As Valeska journeyed back toward Fate's Respite (no one could accuse her of being too intelligent), Valeska kept her nose to the ground and her eyes peeled, stalking through the darkness like a silver wraith, quiet and mysterious as a -

HRRRAAACK, she coughed, raking the sound all the way up from the pit of her stomach. Her prolonged exposure to their acidic lake had taken its toll on her ragged throat, and just when she'd started feeling a little bit better within the Blushed Meadows, stubborn pride saw her drifting back homeward.
It wasn't that she didn't want to stay with Dimitri or her grandpups; it was simply that the Respite had been left - well - abandoned.

It was unthinkable. It was home.

What if someone tried to take it from them? What then?

(She didn't consider that the deadly acid lake would put anyone off of their real estate too much.)

Valeska didn't get too far before another miserable coughing fit stopped her in her tracks, and as she stood gasping for breath she wondered if maybe it would've been better to stay behind after all.

But there was the matter of the - the Runes. Whatever those strange, terribly important items were they had been asked to seek out.

Eyes watering with her throat on fire, Valeska scanned her surroundings for any sign of something unusual.