[h3]The Hunter's Dream[/h3]
“Oh... Farren's back,” Torquil told the two female Hunters as soon as he appeared, as he had been asked to. But before any of them could do much in the way of going to meet him or welcome him back, Farren climbed to the workshop, locked eyes with Gerlinde, and started confessing his part in the fate that had brought her to Byrgenwerth.
Gerlinde met Farren's gaze with wide, attentive eyes and a big smile on her face, initially just seeming happy that he had come back as soon as he had, and then... just smiling as she listened. She did not blink even once during his confession, but started tilting her head to the right. It was a slow, gradual movement, her head angling further and further off to the side until she went past what one would call cocking her head and kept going until it had turned to nearly a 90 degree angle, all while still smiling and staring.

“That was you?” she asked, her voice slightly breathless and her tone full of wonder. But before Farren or anyone else could offer and answer to the question, she repeated her words as a announcement: “That was you.” There was no passion in the words at all, no anger, fear or sadness; it was just a detached statement of a fact.
Her head returned to an upright angle and she started walking directly toward him, never breaking eye-contact. She still smiled, and still did not blink. “Farren... your name was Farren.”

Farren held her gaze, even as the intensity of her gaze ratcheted up bit-by-bit even as her head shifted almost as if on a lever until it was at an uncanny angle. Someone else might have balked, but Farren only felt the faint quiver of tension in his body. He took a breath, letting it drain away, if she meant to strike him, so be it.
[color=#1A1A3B][b]“It was,”[/b][/color] he confirmed, his voice firm, his gaze unflinching. He made no response to her stating his name, there was no need, it was self-evident. If only due to his own determination to weather the storm, a certain steeliness came into his gaze in that moment as she approached.

Never wavering, never breaking eye-contact, her smile never so much as twitching, Gerlinde walked up to Farren. This woman who looked so different from the one years ago, in another life; one who had once been a light weight on his shoulder, defenseless and pathetic, was now a Hunter only a handful of centimeters shorter than him, bearing a deadly weapon on her hip. There could be no doubt that with her new nature, she was as beautiful as she was lethal.
She moved in close, raised her arms, wrapped them around Farren's shoulders and pulled him into a tender embrace, pressing her body into his, gently resting her forehead against his chest.
“You must have felt terrible,” she said, with not even a hint of resentment in her voice. “You poor thing. I am so happy I finally met you.” She raised her head to meet his gaze once again. “Farren.”