Out of the cauldron and into the fire?

The marked beast shook his rugged, salty face (for the ocean was drying quickly upon them both in the balmy heat of the day), and suggested the world around them, the Rift, had dealt them - but Valkyrie was hardly listening, she was inspecting the savage set of thorns now, which had apparently taken root upon the ridge of his nose… Roscorro had a similar imperfection, not that she could recall what they looked like exactly (she had been so distracted after all), and the young girl figured presumptuously, that the giant’s had come to fruition much the same way. How unfortunate. Hideous looking things… She took no notice as he challenged her last question. “And I suppose the Rift slapped to those things onto your face too?" She supposed nothing said dickhead more than a symbolic dick on your head… She chuckled softly, amusedly beneath her breath, and looked towards the glint of chattering reptile as it vanished into the hollow of a tree. The Rift certainly knew purity and perfection when it stumbled in, that was for sure; Valkyrie had passed through the shadow-field surrounding the portal without so much as a second glance - having said that, she’d well and truly misplaced her ability to think her spear to life, and that loss had been round about the same time. A strange noise - not the soft whisper of wind through the leaves, nor the pretty waffle of insect-life (certainly not the clever, ever entertaining passage of her thoughts) - called her notice back to the man. Between his ears, upon the mess of oily tangles, now sat a … it looked like a spider...! Surely it wasn’t that tiny metal critter clicking and whirring? Valkyrie frowned in earnest. “I think I can hear your brain working overtime, would you like to lie down?” Men were thick after all, and no amount of respect for him rattled in the frighteningly empty recesses of her (lack of), conscious. More of them appeared, and she examined each across the distance with a furrowing brow. Not that she was expecting normal to present itself - not down here. “What are they? A demented breed of flea?” she hissed disgustedly through tightening teeth, sliding her lean limbs into reverse. The Shieldmaiden was not particularly fond of bugs, crawling, fluttering pests, and for a moment her skin trembled, wildly discomforted by the puny presence. “You are spreading them!” She scolded suddenly, honest alarm rising with the pitch of her voice; as the spiders travelled to sagging branches about the repulsive vagrant, Valkyrie’s posture began again to stiffen, and slithering back still another step, she lifted the end of the spear in warning.