Disclaimer: I own absolutely and completely nothing. Bioware has that particular pleasure.
Author's note: Mostly just writing to see if I can move the story along. Next. Alistair.
In this chapter: Fine. If he must deal with him. Just because he must.
005.
Assan recognizes what's going on here. It's basic. The sort of thing he learned in a basket with a mother and brothers and sisters and hey. How to live. Everyone learns. And living things go in pairs. Bitch, dog, female, male. By the way. He needs one too. But back to the subject.
His elf and the human.
His elf is his. His and his alone. It has been like that since that place, since war and blood, even more now that they share it, share scent, share home. She is his. But. But. Everything comes in pairs and this being is hers. Assan doesn't bother to raise his head from his paws, the comfortable mattress underneath his body giving the impression to any outsider that the Mabari is little more than a calm pup. He watches though, brown eyes rolling over the human.
He doesn't smell like the bastard. The bastard had been nervousness and a light heart, strength but lacking some types of it, despair and something young and honeyed. Still growing. He doesn't smell like his elf either, all of her iron and green grass covered in vicious blood. This human is just different. Assan scoffs against his paws, raising his nose just a little. Closer. More deeply. Scents tell a lot about things.
Earth, that's the first. Something like rock after rain. It means change, slow change but change anyway. If you change, you can betray, if you can betray, he's not touching her. Assan remembers well how it was with the bastard. She trusted, she trusts easy at times – maybe not easy, doesn't matter. He remembers water that didn't fell and blood that didn't flow. Harm was there though, wounds underneath her skin. He's hers and she's his and he's not letting anyone do it again.
Rock's strong though. Maybe rock changes to fit instead?
"I am not leaving," the human speaks from his chair, elbows on knees, eyes right in front of him. "So I thought, perhaps you should know this. It will be permanent. And we should come to an arrangement."
Words are words, human. His eyes narrow, his lip raises and there are teeth and threats displayed in equal manner.
"She is a good woman, your owner." There he goes again. They don't understand. He can't explain. Nature doesn't work like they want. Their kind is still foolish, young, needing help and guidance. His kind adopts. Imprints. The Mabari stops giving the human a baleful eye and carries on. Rock and something spicy, like the pies slipped underneath the table. "She understands," and it tastes like fire but not the one who consumes, that burns everything. Maybe his type of strength or. Or. To live, he wants to live, is that it? "You see all kinds of people when you are born as I was. You don't see many sacrificing as she did. It's just."
The human's talking to himself now and doesn't notice.
If he was two-legged, Assan would roll his eyes – just like his elf – but he's not. Instead he jumps from the bed, paws clicking against the floor as he comes near. The man doesn't back away. Doesn't move. Keeps silent with that odd calm gaze on him that he sees sometimes on her, even when the Mabari snares, even when he growls, teeth against his skin and he could and would rip him apart in an instant if needed. Pairs, he and she, that's how it goes.
What else can he do? He wants fresh grass not salt, he wants her smiling and happy, not harmed.
Assan's head rests against the man's knees, a moment to taste the hand nearby, to feel the rock and the earth and the spring morning just after a storm. Commits it to memory. Trusts this human won't be like the other and the hundred others he protected her from.
When Tasha finally chooses to make her presence known, arms crossed over her chest and that scent of grass all around them – really, human, pay more attention, she was just behind you – Assan is back on the bed, head on the blanket and the place that he's still not giving up. Sharing, not giving up.
"You do realize he isn't the one you should be having the conversation with?" His elf does that weird thing with lips to her pair and pulls away, humor in her voice as she sits by his side. Hand. Hand on his neck, that's the spot. "And you won't be able to bribe my father with meat and cookies."
Eh.
He's the one sleeping on her bed. He's the important one. The human's smart, he realizes that. That smile, see, his smile says a lot. Things come in pairs and this is hers. Fine. He'll be his too. His human.
But keep the bones coming.