Author's Notes: Whew. This chapter kicked my ass. Putting it up before I can finish nitpicking it to death, even though I'm still unhappy with it. If it sits any longer, it'll stagnate. -makes face-
In any case, there's some violence in this chapter, so heads up- and of course, I own no characters from FE.
Cargo- Chapter 3
It was not, Janaff had thought, a terribly bad plan. Undoubtedly he'd come up with worse before.
In fact, there were more than a handful of occasions that came readily to mind, most of which involved Ulki informing him, in no uncertain terms, as to what precisely had gone wrong with them. And this, at least, had held the advantage of simplicity- an improvement, he'd thought, considering the look his partner usually gave him when he admitted to the convolutions inserted into said plans for the sake of challenge over necessity.
The first step had gone smoothly enough.
It had involved simply lying still and gathering his strength- and though usually impatience would have made him restless, the hawk had been slightly unsettled to discover that it wasn't difficult at all to convince his body that sleep was preferential to the cold and damp and pain of being awake.
And so he'd rested. Recovered until the exhaustion weighing him down hadn't been quite so heavy, the pain in his head not quite so sharp.
Until he felt that, when the beorcs came to look in on him, he could put up a fight that would make them reconsider slaving altogether.
Because it was one thing, certainly, to bind him when he was in the form closer to the way beorcs looked. But it was quite stupid, in Janaff's mind, that they hadn't thought to tie any part of him that would carry over when he became a hawk. His hands might be useful enough before he'd transformed, after all- but when he didn't have them any more, all his captors would have left to show for the bindings would be a pile of knotted ropes at the ship's bottom.
And so he waited, and rested, and occasionally caught the muffled bellows of the man that his mind had come to recognize as responsible for this shipment. And found himself grinning into the darkness, despite himself, to discover that whatever other laguz they'd been carrying as cargo evidently had jumped ship.
And when at last light flooded into the hold, illuminating a square of grey sky some distance away and the outline of steps leading downward, Janaff had held his breath and waited. Watched as the first of the men stepped down onto the stairs. Struggled hard not to translate the nervous energy that always flooded him before a battle into the tapping of a foot or something even more obvious.
The fact that there were only two of them was enough to bring the edges of an anticipatory smile to his lips, despite how he willed it away. The hawk couldn't count the number of times that Ulki had warned him never to underestimate his enemy, after all- and here were these men, wearing no armor, obligingly leaving the hatch wide open for him.
It seemed almost unfair.
But if cheating, Janaff conceded to himself, involved exploiting the stupidity of beorcs with all the moral sense of vultures, unfair he would be. And after he'd taken the two in the hold, all he'd have to do is clear the stairs- because, injured wing or no, they'd never catch him once he was out in open air.
They were talking to one another as they drew nearer, words too low for him to hear. The conversation gave him confidence all the same, though; if they were paying attention to each other, that meant they were paying less attention to him.
But he waited, regardless, every muscle tense and ready, struggling to give no outward sign that he was conscious- waited until the both of them stood over him, looking down.
And when the first beorc moved as though to kneel, he struck.
It was an awkward blow, certainly. Janaff couldn't recall the last time he'd kicked someone, if ever. But his foot caught behind the man's knee, and an instant later, he was cursing as he hit the floor, caught off guard, his companion's attention stolen just as it was meant to have been.
A second was all it took for Janaff to push himself up to his knees, even bereft of his hands, and from there he had a brief, awkward struggle to regain his feet.
The beorc turned back toward him at about the same moment that his feet cleared the wood of the ship's bottom, wings beating hard against the stale air of the hold, aching with protest but holding him aloft. The other man was climbing to his feet, now, but that wasn't important- nothing was important, beyond the nudge that would transform him into something more than capable of showing the bastards exactly what he thought of them carrying live cargo.
Janaff drew a breath in, tasting the rush of an impending fight, and reached for the part of him that would send him tumbling into another form. For one trembling moment, everything hung in the balance.
And then he simply didn't change.
His hands remained knotted, unmoving, behind him, and the wings that were supposed to have become much more powerful remained as they were, one still unsteady and hurting from the impact with the mast. But more than that were the things that remained missing entirely- the talons that could have closed effortlessly into the beorcs' flesh, or the beak that would have made them hesitate, once they'd felt the force he could put behind it.
Astonishment came like a shock of icy water, spilling over him in the space between breaths.
And before he could comprehend- before he could even begin to process- a hand was reaching out for him, heedless of the fact that he should have been able to force it away, was closing around the messy remains of his bun and tugging, hard.
The pain and the shock and the unexpected strength behind it stopped him cold- and in the next instant, the other hand had seized a wing, was twisting in a way that made him give a hoarse cry, and before the hawk knew it his feet were on the ground once more, succumbing to the pressure.
"Oh, come on now," the man said, casually. "You didn't really expect us to let you do whatever you wanted. Right?"
The words didn't process. Janaff's mind was caught up in something much more important.
Because he ought to be able to do this. It was only natural that he be able to do this. He wasn't exhausted, or terribly injured- there was nothing that should be stopping him.
Blindly, the hawk reached toward the part of him that had always made the shift in forms so effortlessly- and just as he teetered on the edge once more, a shivering almost-change that settled him back into a shape closer to that of a beorc, the man's words reached him.
"I mean, after all, sub-humans are useless unless they're animals."
Janaff stared up at him, eyes wide, mouth slightly open. Quite suddenly, it felt as though breathing was something difficult, and he wondered, just for a second, if perhaps his ears had failed him. "What?"
The man was close enough that Janaff could see the smirk creeping up at the corners of his face, even in the dim lighting. "You think you lot are clever enough to come up with magic artifacts to stay like that indefinitely, but we can't do the opposite?" The hand still clenched in the hair loosened its grip, shifted instead to take his chin in a tight hold. "Presumptuous little fuck, aren't you?"
Hissing like a startled bird, Janaff jerked backward- was reminded, quite forcefully, of the fact that the other hand still had a crushing grip on one of his wings. Despite his efforts, the man leaned closer.
"Well, here's some news for you, sub-human: you've got a handy new bracelet that's gonna make sure your sharp edges are smoothed over." The hand on his wing-joint grew cruelly tighter, even as the thumb on his chin gentled up, turning the gesture into a mockery of a caress. "So until you're ready to take your hand off, don't bother putting up a fight. You'll just embarrass yourself."
Janaff didn't even bother a response to that; he did, instead, the only thing he could think to do.
He bit the human bastard. Hard.
The result was instantaneous; the grip on both wing and face jerked suddenly backward as the man howled in pain, and the hawk grinned viciously even as he staggered, pleased to discover that he could taste blood in his mouth. "Embarrass myself?" he echoed, eyes innocently wide, lips closing over teeth to make the smile something closer to a smirk.
The expression lasted for all five seconds before one of those hands returned. It clenched in the front of his shirt, this time, and the other hardened into a fist, connecting with his mouth.
The force of the blow set his head to ringing; pain sparked, bright and hot, where it had landed, and quite suddenly there was more blood on his tongue than there had been before. For an alarming second, Janaff wasn't certain whether he'd have fallen if not for the hold on the collar of his shirt.
And then the second strike connected with his jaw, and he knew he'd have fallen; it was strong enough to snap his head backward, grey out the dim lighting of the hold with tiny black dots.
Instinctively, he cringed away, bracing to be hit again- and opened one eye a moment later, cautiously, when the blow didn't come.
Because the other human was saying something now, tone sharp, words quick. He'd climbed back to his feet at some point, Janaff realized distantly, and was standing beside his companion. "Hey," he said. "Hey! Watch his face!"
It was with unmistakable reluctance that the instruction was heeded, fingers unclenching grudgingly from the front of Janaff's shirt.
The hawk was distantly surprised to discover that his legs didn't seem interested in stopping the fall; they gave out with an unsteady little wobble, and he hit the wood of the floor without the benefit of having his hands free to slow the impact.
"Fucker bit me," the first man was growling. "You see this? Fucking teeth marks."
Dimly, Janaff wished the light was good enough for him to make out the teeth marks.
"So kick him in the side, or something," came the suggestion, off-handed. "Just leave his face out of it." A foot descended on his shoulder, then- pressed until the hawk gave a tiny gasp of pain, yielded, and rolled onto his back. In the darkness, the human leaned down to peer more closely at him. "He's too scrawny for labor. Won't get a decent price 'less someone thinks he's pretty. Y'know- puts him to use that way." The pressure on his shoulder increased as the man straightened up again.
"People are pretty sick," came the declaration, disgust making the words sharp. "Or desperate, if they want a fucking sub-human." He punctuated the words by taking the suggestion, landing a heavy, broad boot against Janaff's ribs.
The hawk clenched his teeth shut against the noise of pain that tried to escape- twisted on the floorboards, trying to squirm out from under the foot that still pinned him.
The second strike came before he could make any progress, however, a blow to his stomach that was more a stomp than a kick. The breathless cry that it wrenched from him wasn't something Janaff could hold back.
"Their money," the second human was saying, unconcerned. "They can do whatever the hell they want."
It wasn't until some time later, when the pain of the beating had begun to make him teeter on the edge of consciousness, that the pressure on his shoulder let up.
And if Janaff had made plans concerning the little square of light that led outside, he couldn't seem to recall what they were as he watched the silhouettes of the humans climb the stairs again.
-end chapter 3-