The stranger is polite, an occurrence that seems to have gone too long from one to the other in the collection of random faces from the forest of beginnings. Each name given to the man is carefully repeated in the order that they had arrived before him, and the arrogant bitch smiles all the more brightly as her own name is sounded back into the crisp air. Soft flakes of snow melt against the warmth of her face, clinging for a moment before becoming darkened smudges.

He is called Jakar, a fine name, she decides, not as unusual as some she has been offered and one that, as it seems to always be, fits his appearance with invisible bindings that she cannot see nor truly explain other than that they are there; the griffon along her back takes an interest now that the more droll proceedings have come to pass, Kyst usually holding few concerns for the names of the horse creatures her bonded kept company with, keeping in higher esteem the way that person was than who they said they were.

Illynx could learn many things from her young griffon, if she wasn’t so arrogant as to think that the creature was stupid.

Her Engineer has sent him, she learns, and a delighted glimmer lights her eyes at the mention of his name. He claims to be on a hunt but does not describe the facets of such a thing, the golden mare gaining a curious glow to her expression as she ponders what sort of thing it is he is hunting for. She and her kin have many things to offer someone who is in such a state of need, to be sure, and while the man is new, she knows all too well the effects of gifts on a tender, untouched heart.

It would do them all well to assist Jakar, unless his mission was utterly foolish and meant to have an end put to it – which would ultimately be assistance in its own way, wouldn’t it?

The Lord, ignored most often by the woman for reasons that had come to pass long before and were truly unsubstantial, does earn himself a look as he breezes right on through the obvious offered by the bay man in his words and instead goads at what else he has to offer. The frown that finds her face is soft and judgmental, feminine features lifting haughtily as she turns her golden eyes to the man who searches, the finest of twitches along the length of her straight, long black tail alerting any who spied of her annoyance.

One ear holds itself to Deimos, the other freely pivots between the rest, and her voice is crisp and friendly despite the annoyance with the man she’s been straddled with as a co-leader; no matter his prowess on the field of war, he loses her respect when he fumbles verbal cues so intensely and before new arrivals to the herd. "What do you search for, Jakar?" she asks, all sweetness, not even the faintest hint of her usual treachery or ponderous schemes bleeding into the integrity of the inquiry, "I like to think that we of the Basin hold high talents in finding and taking that which is ours, and I myself know many outside our borders. Perhaps your task would benefit from these?"

Her smile grows all the more friendly as a jovial row of laughter breaks the seriousness of her replies, crown shaking lightly to the loosen the collection of white that rims the dark locks atop her head and cleaves to the golden length of her horn. "There are caves for respite throughout the land, and a pool of earth heated water to ease the chill in one’s bones against," she explains, "but the winds are demure within the walls of stone that guard us, and the snow will be much less than that in the mountains. It is mostly growing accustomed to the travels through the rest of the northland that one worries about here."