I'm sorry for the delay, I guess I do have a life after all... Anyway, in the last chapter a reviewer told me that the PoV things are unnessesary, I will use them in this chapter and YOU will tell me if I should keep them or not, I will do whatever my readers want. After all, I'm trying to make this nice to read and only the ones who read it can help me with that.

Disclaimer: Not mine, never will be.

Enjoy!

Muarim's PoV

Muarim ran as fast as he could. Jerme´s shriek was unmistakable, he had found Tormod! He squinted his eyes trying to see if there really was something moving ahead of him and after a while he saw it clearly.

Jerme was fighting some bandits, about five of them Muarim thought, together with Eyaya, Mariska and a beorc, the one Muarim and Jerme met earlier.

Tormod was there as well.

The red haired mage was fighting a strong axe fighter that just seemed to play with the boy, like a lion playing with it's pray before killing it. The bandit lunged at Tormod, who could barely avoid the attack and a shallow wound was inflicted on his leg. In response, Muarim roared in anger.

'Nobody hurts my boy like that!' he thought as he pounced at the bandit, aiming for his axe-arm. The axe-wielder screamed in pain when the over-sized tiger hit his arm, but as Muarim prepared for another attack a sharp pain sprung from his hip, where his old wound from he other battle had been. It reopened and started to bleed badly. Muarim gasped and didn't notice the bandit's next attack until it was too late. As another wave of pain came over his leg and hip his vision blurred and he lost consciousness.

Stefan's PoV

Stefan slayed the second bandit that had attacked him and looked around to see his next victim, Stefan had killed two of them, Mariska and Eyaya had helped each other and killed one of them and Jerme had killed one, leaving only one left. Stefan first thought that everything would be fine when he saw Muarim´s body covered in blood, completely still.

'What? How did..? Could it be..?' Stefan looked closer at the bandit that where coming closer to the defenseless child, who didn't seem to make any attempt to run. The others might have been brigands, but this one was a berserker! No wonder the laguz couldn't win, this guy was an experienced fighter. As the bandit rose his arm to chop the child in two Stefan saw an opening, quicker than he could think he lunged at the berserker.

Tormod's PoV

Everything happened so fast. First Muarim was defeated, and then the bandit was swinging his axe towards him… Then the axe fell to the ground, just a few inches away from Tormod, and blood where falling to the ground, mixing with the sand, staining it a deep crimson.

Tormod could barely make out the movement of the green-haired swordfighter as the man cut a deep wound in the bandits arm and then quickly trusted his sword into the bandit's stomach and with that the fight was over.

"…Tormod…" A weak voice called his name and he looked up to see who it was. He smiled when he saw the owner of the voice.

Muarim´s PoV

Muarim blinked a few times as he regained his consciousness and after a while he could see quite clearly, but he was still dizzy from the blood loss. When he remembered what happened he tried to scream Tormod's name, but his voice came out as a soft whisper, even if it was weak Tormod still heard him.

"Muarim! You're okay!" the small boy screamed and ran towards the laguz, almost tripping over when he became aware of the pain in his leg, and knelt down to hug the laguz.

" M-Muarim, I th-thought you were dead! You didn't move o-or do anything! This i-is the se-second time in j-just a few days that you scared m-me like that!" Tormod screamed as he hugged the tiger even harder, Muarim couldn't help but to smile and return the embrace.

"I'm sorry I scared you, little one. But you scared me as well, I was really worried… You just ran away, you could have died…" Muarim tried to hold back his sobs as they held each other in silence, Leo sat down next to them and started to take care of Muarim´s leg. Then Jerme decided to break the silence.

"Hey, we should get home now right? Everyone's here…" he said gesturing towards the others, "…and we're all tired and some of us are wounded, why stay here?" Muarim looked around at the other laguz and smiled.

"Yeah, we should, but…where did that beorc go? The one who saved Tormod? I wanted to thank him…" Muarim replied.

Jerme looked around at the others silently asking if they knew and then back at Muarim.

"I dunno, I think he just left when he didn't think we needed him anymore."

"Why? Did he just help us to get a chance to fight or what?" Muarim asked his crow friend. Jerme shrugged.

"Really, I don't think he wanted to help us, he wanted his own kind to be safe. He did it for Tormod. After all, he has reasons not to like laguz…" Jerme said the last part silently, not really wanting to tell the others that a parentless had saved their friend.

"Anyway, as I said. We really should go home now." Muarim nodded and with some help from his tiger friends he managed to get up, only listening to Leo's words of advice with half an ear, when Tormod started to squirm out of his grip.

"Little one, what are you--?"

"Muarim, let me go!" Tormod screamed.

"What? What do you--?"

"I don't belong with you! Jerme was right! I belong with other humans!" Muarim flinched at the 'H-word' and looked accusingly at Jerme who looked away, refusing to meet his friends gaze.

"No! Tormod, listen to me! You don't belong with beorc anymore. You belong with us, you… you are my only family now. You are my son…" This made Tormod stop squirming and he relaxed in Muarim´s arms, but he didn't stop sobbing.

"B-but… I'm not like you Muarim. I'm a human and you're a laguz…" Muarim sighed and stroked Tormod's head.

"Don't call yourself a human. You are a beorc…and a proud and honorable beorc at that. Don't insult yourself like that, ok?"

"B-but…"

"Please little one. Let's go home. Let's go to the home where you belong…" Muarim gently patted his child's head and hugged him close. Silence followed until Tormod spoke up.

"Is everyone okay with that?" he asked softly looking into Muarim´s eyes. Before Muarim could answer Jerme spoke up.

... Cliffhanger..? Well, maybe not. But I had to stop there. I think my updates will be quite irregular (is that the right word?) so be sure to check back now and then.

Untill then, ta!

Maidenmonster