said with a nod as he fished his mind for other things to say. "Elliot's uh, embarrassed me a handful of times."
"I was out with some other hunters once," Tasha says. "It was me and two others. At the time, I was still pretty young, new to the whole thing, but I was confident and was seasoned compared to most my age. I was going with them because we were going after bigger game than usual, and of course, due to my age, I had to prove my prowess. Day started off well enough - we met at the square before dawn and rode out. We finally get up to the mountains where we're looking for the monsters and the eldest of the two starts yelling that he's got it, so we all take off to flank it. We're closing in, climax of the hunt, weapons out and the horses are just going full speed after this thing, when the second one calls out to me to pull in and herd it towards them. So I grab her reins and I politely ask her to please turn, and the horse takes one look at me and then the monster before skidding to a complete stop and rearing, throwing me off her back. She gave me this smug-ass horse smirk and then just turned around and trotted off, leaving me on my butt, on the rocks, watching as the other two hunters disappeared over the horizon," Tasha laughed. "Never forgave her for that one. Didn't get my pay that day."
"All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
"Damn," James said with a chuckle. "There was one time, when Elliot was still quite young, when I was working with him out in the field. I had some food in my back pocket and in his effort to get it the moment I turned my back, he pantsed me."
"... unfortunately, people were watching. I never really lived that down."
“Such nonsense!" declared Dr Greysteel. "Whoever heard of cats doing anything useful!"
"Except for staring at one in a supercilious manner," said Strange. "That has a sort of moral usefulness, I suppose, in making one feel uncomfortable and encouraging sober reflection upon one's imperfections.” — Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
