never over - o, joining

[wormwood.]

i was born, on the highway, in a train wreck

with a heart, that was beating, out of my chest

The territory of Tanglewood especially seemed to have an atmosphere of being owned, mainly due to the fact that if you weren't a member of the group, the swamp that they inhabited could be an absolute nightmare to navigate. Recently, Aurum had made sure that all of the tree signs were refreshed everywhere, but that didn't particularly help anyone outside of the group that assent aware of what the symbols meant, which meant that they were susceptible to traps or other hazards of the marshy territory around them. Luckily for Abathur, however, the first male to find him didn't have any particular interest in just launching himself forward and attacking without at least asking some questions first. He didn't have a tendency to do that, at least as long as someone didn't smell of the Pitt and hadn't recently kidnapped his son. So Aslisk happened to be quite the special case. Otherwise, though? Aurum tended to exude a friendly and warm atmosphere as he approached anyone at the border, whether they be a joiner or just someone from another group who was interested in getting some sort of information out there. Honestly, Aurum wasn't sure he was aware of anyone who would've chosen to just attack Abathur on sight, at least outside of the context of perhaps a prank or joke. It wasn't as if they were the insanely violent Pitt, and it also wasn't as if Abathur had gone strolling past the border with reckless abandon, so they weren't going to do anything so rash and violent right off the bat.

It was a bit unnerving, however, to be patrolling the border and find such an absolutely massive spider sort of just... relaxing there. Aurum had never been that much of an arachnophobe, since he had always been so big and so much more powerful than spiders that they represented little threat to him unless they were highly, highly poisonous. Sure, their appearance could be unnerving, but so could his to the right person, so what right did he have to judge? This was the first time, however, he had encountered such a creature so large, and evidently so intelligent, if his resting and waiting at the border was anything to go by. Aurum found himself hesitated before he steeled himself, wandering up to the spider and settling back on his haunches before he spoke, his wings spreading out a little bit to help maintain his balance, "Hello there... I'm assuming you're waiting here for someone, so could you tell me who you are, and why you're here at Tanglewood?" Part of him had just wanted to straight up ask the creature if he was sentient, since Aurum wasn't sure if he had ever actually encountered a sentient spider before, despite having encountered many sentient prey animals, but... that felt rude, so he decided to go with his standard greeting, his fluffy tail coming to wrap around his paws as he relaxed. Even with his slightly disturbing appearance, it didn't seem as though Abathur was here to go on a rampage of biting and pillaging anything, so the angel didn't feel there was any reason for him to be so tensed up.

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