Is Cupid Green?
"N.. Noishe?" Kratos stared down at his companion who looked up at him with wide pleading eyes. And none of the pleading came from those well drilled in lessons. Sitting in a pool of soft silk green locks the Protozoan whined, a glossy pink patch hung between his ears where his tuft should have been.
"WHINE!"
Noishe had no need to "act" heart broken, nor did he have to fake the breaking of his voice at the last note.
From the other room Anna's evil laughter caught the Seraphim's ears.Fury blazed in him, fully human rage that was not at all fettered by his angelic nature. This act was a humiliation, a malicious move against one of his oldest friends, his hand snapped over the hilt of his sword and for one moment had that woman actually been in the room instead of safely (or marginally safely as the door wouldn't have been too much of a problem due to his strength) behind a few inches of steel he would have taken matters in his own hands there and then.
"Whiiiineee!" Noishe bawled, his brown eyes wide, his ears had been pinned back with a length of cloth -a shred length of rag perhaps- and it made those warm pools of brown-black nearly double in size. Tears leaked out from the corners of his eyes and Noishe howled mournfully, despite his grief one paw pinned down a patch of the green tresses and the raw hope in those eyes...
Kratos felt something wrench in the vicinity of his heart at the realization he was going to have to dash all that hope.
"Ene mereth coiuinin." Kratos murmured, scooping up the small protozoan in his arms. "I'll see what I can do."
Leaning against Kratos' chest Noishe whimpered.
X
About half an hour later Noishe let out an ear splitting scream and ran from Kratos' room. The Seraphim sighed, watched his "pet" slither through the partially open door and had to wonder for a second if it's next form would be reptilian. Alright magic had failed, but certainly binding the hairs via wax and sticking it on the protozoan's head couldn't have been that bad of an idea...
"Oh Noshy... what in Martel's name cooked that little head of yours!"
Kratos winced, then his anger surged through him like a molten tide and burned away his guilt. To his surprise he found himself out of his quarters and stood framed in the doorway, his dark eyes black with anger. Had he been thinking he might have actually put the candle on the desk, left it behind. Anger though tended to kill all thought. So it was without any sense he had stormed out of his rooms and into the hall the primitive sylvarant means of illumination on hand. Spotting him Anna's demeanor went ice cold, it went so cold in fact that had he been able to feel heat he might well have been shivering.
"Well that answers my question." She spat.
"Really, because you've left so many of mine unanswered." Kratos purred, his voice loaded with quiet menace.
She either was the stupidest or bravest woman -Kratos was going with stupid at the current moment- he'd ever met because she had the gall to look him straight in the eyes and begin to tell him off. So it was his fault was it, that he couldn't feel heat, that he had accidently singed the protozoan? He gritted his teeth and clenched his hands into fist ordering himself not to hit her, despite the fact it would effectivly shut her up. The last woman he'd hit had been Martel, and it would be the last. He'd sworn it and only his loyalty to his deceased companion kept him from acting on the alluring fantasies of both of his hands around the brown haired woman's throat.
"If there is any blame in this situation Ms Anna," Kratos whispered, "it is shared between us both. Who, might I ask, preformed the mutilation of my companion's hair?"
"Muti-what?" Anna stared up at him blankly and Kratos' rage dissipated at her all too real confusion. Then something dark and cruel flickered to life in his mind and lit in his eyes. Noishe whined in protest, knowing that look all too well.
"Mutilation; to scar, to flaw, to cause injury upon." Kratos put a slight sneer into his tone. Allowing his eyes slid to mere slits, he tilted his head ever so slightly to the side. "It is my hope that such advanced words as scar and injury do not allude you host body A012?"
Flushing in shame and anger the woman gritted her teeth and he knew one more word, one more barb and he'd probably have a fight one his hands. Kvar must be losing his touch if someone this spirited had made it through his ranch, certainly Forcystus too was losing his edge as well. It must be old age creeping up on the two cardinals, he only knew that senility was the only excuse Yggdrasil would accept from the two of them when he gave his report over this... mishap.
"Prepare to find someone else, anyone else." Kratos spat, locking eyes with the startled Protozoan. "And be ready to do so in a few hours. There is paperwork I must fill out to have you transferred back to your cell Ms Anna, if you'll excuse me I'd like to get to doing it."
"Fine by me bastard."
"I'm glad we understand each other so well." Kratos hissed, bowed mockingly to the woman then turning on his heel he stormed past her...
"Whine!" Noishe almost screamed in protest.
Flexing his fingers Kratos exerted control over his anger. Having not felt rage of this magnitude in so long however it seemed harder then he recalled. Taking a deep breath he looked once over the edge of the violet shoulder pad that topped his sparrow tail cloak.
"Nu, ne nu Noishe, mer-iea stea."
"Howl!"
"It's final!" Kratos snapped. "Grow up and learn that because you actually might want something that doesn't mean you are going to get it!"
Even if it was something so simple as running the length of a steel sword through about half of the Desians of this ranch and then perhaps turning the blade on a certain woman in his company...
Some other day perhaps he'd get the opportunity, until then he had forums to fill out. It was the first set in a long while that he was actually going to enjoy doing.
X
Noishe whined and actually cried when the Desian's came. Shame what ever his name was missed the sight, it might actually have moved him to some shadow form of pity. But then considering that stone heart of his it probably wouldn't have...
"Ya've packed on a lot of weight haven't you bitch?" One of the guards hit her with the handle of his crossbow because she wasn't moving fast enough it seemed.
Anna only smiled slightly at the man's stupidity even as she put her hands over her new 'belly'.
"We'll sweat it off ya soon enough." Another guard leered, "you were a pretty thing in the cells, I bet a few weeks you'll be just as you were."
Still Anna only smiled, her plans, set in stone nothing could stop her from escaping now.
She passed through steel sheathed halls, past the floating glaring eyes that ran along the sealing on steel paths and shed red light that unpleasantly stung her on passing. Even as they dragged her to the courtyard, there tight grip on her arms leaving bruises she smiled, and they muttered amongst themselves she was a lunatic. Those few in the court yard, one woman from Luin in particular who had a nodding acquaintanceship with Anna, knew that look and that the images of tree branches hitting the back of steel sheathed skulls was running through the girl's head.
They tossed her in the dusty court yard like so much refuse, and still Anna grinned, the prisoners around her looked at her in anger, disgust. Ignoring them she lifted up the front of her tunic. The knapsack stuffed with food and water skins fell free at long last and there were hints of smiled on every one's face.
"Come on guys." Anna's lips curled into a smile, though there was for a heartbeat a flash of pain in them for their show of distrust. "I never forget, no matter what."
Unlike a certain "lord" who had seemed to have forgotten long ago that he was human, but then that was him and he wasn't her. She wasn't a monster like he was.
She took a lot of comfort in that fact.
X
There were two days straight of screaming, during those days when he finally realized what Noishe was going to be doing he filled both food and water bowls to near overflowing then shut the door to his private quarters. Fishing out a pair of earmuffs that he kept for the sake of disguising his nature in the winter -why in Origin's name he's allowed Yuan to talk him into buying the pair of fluffy red ones was beyond him, they probably were both bored out of there minds that century or something- he snapped those over his ears and let Noishe scream himself voiceless. It was hard, hard because despite the earmuffs he could still hear the shrieks of anger, and it was hard to hear the agony in that voice, still he ignored it best he could and managed to actually clean off his desk.. Kratos opened the door after a few hours of pure silence only to find the Protozoan sprawled out on the floor, eyes closed, drying tear tracks run down the canine's face. Noishe had -by the looks of it- literally passed out from pure exhaustion. Despite the fact that Noishe had annoyed the Hell out of him for the last few days he picked up the sleeping Protozoan and lay the small creature on the couch. He padded from living room to kitchen and filled the empty food and water bowls. Duty done he stood, spent one moment staring at the small being on the couch, tomorrow Noishe would understand, tomorrow Noishe would forgive him. He just had to wait for tomorrow to come, that was all.