::dew-borne::

Morning peeked through the branches and fog. A gentle glow crept across the stream as the last of its overflowing volume dove past rocks along its bed and around those that protruded above the surface. Besode it the green grass and leaves of bushes shuffled in a breeze. Stalks supporting blooming purple flowers swayed, their petals rustled, perhaps passing on gossip of the new arrival in the glade. On a branch nearby an owl watched the breathing form of a human from its perch.

The clouds had released her reluctantly on her descent with the last of the rain that connected the earth and sky. Still they clung to her in soft hair that lay around her head. Her skin had taken on the drying color of the earth beneath it, bronzed and lightened by her watery origin. There was a rumpled path between the plants, showing where she had rolled down the slope. Above her point of origin branches tilted, some broken, others just bent from breaking her fall.

She breathed involuntarily now, her chest nestled in wet leaves and blades of grass. The plants that had curled over her form tickled the drops of water on her back, causing her to shiver.