“One can be part of the crowd and still stand out,” he chimed, freeing a hand to place it against his chest as if offering himself an example, clearly not as weary as he should have been.
Even with a more human appearance, Avery still primped and preened like his life depended on it. You’d think the humans who desired the properties of dragons enough to hunt them for it would spare a compliment or two for the feathers he’d managed to cleverly disguise as regular accessories; covered with bands of gold, but the glances he received from time to time were good enough, for now.
“Mmh. But I suppose keeping a low profile wouldn’t be so bad.”
There were other things to focus on than the humans surrounding them, after all. He had Kyouhei at his side, music ringing out around them, and all the sights and smells of a festival he hadn’t experienced before.
Taking one of Kyouhei’s hands in his own – a true bonus to mingling in with the humans around them – Avery wondered out loud as they moved.
“Perhaps there’s something that’s caught your eye from the stalls, as well? It’d be a shame coming all this way, with all this effort, to not take something back with us, wouldn’t it~?”
Typical hoarder, eyes always on the shiny stuff.
“Oh, don’t worry, even all disguised like this there’s no way someone would mistake you for some common human.” He reassured, using their connected hands - and he definitely squeezed Avery’s fingers when he laced them together - to keep them out of the thick of the crowds.
He didn’t want either of them to be dragged away, after all, and he for sure didn’t want to be separated from his mate.
“I saw some of those little music boxes a few stalls back, but we can circle back to them. Something smells good, I want to check that out first before we go hunting for gold and trinkets.”
It wasn’t uncommon that Kyouhei ran into his own kind. Not that Fae dragons were common, or that he lived in an area where they were plentiful, but he wasn’t one to shy away from signs of dragon life, and he could spot them easily, so he had no reason to avoid places.
Still, running into one while disguised as a human wasn’t… ideal? He’d only done it to climb over some rocks - just for the experience - and now he was face to face with a cute lil’ Fae!
“Hello there!” He chirps, bouncing back so as not to seem intimidating to the smaller creature. “Didn’t mean to intrude in this form, I figured nothing would be around for a while yet. How are you doing?”
“Haha! I guess you’re right, but think about it this way, nothing bad has happened yet, so things are still a’right.”
Mizumachi chuckled to himself at Kyohei’s meek attitude as he drew in closer to him, putting trust in him, an Ayakashi. Well, he didn’t mind doing a good deed every now and again before he goes to do what he normally does, which is tricking humans. That’s the job of his kind, wouldn’t you know?
“No prob! Wanna hold hands or something? Would that help you feel more relaxed?”
The forest was dark and there was a chilly wind that would blow past the forest every now and again. It wouldn’t do Kyouhei any good if he’d accidentally gotten himself separated from Mizumachi, who was actually trying to do a good deed for once.
“You made your way pretty deep into the forest, but it won’t take very long to get back out, so don’t worry. You’ll be out of here safe and sound in no time.”
Mizumachi tried to console the worried little guy the best that he could. It was hard to figure out how to console a human when you yourself were not human.
Did this guy think Kyouhei was a toddler or something?! He went to immediately deny the offer of a hand to hold and then paused to reconsider.
The last time he’d been alone (and not just in a random place, in the comfort of his own home) something had snatched him up and spirited him away. As strange as the situation was….
“I’ll take a rain check on the hand-holding, but… you don’t mind if I walk fairly close to you?” Personal bubbles were weird and personal, Kyou didn’t want to accidentally trample on a societal norm.
“Thank you for your kindness. Assuming this is a forest near to where I live, would you want to come by for some food? I feel like I should pay you back for this somehow.”
The human’s territory was always more exciting in Avery’s eyes, as if every simplistic venture into a town or city was a brand new adventure for the Dragon with an unusual hobby for mingling in with the locals.
A marketplace with rows of stalls selling different foods or odd human trinkets may have appeared mundane to some, but for him it was almost inspiring. Look at them, buying and selling, hurrying about like working ants, with some even in the company of smaller humans who were more concerned with playing than paying attention to anything else around them.
“Do you think they’ve noticed anything different about us yet?” Avery wondered out loud to his companion beside him, eyes the colour of sweet caramel flitting about as if trying to hone in on the market stall with only the prettiest collection of trinkets for him to admire.
Eventually he settled on one in particular, the shine of a certain jewel catching his attention and brightening his expression. Fortunately, he managed to display enough self control to not wander over towards it immediately with zero warning, instead curling one arm around Kyouhei’s to give it a little tug; prompting the other to move with him.
“Everyone here seems to busy to even spare us a second glance.”
As someone who not only appreciated but thrived in attention, it was fair to say he almost sounded a little disappointed at the lack of admiration, even when looking more human themselves.
Kyouhei kept a close on his pink-haired companion while they danced between crowds of people. Festivals were usually his go-to distractions when visiting places, but that didn’t mean casual appearances were against his nature.
Besides, who was he to refuse a request from Avery?
“Well, I would hope they haven’t, dearest. Best case scenario, they’ll think we’re foreigners and not… y’know.” He peered around, double-checking that what Avery was complaining about was actually accurate.
“I’d rather be part of the crowd then thrown out or hunted down. I know you like the drama, but I was hoping for some softer event today.”