Coffee and Rainbows

The last time Iride had an audience for her sculpting was when she had been in middle school, and her parents had wanted to secretly observe her creation process. They had gotten bored really fast, under half an hour. Solas had lasted several hours, and Iride had to applaud him for that. Iride's process was unique, she started sculpting at random points and never worked on one place for a long time. Or she would only work on one place for the whole time. This time she had started working on that owl bear statue, and it hadn't even taken a form yet, But Iride woul've never known Solas would still find it fascinating.
But Iride didn't know how Solas had gotten her to go for a walk afterwards. It had to be the coffee, naturally. Iride couldn't resist the sweet call of coffee. She pulled way too many all-nighters.

Iride had changed out of her working clothes, overalls, goggles and boots that all made her look like a child. Now she was wearing a simple white t-shirt, black jeans and ballerina slippers. Maybe white t-shirt had been a mistake, she was drinking coffee after all. But Iride had just grabbed the first things she had found. She might be blunt but making someone wait was bad manners.
Iride drank from her coffee, being careful not to spill it, and glanced at Solas. He was weird. She didn't have that many male friends, Eon was about the only one, or even female friends. Was she hoping too much to wish that Solas could be her friend? Or did he have other objectives? Iride remembered the coversation from other day, about flirting and dating. Eon had said guys had probably put some moves on Iride and she had been too dense to notice. If Solas was trying something like that Iride would not miss it, and would reject it. So she watched him like a hawk.

Iride listened to Solas' words and answered to his smile with a raised brow.
"You are the only one besides, well, anyone who would say that. Since I also think it's a bit boring from time to time. Especially today since I couldn't actually form anything definite."
Iride blew on his coffee a bit and drank it carefully. It was pure bliss, and Iride felt the caffeine starting to course through her body.
When Solas thanked her Iride just shrugged and drank her coffee.
"Don't thank me, you were the one who dragged ME here. You should thank yourself. Besides, why are you in the forest so much anyway?"

Iride listened to Solas, interested. Although she was trying not to be too eager.
"Lived in the forest, huh? Then no wonder."
Iride sipped her coffee, and turned her head a bit to look at the trees near them.
"I go to the forest sometimes too, to look for good sculpting rocks. I sometimes run into people. And recently this small gnome thingy has started living in the woods. Though it always runs away when I see it."
Iride shrugged and turned to look at Solas again, smiling a bit.
"Is it one of your friends?"

When Solas asked Iride just nodded and drank from her coffee with a distant look in her eyes. Her eyes slowly turned from red to violet.
"I've been here since I was 19. I was raised as a normal person, my parents are both human too. I would've probably lived in the human world for much longer if it wasn't for- "
Iride stopped talking abruptly. She wasn't stupid enough to tell Tristan all about her first crush which resulted in her making a statue that had such a nasty power even the academy took notice of it, and tracked it to Iride.
"Anyway, I'm here now. And this place is neat. I'll probably stay after I graduate, put up a workshop. I've got money saved plenty for that."

Iride turned to look at Solas.
"How about you? How long have you been here, and why are you here in the first place? You said you lived in Canada before."