"Talisman"- skekGra/urGoh
“UrGoooh!” skekGra crows the moment he walks in the door, dropping his bags from this most recent supply run in a heap on the floor. “Get out here, I brought you a present!”
UrGoh’s head pokes curiously through the curtains, followed by the rest of his lumbering body as he makes his way down the ramp. “....Really…...now…..?” SkekGra catches the playful tone in his voice, and the moment they’re within arms’ reach they’re touching, nuzzling, re-familiarizing after an agonizing three entire days apart. He nearly forgets about anything else, but no, it’s too good. He extricates himself from urGoh’s arms.
“Wait, wait, in a minute.” He reaches into a hidden pocket of his robes and pulls out a pendant- polished sandstone and crystal, carved with a symbol of some sort, strung on a narrow braid of leather. He begins to braid the cord into urGoh’s hair, while urGoh turns the little thing over in his hand, thumb curiously tracing the carving.
“It’s…...beautiful…..” he murmurs. “What….does it……….mean?”
SkekGra snorts. “The writing? Not a clue, but the Dousan woman I bought some of these dyes from was very insistent I take it.” He’s struggling to keep a straight face now. “Apparently it’s a charm meant to ward off evil spirits and energies? She was extremely concerned that I would be passing so close to the Circle of the Suns.”
UrGoh blinks as it hits him, then starts to laugh- a giggle at first, then great deep belly laughs, joined by skekGra’s shrieking cackles that must surely have contributed to that myth in the first place. When they can finally breathe, urGoh admires the glint of it dangling in his mane. “I…..like….it.” He reaches up to bump skekGra’s beak with his nose. “As long…..as…..it doesn’t……..ward you off.”
SkekGra lets out a noise of mock-indignation. “Are you calling me evil?” But he nips at urGoh’s jaw affectionately, breathing in the scent of him. It smells like home. “Don’t worry, you can’t get rid of me that easily.”
UrGoh lets out another chuckle, pulls him closer, and the talking ceases.