Impossible Promise
Cuero Colza had felt a presence that was vaguely familiar to him and had been traveling toward it for days now. Since he had been on the far side of the Gossamer Woods near Austuria the presence was muddled and mixed with the other scents on the wind. When a certain tinge in the scent reached his very sensitive nose, the shadowfox retreated to his fox form before running through the woods following the scent.
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The person that Riis had to appreciate most in her life in her given situation would have to be Tayoru. Tayoru came in sometime after she had been abused and would treat her wounds and feed her a broth of some kind. But what Riis was most concerned about wasn't her abuse, but her weight. She wondered how much weight she had retained through her arduous ordeal. Her smirk quickly turned into a grimace of fear as her room door opened. She could barely smell the six men through her broken nose. If it weren't for Tayoru's spasmodic cleanings Riis was sure that she would look a gory mess.
"So, have you decided to give us our boon yet?" Mishi asked. She could tell he was losing his patience. She had been here for a few days now. As her mind started to shut down, a fleeting thought that originated from the chant that was spoken to her nightly was caught. She didn't have much to lose.
"Do you know how old I am?"
The group of men looked slightly confused before they answered what she expected to hear.
"No. How old are you?"
"I just turned sixteen last full moon," Riis whispered hoarsely. "And when was the last full moon?"
"Three days ago," Greffyn answered.
"I just turned sixteen, I haven't been taught the boon," Riis said, her voice cracking. "That night, before you guys woke me up, another shadowfox was teaching me, but you interrupted her. Now I have to wait until the new moon before she comes again." Riis was in tears now. She couldn't take it anymore. She broke down and cried. She didn't notice they men leave or the door shut. Riis was too absorbed in her miserable existence to notice anything.
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Riis woke up to a sharp slap across her face, further aggravating her broken nose.
"Wake up, bitch," a rough voice told her. She groggily opened her tearing eyes to see unfamiliar brown eyes.
"Hn?"
"Mishi told me to tell you that you have a few days," the man said. She watched as he looked back at the door. He leaned in to her abused ears. "I'll help Lord Van."
Riis' eyes opened wide and she turned her head sharply to look into his eyes, ignoring the sharp pain. "What's this about Lord Van?"
Again he looked at the door before continuing. "Yesterday when I was out hunting, I saw a skirmish between a dragon, a dog, and three people. I recognized the boot prints of Lord Van and Master Koyo, but the dog prints I didn't recognize nor the Lady's footprints."
Riis was so happy she could cry. "The dog prints belong to my underling. The Lady's prints are the Queen's."
This man looked surprised that the whole royal family was coming for her. "What's this underling you spoke of?"
"Shadowfox need something to have dominion over and they need someone that has dominion over themselves," Riis explained. "The dog is under me and Van and Hitomi are above me."
"I see," her nameless guest said. "I'm keeping a record of all the people that have come in and out, fought against who, and who have died in Mishi's little band. I plan on leaving it as soon as you're rescued." He started as he heard noises in the hall. "I'm meeting him this evening. So sorry."
Riis was confused for a minute until he shouted at her. She flinched at the suddenly loud noise. She gasped and opened her eyes wide when he punched her full in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her.
"I understand," Riis gasped out before she fell unconscious in the hay. Her guest left hurriedly.
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"Run!" Van shouted as they all scattered. Dutch barked at it. Considering what Van had seen, this dragon was rather small. He suddenly wished that he had been fighting this dragon instead of the full-grown bull male in its prime that he had fought. Van drew his sword and, while it was preoccupied with curiosity over Dutch, Van lunged and desecrated the dragon's eye.
"Van! Its tail!"
Van saw the tail a second too late. The tail hit him and threw him bodily into a tree. It hurt to breath. He gasped for a minute, before dodging the spoke on the end of the dragon's tail. He was still gasping when he rendered the dragon's other eye useless. Van leapt away from the thrashing dragon still gasping for breath. When he landed he staggered and fell on one knee. He saw Koyo freeing his sword from his scabbard. Van gathered a breath before he yelled his son's name. He threw the sword to him before he clutched his ribs and continued to fight for air.
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Koyo saw the arc in which the sword was flying. He grabbed it and lunged at the dragon. Koyo stabbed the dragon between the two heat chambers in it's chest, drew it up, then around the left chamber, then down its belly as it jumped over him. He gagged as some of the blood fell in his mouth. Koyo watched as the dragon went through its death throws before going still.
"Cut the energist out."
Koyo walked over to the dragon and made a cut perpendicular to the one already there. He squinted as the energist glowed a bright orange. He loosened it with his sword before pulling it out of the dragon by hand. He suddenly remembered his father. He turned and ran back to where Dutch and his mother were tending to his father.
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Hitomi saw Dutch flinch and lay his ears against his skull.
"Dutch!" Hitomi whistled. She watched his ears perk back up and he turned his head toward her. "Come here, honey." The dog dutifully skirted the battle between dragon and draconian as he came to her. When he reached her he started to whine.
"What is it, boy?" He just looked at Van as he panted for breath. The two watched as he called out to Koyo and threw him his sword before he grasped his ribs before collapsing.
"Van!" Hitomi called as she ran to his side. She dragged him a meter or two out of the way before she asked what was wrong with him.
"I." Van started. "I.it.hurts.I.can't breath."
Hitomi pulled her hands away from his shirt intending to wipe them on her skirt thinking they were covered with sweat. Dutch put his paw on her forearm and she looked down to see that her hands were covered with blood.
"Oh my God," Hitomi breathed.
"The.energist," Van rasped out.
"Cut the energist out," she shouted to Koyo. Her attention immediately went back to Van.
"Van," Hitomi started gently. "I need you to lie on your back." When all he did was gasp, Dutch nosed him onto his back where he let out a breathy moan of pain. Hitomi gently pried his arms off his chest. At this point Koyo showed up. He held Van's hands above his head as Hitomi pulled his red tunic above his head to his elbows before looking back at his chest.
It was clear that he had several broken ribs among the bruised ones. She grimaced when she saw a spoke of something white covered in blood. They were several days from the castle. Hitomi looked at Koyo.
"Get a rope and tie his legs and arms down," Hitomi instructed. Koyo nodded and went over to their pack to follow his mother's instructions. "Van?" Her heart wrenched when he opened his pain glazed chocolate eyes. She briefly glanced at Koyo before she continued. "This is going to hurt." His eyes looked confused and Hitomi guessed it was a side effect of the pain. As Koyo had tied his legs down and had just finished tying down his arms, his eyes widened in sudden comprehension. His mouth worked but no sound came out.
"I said that it would hurt, Van," Hitomi said as her eyes filled with tears. She turned away from Van and drew a knife from her pack while Koyo blindfolded his father. Van's scream echoed throughout the woods.
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Riis' screams echoed throughout the catacombs. It had dawned on her that Mishi had no intention of giving her until the new moon to attempt to learn what she needed in order to grant them their wish. They thought that she was lying to them. She had never had a reason to lie in her life. And now she was slowly being beaten to death for it.
She hung limply from the ceiling by a fraying rope. She cried out and flinched when the whip bit her again. She heard the rope creak above her. How much longer it would support her she didn't know. He question was answered with the next stroke that was dealt her. When the butt of the whip hit her shoulder blades, she was thrown violently forward causing the old rope to brake. She fell to the floor with a loud thud and a crack. She lay gasping in the hay.
"Looks like you broke some of her ribs, Yameru," Mishi gloated.
"Lerks like I did, huh?" Yameru said in his slurred speech of a drunk. The group of men laughed as they left. Riis cringed in the hay, clutching her chest and gasping.
Father.was Riis' last conscious thought.
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Hitomi looked up when she heard Dutch growling. On the other side of the fire, fire light danced in familiar eyes.
"It's all right, Dutch," Hitomi told him. "You can come out, Colza."
Since he was beckoned, the black shadowfox slunk out of the bush, his long, bushy tail thrashing angrily as he sniffed around. Unsatisfied, he sat down and changed into the form that she had first seen him in: human like with black ears and a handsome black tail.
"Where's Ceciline? I thought that I smelled her."
Hitomi didn't know what Ceciline had seen in this wild creature, but then again, she was the same as he was. Society on Gaia or Earth couldn't have tamed that girl. She turned to look at the prone from of Van. Her little surgery had realigned his snapped ribs allowing him to breathe easier.
"Well?"
Hitomi started. "What you smell," she said looking at Van. She looked at a sleeping Koyo before looking into the two-tone eyes of the black shadowfox. She saw where one colour of Riis' eyes came from. "What you smell is your daughter." She smiled when his mouth fell open. "Cue, why don't you travel with us?" Hitomi asked. "That way you can help us rescue Riis and you can ask her about Ceciline."
She watched as he considered her proposition. He eventually walked back over to the bush he had emerged out of. He retreated to his fox form before curling up on the ground and falling asleep with a "humph". Hitomi watched as Dutch walked over and curled up next to the shadowfox. Hitomi smiled and fell asleep with it still on her face.
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Riis knew she was asleep, but perhaps she was near the end. In her dream as in reality, she lay prone and hurting in hay with nothing but blackness around her. Through the shadows she saw the vague outlines of objects. Her ears were fixed on a noise. Every now and then a noise was heard and her ears flicked but returned. In her dream, she whimpered and then she howled.
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Cuero's ears twitched and he stopped playing chess with Dutch when he heard the whimper. The room around him blurred when he heard the howl. He closed his eyes to the cold wind that rushed all around him bringing with it far away scents of forests he had once traveled in.
When he dared open his eyes, he found himself not in the forest as he expected, but in a dark, dank corridor of what appeared to be a cave. He closed his eyes and lifted his nose to sniff. He sniffed a few more times saying all the things that he smelled to himself. ::Mildew, water, excrements, hay, blood, sweat, earth, limestone. . .:: His eyes snapped open as the last scent reached his nose. He had never brought Ceciline to any cave that he could remember. At that moment what Hitomi had told him became so clear that it was painful.
Following the smell Cuero carefully made his way down the corridor. Each door he passed smelled vaguely like the smell he had scented before. The further down the corridor he went, the stronger the scent was. When he reached the last door on the left, the scent was so strong it ran down the door, pooled underneath it on the hay tat stuck out, and was almost a tangible object. He gently opened the door and was met with a net of scents: blood, hay, sweat, fear, pain, hope . . . and that odd mix of his and Ceciline's scents. He looked around and saw a figure in the hay. He walked over to it and his heart nearly ripped in two.
The shadowfox lying there was a ragged mess. Her clothes were ripped in various places. He couldn't see her face clearly, for her arm covered her face. His eyes traveled down her body. Her tunic he thought had once been either a green or a blue was now an angry brown with dried blood. He walked around and saw her back was a red indicating she had recently been beaten. He unconsciously whimpered. This girl stirred.
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Riis heard a noise near her. Hoping it was Tayoru here to give her food she made an effort to get up. Using the hand that had been covering her face, she pushed herself up and slightly rolled to sit on her haunches. She fought unconsciousness but managed to open her tri-coloured eyes. She blinked several times before painfully rubbing them. Her dreams kept getting weirder. It took a moment before her conscious started on her.
~What's up with you dismissing this!!~ it yelled at her.
-It's just a dream,- she told it back tiredly.
~Your grandmother came to you in your dream, so why not your father?~
-Father?- Riis said back to her subconscious as her eyes flew open. Apparently, what had just been conversed had slipped her mind. She stared into semi familiar eyes. She knew she had seen those eyes before. Riis kept staring into the eyes as a hand was put forth and gently caressed her cheek.
Like the whip biting her back, Riis finally figured out where she had seen his eyes before. The colour that was closest to the pupil was the same colour as hers was. As one was added to one, two came about.
"Are you related to me?" Riis asked dumbly.
"Yes," the man replied. "Yes I am." She watched as his eyes glistened with unshed tears.
"What's wrong?" Riis asked. He just shook his head and began to open his mouth when her dream world blurred and dissolved into the real world.
"Wake up whelp!"
Riis cried out as she was whipped across her stomach this time. She felt three bites throbbing along her stomach. She hissed as she attempted to breathe correctly. She was roughly flipped onto her back, still hissing and gasping for breath, the stale air not helping much.
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Mishi was about to strike her with the whip again when he noticed something about her garb. Her shorts were wearing thin and her shirt was torn in places and threadbare. Instead of whipping her, he picked her up and started to carry her out into the hall.
"What are you doin', Mishi?" a guy next to Greffyn asked.
"She smells," Mishi said. "And not taking baths is unhygienic." His smile was evil.
A chorus of "oh's" followed him as well as his group as he made his way down the hall into the catacombs of the caves.
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As soon as Riis left her room, she squinted hard against the light. The light was dim, but being used to almost total darkness for who knows how long will do that to a person. She tried to follow the turns her carrier was taking but got rather dizzy trying. She was about to relax and attempt a nap when she smelled something through her damaged nose: water.
Her cloak missing, Riis shivered as a rather cool breeze kissed her skin. She started to sniff the person carrying her when they stopped. She was about to raise a question when she was bodily thrown into the air. She called out in surprise and shrieked when her broken body met the cold water. Her magic screamed in her to let her release it. She did so as she sank in the cool water.
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Cuero and Dutch woke up and yelped as if they had been burned. This had miraculously awoken Van as well. Van opened groggy eyes to see...a big pretty blurred picture. He smiled stupidly and muttered something about fuzzy rabbit-squirrels playing checkers with chickens. He blinked a couple times. His vision started to clear and his mind was more aware. He thought about sitting up, started to do so, but was pushed back down by two sets of hands on his shoulders. He hissed his displeasure.
"Take it easy, Van," a female voice said. He turned and looked at the green eyed girl, Hitomi, and his memory came back to him in a rush. He looked to his left and Koyo sat there wearing a concerned expression that, as Van thought, looked quite unbecoming of him.
"What's up?" Van asked trying to figure out what was going on.
"From what I gather," Van turned his head to get as good a look at the up side down shadowfox as he could as it addressed him, "from the scents on the winds and grounds as I traveled, you, Koyo, Hitomi and Half-breed here are following a group of people. For what reason, I know not.
A dragon came upon your path, and you're group had to fight it because it wouldn't let you pass. The barb at the end of the dragon's tail caught you square in the chest and broke some of your ribs. Hitomi fixed you up and we are now here, waiting for you to come around and be well enough to travel once more." The fox finished somewhat angry and sulked to the brush line of the clearing.
"What's with him?" Van asked.
"We don't know," Koyo replied. He jerked his head in the direction of Dutch and the shadowfox. "The two of them woke up like they'd been scalded with hot water."
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before Hitomi braved the silence and spoke up.
"Cuero said he'd stand watch for the night so we could get some proper sleep." Van nodded. While Koyo and Hitomi were readying their sleeping areas, Van beckoned his son.
"Koyo," Van started looking into his mismatched eyes. "Could you please bring me my pack?" Koyo nodded. He walked over and returned in moments, relieving himself of Van's pack before he returned to his sleeping area.
Van dug through his pack with gusto, looking for something that he thought would be useful in their search for Riis. As the sky darkened to full night and the day birds retreated to their roosts, Van's fingers touched something cold and slim. He looked at Hitomi. Her breathing told him he was asleep. The same diagnostic on Koyo provided Van with the same information. Gently, Van removed a silver flute from his pack.
His hands left foggy prints on it as he moved his hands around, his breath on the cold metal left condensation. He brought the mouthpiece to bear and blew across and somewhat into the hole at one end. The flute sang. Van slowly closed his eyes and let the music take over his mind. It slightly reminded him of the piano music he had heard when Hitomi had talked to him that one day.
Removing and replacing, his fingers slid over the wholes and keys on the shiny metal instrument. Van didn't know that he had Cuero's attention. He was reaching out to someone else. He was calling a lost soul.
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Riis was half drowned and coughing up water when she was grabbed and dragged back to her room by her braid. She heard the singing of steel and a giving before she collapsed on the ground. Laughing, the men left her. Riis, mortified, reached back for her long braid only to be accosted with a braid that, instead of easily reaching the bottom of her buttocks, only reached the bottom of her shoulder blades.
Broken beyond measure, Riis broke down. She couldn't take it anymore. She cried her situation to molding, fetid straw, rock walls, and microscopic creatures. Her cry echoed down the corridors of the catacomb, becoming more and more eerie as the sound reverberated through the damp caves, water bending the sound waves.
And above it all, on the wind that came in through a small hole in the top most corner of Riis' prison, a melody danced. Riis, heard a particular note and froze, tears racing down her face and her sobs soft hiccups. Her tattered ears twitched this way and that as she listened to the melody. It was beautiful, and she thought she recognized the tune. Painfully, Riis stood up and limped her way to the far wall. She painstakingly climbed the wall and pressed her face in the small hole. The music was clearer as well as the air. She took a deep breath of it as she listened.
A#, B, triplet, C, repeat. Riis followed the music in her head until it dawned on her what the song was about. Her ears sagged.
"Impossible Promise," Riis muttered. She gathered some clean hay from the ground, found a nice deep hole in the wall that would be invisible to the door, and hunkered down for the night. But deep down in her core being, a pile of embers flared into a small, unstable flame.
R&R please!
(is talking to cricktes)
Cuero Colza had felt a presence that was vaguely familiar to him and had been traveling toward it for days now. Since he had been on the far side of the Gossamer Woods near Austuria the presence was muddled and mixed with the other scents on the wind. When a certain tinge in the scent reached his very sensitive nose, the shadowfox retreated to his fox form before running through the woods following the scent.
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The person that Riis had to appreciate most in her life in her given situation would have to be Tayoru. Tayoru came in sometime after she had been abused and would treat her wounds and feed her a broth of some kind. But what Riis was most concerned about wasn't her abuse, but her weight. She wondered how much weight she had retained through her arduous ordeal. Her smirk quickly turned into a grimace of fear as her room door opened. She could barely smell the six men through her broken nose. If it weren't for Tayoru's spasmodic cleanings Riis was sure that she would look a gory mess.
"So, have you decided to give us our boon yet?" Mishi asked. She could tell he was losing his patience. She had been here for a few days now. As her mind started to shut down, a fleeting thought that originated from the chant that was spoken to her nightly was caught. She didn't have much to lose.
"Do you know how old I am?"
The group of men looked slightly confused before they answered what she expected to hear.
"No. How old are you?"
"I just turned sixteen last full moon," Riis whispered hoarsely. "And when was the last full moon?"
"Three days ago," Greffyn answered.
"I just turned sixteen, I haven't been taught the boon," Riis said, her voice cracking. "That night, before you guys woke me up, another shadowfox was teaching me, but you interrupted her. Now I have to wait until the new moon before she comes again." Riis was in tears now. She couldn't take it anymore. She broke down and cried. She didn't notice they men leave or the door shut. Riis was too absorbed in her miserable existence to notice anything.
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Riis woke up to a sharp slap across her face, further aggravating her broken nose.
"Wake up, bitch," a rough voice told her. She groggily opened her tearing eyes to see unfamiliar brown eyes.
"Hn?"
"Mishi told me to tell you that you have a few days," the man said. She watched as he looked back at the door. He leaned in to her abused ears. "I'll help Lord Van."
Riis' eyes opened wide and she turned her head sharply to look into his eyes, ignoring the sharp pain. "What's this about Lord Van?"
Again he looked at the door before continuing. "Yesterday when I was out hunting, I saw a skirmish between a dragon, a dog, and three people. I recognized the boot prints of Lord Van and Master Koyo, but the dog prints I didn't recognize nor the Lady's footprints."
Riis was so happy she could cry. "The dog prints belong to my underling. The Lady's prints are the Queen's."
This man looked surprised that the whole royal family was coming for her. "What's this underling you spoke of?"
"Shadowfox need something to have dominion over and they need someone that has dominion over themselves," Riis explained. "The dog is under me and Van and Hitomi are above me."
"I see," her nameless guest said. "I'm keeping a record of all the people that have come in and out, fought against who, and who have died in Mishi's little band. I plan on leaving it as soon as you're rescued." He started as he heard noises in the hall. "I'm meeting him this evening. So sorry."
Riis was confused for a minute until he shouted at her. She flinched at the suddenly loud noise. She gasped and opened her eyes wide when he punched her full in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her.
"I understand," Riis gasped out before she fell unconscious in the hay. Her guest left hurriedly.
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"Run!" Van shouted as they all scattered. Dutch barked at it. Considering what Van had seen, this dragon was rather small. He suddenly wished that he had been fighting this dragon instead of the full-grown bull male in its prime that he had fought. Van drew his sword and, while it was preoccupied with curiosity over Dutch, Van lunged and desecrated the dragon's eye.
"Van! Its tail!"
Van saw the tail a second too late. The tail hit him and threw him bodily into a tree. It hurt to breath. He gasped for a minute, before dodging the spoke on the end of the dragon's tail. He was still gasping when he rendered the dragon's other eye useless. Van leapt away from the thrashing dragon still gasping for breath. When he landed he staggered and fell on one knee. He saw Koyo freeing his sword from his scabbard. Van gathered a breath before he yelled his son's name. He threw the sword to him before he clutched his ribs and continued to fight for air.
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Koyo saw the arc in which the sword was flying. He grabbed it and lunged at the dragon. Koyo stabbed the dragon between the two heat chambers in it's chest, drew it up, then around the left chamber, then down its belly as it jumped over him. He gagged as some of the blood fell in his mouth. Koyo watched as the dragon went through its death throws before going still.
"Cut the energist out."
Koyo walked over to the dragon and made a cut perpendicular to the one already there. He squinted as the energist glowed a bright orange. He loosened it with his sword before pulling it out of the dragon by hand. He suddenly remembered his father. He turned and ran back to where Dutch and his mother were tending to his father.
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Hitomi saw Dutch flinch and lay his ears against his skull.
"Dutch!" Hitomi whistled. She watched his ears perk back up and he turned his head toward her. "Come here, honey." The dog dutifully skirted the battle between dragon and draconian as he came to her. When he reached her he started to whine.
"What is it, boy?" He just looked at Van as he panted for breath. The two watched as he called out to Koyo and threw him his sword before he grasped his ribs before collapsing.
"Van!" Hitomi called as she ran to his side. She dragged him a meter or two out of the way before she asked what was wrong with him.
"I." Van started. "I.it.hurts.I.can't breath."
Hitomi pulled her hands away from his shirt intending to wipe them on her skirt thinking they were covered with sweat. Dutch put his paw on her forearm and she looked down to see that her hands were covered with blood.
"Oh my God," Hitomi breathed.
"The.energist," Van rasped out.
"Cut the energist out," she shouted to Koyo. Her attention immediately went back to Van.
"Van," Hitomi started gently. "I need you to lie on your back." When all he did was gasp, Dutch nosed him onto his back where he let out a breathy moan of pain. Hitomi gently pried his arms off his chest. At this point Koyo showed up. He held Van's hands above his head as Hitomi pulled his red tunic above his head to his elbows before looking back at his chest.
It was clear that he had several broken ribs among the bruised ones. She grimaced when she saw a spoke of something white covered in blood. They were several days from the castle. Hitomi looked at Koyo.
"Get a rope and tie his legs and arms down," Hitomi instructed. Koyo nodded and went over to their pack to follow his mother's instructions. "Van?" Her heart wrenched when he opened his pain glazed chocolate eyes. She briefly glanced at Koyo before she continued. "This is going to hurt." His eyes looked confused and Hitomi guessed it was a side effect of the pain. As Koyo had tied his legs down and had just finished tying down his arms, his eyes widened in sudden comprehension. His mouth worked but no sound came out.
"I said that it would hurt, Van," Hitomi said as her eyes filled with tears. She turned away from Van and drew a knife from her pack while Koyo blindfolded his father. Van's scream echoed throughout the woods.
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Riis' screams echoed throughout the catacombs. It had dawned on her that Mishi had no intention of giving her until the new moon to attempt to learn what she needed in order to grant them their wish. They thought that she was lying to them. She had never had a reason to lie in her life. And now she was slowly being beaten to death for it.
She hung limply from the ceiling by a fraying rope. She cried out and flinched when the whip bit her again. She heard the rope creak above her. How much longer it would support her she didn't know. He question was answered with the next stroke that was dealt her. When the butt of the whip hit her shoulder blades, she was thrown violently forward causing the old rope to brake. She fell to the floor with a loud thud and a crack. She lay gasping in the hay.
"Looks like you broke some of her ribs, Yameru," Mishi gloated.
"Lerks like I did, huh?" Yameru said in his slurred speech of a drunk. The group of men laughed as they left. Riis cringed in the hay, clutching her chest and gasping.
Father.was Riis' last conscious thought.
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Hitomi looked up when she heard Dutch growling. On the other side of the fire, fire light danced in familiar eyes.
"It's all right, Dutch," Hitomi told him. "You can come out, Colza."
Since he was beckoned, the black shadowfox slunk out of the bush, his long, bushy tail thrashing angrily as he sniffed around. Unsatisfied, he sat down and changed into the form that she had first seen him in: human like with black ears and a handsome black tail.
"Where's Ceciline? I thought that I smelled her."
Hitomi didn't know what Ceciline had seen in this wild creature, but then again, she was the same as he was. Society on Gaia or Earth couldn't have tamed that girl. She turned to look at the prone from of Van. Her little surgery had realigned his snapped ribs allowing him to breathe easier.
"Well?"
Hitomi started. "What you smell," she said looking at Van. She looked at a sleeping Koyo before looking into the two-tone eyes of the black shadowfox. She saw where one colour of Riis' eyes came from. "What you smell is your daughter." She smiled when his mouth fell open. "Cue, why don't you travel with us?" Hitomi asked. "That way you can help us rescue Riis and you can ask her about Ceciline."
She watched as he considered her proposition. He eventually walked back over to the bush he had emerged out of. He retreated to his fox form before curling up on the ground and falling asleep with a "humph". Hitomi watched as Dutch walked over and curled up next to the shadowfox. Hitomi smiled and fell asleep with it still on her face.
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Riis knew she was asleep, but perhaps she was near the end. In her dream as in reality, she lay prone and hurting in hay with nothing but blackness around her. Through the shadows she saw the vague outlines of objects. Her ears were fixed on a noise. Every now and then a noise was heard and her ears flicked but returned. In her dream, she whimpered and then she howled.
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Cuero's ears twitched and he stopped playing chess with Dutch when he heard the whimper. The room around him blurred when he heard the howl. He closed his eyes to the cold wind that rushed all around him bringing with it far away scents of forests he had once traveled in.
When he dared open his eyes, he found himself not in the forest as he expected, but in a dark, dank corridor of what appeared to be a cave. He closed his eyes and lifted his nose to sniff. He sniffed a few more times saying all the things that he smelled to himself. ::Mildew, water, excrements, hay, blood, sweat, earth, limestone. . .:: His eyes snapped open as the last scent reached his nose. He had never brought Ceciline to any cave that he could remember. At that moment what Hitomi had told him became so clear that it was painful.
Following the smell Cuero carefully made his way down the corridor. Each door he passed smelled vaguely like the smell he had scented before. The further down the corridor he went, the stronger the scent was. When he reached the last door on the left, the scent was so strong it ran down the door, pooled underneath it on the hay tat stuck out, and was almost a tangible object. He gently opened the door and was met with a net of scents: blood, hay, sweat, fear, pain, hope . . . and that odd mix of his and Ceciline's scents. He looked around and saw a figure in the hay. He walked over to it and his heart nearly ripped in two.
The shadowfox lying there was a ragged mess. Her clothes were ripped in various places. He couldn't see her face clearly, for her arm covered her face. His eyes traveled down her body. Her tunic he thought had once been either a green or a blue was now an angry brown with dried blood. He walked around and saw her back was a red indicating she had recently been beaten. He unconsciously whimpered. This girl stirred.
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Riis heard a noise near her. Hoping it was Tayoru here to give her food she made an effort to get up. Using the hand that had been covering her face, she pushed herself up and slightly rolled to sit on her haunches. She fought unconsciousness but managed to open her tri-coloured eyes. She blinked several times before painfully rubbing them. Her dreams kept getting weirder. It took a moment before her conscious started on her.
~What's up with you dismissing this!!~ it yelled at her.
-It's just a dream,- she told it back tiredly.
~Your grandmother came to you in your dream, so why not your father?~
-Father?- Riis said back to her subconscious as her eyes flew open. Apparently, what had just been conversed had slipped her mind. She stared into semi familiar eyes. She knew she had seen those eyes before. Riis kept staring into the eyes as a hand was put forth and gently caressed her cheek.
Like the whip biting her back, Riis finally figured out where she had seen his eyes before. The colour that was closest to the pupil was the same colour as hers was. As one was added to one, two came about.
"Are you related to me?" Riis asked dumbly.
"Yes," the man replied. "Yes I am." She watched as his eyes glistened with unshed tears.
"What's wrong?" Riis asked. He just shook his head and began to open his mouth when her dream world blurred and dissolved into the real world.
"Wake up whelp!"
Riis cried out as she was whipped across her stomach this time. She felt three bites throbbing along her stomach. She hissed as she attempted to breathe correctly. She was roughly flipped onto her back, still hissing and gasping for breath, the stale air not helping much.
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Mishi was about to strike her with the whip again when he noticed something about her garb. Her shorts were wearing thin and her shirt was torn in places and threadbare. Instead of whipping her, he picked her up and started to carry her out into the hall.
"What are you doin', Mishi?" a guy next to Greffyn asked.
"She smells," Mishi said. "And not taking baths is unhygienic." His smile was evil.
A chorus of "oh's" followed him as well as his group as he made his way down the hall into the catacombs of the caves.
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As soon as Riis left her room, she squinted hard against the light. The light was dim, but being used to almost total darkness for who knows how long will do that to a person. She tried to follow the turns her carrier was taking but got rather dizzy trying. She was about to relax and attempt a nap when she smelled something through her damaged nose: water.
Her cloak missing, Riis shivered as a rather cool breeze kissed her skin. She started to sniff the person carrying her when they stopped. She was about to raise a question when she was bodily thrown into the air. She called out in surprise and shrieked when her broken body met the cold water. Her magic screamed in her to let her release it. She did so as she sank in the cool water.
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Cuero and Dutch woke up and yelped as if they had been burned. This had miraculously awoken Van as well. Van opened groggy eyes to see...a big pretty blurred picture. He smiled stupidly and muttered something about fuzzy rabbit-squirrels playing checkers with chickens. He blinked a couple times. His vision started to clear and his mind was more aware. He thought about sitting up, started to do so, but was pushed back down by two sets of hands on his shoulders. He hissed his displeasure.
"Take it easy, Van," a female voice said. He turned and looked at the green eyed girl, Hitomi, and his memory came back to him in a rush. He looked to his left and Koyo sat there wearing a concerned expression that, as Van thought, looked quite unbecoming of him.
"What's up?" Van asked trying to figure out what was going on.
"From what I gather," Van turned his head to get as good a look at the up side down shadowfox as he could as it addressed him, "from the scents on the winds and grounds as I traveled, you, Koyo, Hitomi and Half-breed here are following a group of people. For what reason, I know not.
A dragon came upon your path, and you're group had to fight it because it wouldn't let you pass. The barb at the end of the dragon's tail caught you square in the chest and broke some of your ribs. Hitomi fixed you up and we are now here, waiting for you to come around and be well enough to travel once more." The fox finished somewhat angry and sulked to the brush line of the clearing.
"What's with him?" Van asked.
"We don't know," Koyo replied. He jerked his head in the direction of Dutch and the shadowfox. "The two of them woke up like they'd been scalded with hot water."
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before Hitomi braved the silence and spoke up.
"Cuero said he'd stand watch for the night so we could get some proper sleep." Van nodded. While Koyo and Hitomi were readying their sleeping areas, Van beckoned his son.
"Koyo," Van started looking into his mismatched eyes. "Could you please bring me my pack?" Koyo nodded. He walked over and returned in moments, relieving himself of Van's pack before he returned to his sleeping area.
Van dug through his pack with gusto, looking for something that he thought would be useful in their search for Riis. As the sky darkened to full night and the day birds retreated to their roosts, Van's fingers touched something cold and slim. He looked at Hitomi. Her breathing told him he was asleep. The same diagnostic on Koyo provided Van with the same information. Gently, Van removed a silver flute from his pack.
His hands left foggy prints on it as he moved his hands around, his breath on the cold metal left condensation. He brought the mouthpiece to bear and blew across and somewhat into the hole at one end. The flute sang. Van slowly closed his eyes and let the music take over his mind. It slightly reminded him of the piano music he had heard when Hitomi had talked to him that one day.
Removing and replacing, his fingers slid over the wholes and keys on the shiny metal instrument. Van didn't know that he had Cuero's attention. He was reaching out to someone else. He was calling a lost soul.
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Riis was half drowned and coughing up water when she was grabbed and dragged back to her room by her braid. She heard the singing of steel and a giving before she collapsed on the ground. Laughing, the men left her. Riis, mortified, reached back for her long braid only to be accosted with a braid that, instead of easily reaching the bottom of her buttocks, only reached the bottom of her shoulder blades.
Broken beyond measure, Riis broke down. She couldn't take it anymore. She cried her situation to molding, fetid straw, rock walls, and microscopic creatures. Her cry echoed down the corridors of the catacomb, becoming more and more eerie as the sound reverberated through the damp caves, water bending the sound waves.
And above it all, on the wind that came in through a small hole in the top most corner of Riis' prison, a melody danced. Riis, heard a particular note and froze, tears racing down her face and her sobs soft hiccups. Her tattered ears twitched this way and that as she listened to the melody. It was beautiful, and she thought she recognized the tune. Painfully, Riis stood up and limped her way to the far wall. She painstakingly climbed the wall and pressed her face in the small hole. The music was clearer as well as the air. She took a deep breath of it as she listened.
A#, B, triplet, C, repeat. Riis followed the music in her head until it dawned on her what the song was about. Her ears sagged.
"Impossible Promise," Riis muttered. She gathered some clean hay from the ground, found a nice deep hole in the wall that would be invisible to the door, and hunkered down for the night. But deep down in her core being, a pile of embers flared into a small, unstable flame.
R&R please!
(is talking to cricktes)