Chapter Twelve – The Leaving
[New reader? If you would like to start at the beginning, click here.]
Almost guiltily, Ja’kh’redd crept up beside the girl, and put his wing over her. Thomas was asleep in the tiny attached bedroom, snoring away loudly. He licked her ear once, pressing his muzzle into the back of her neck, and felt her stiffen. That was not usual; before, she’d always hugged back, the hug that Jared craved.
This time, Sarai could only think of the disturbing practices of the Vidos culture, their ‘three or four’ females, mating in a week of war more barbaric than anything she’d even imagined. The beast at her back had just become that — a beast.
Yet he was still her big pet, just as adoring and comforting as before, as when she recalled him, an angel from the mists of her earliest childhood. So when he drew back and sat up, confused, she turned over just a little to look at him in the dying light of the old fire.
He didn’t look like a beast to her eyes, not anymore. His brows, fixed fiercely by bone, could be subtly twisted and moved in a variety of expressions just as a human brow could be. His long, pointed ears which mimicked and reversed from his small forward-pointing horns could droop, or pull back in annoyance, or give any number of gestures, and his eyes were infinitely able to communicate. He was, after all, a perfectly sentient being. He could even smile, if he felt like it, which Vidos very rarely did. His smile gave him a sort of flummoxed, rueful expression to her mind, but it was a smile nonetheless.
However, as he gazed down at her, he looked only worried, confused, and troubled. There was a distinct kink in his left brow-ridge which gave him the trembling uncertainty of a puppy whose beloved master has just swatted it for no apparent reason. He truly didn’t understand her sudden reversal, with an open innocence which only a beast could possibly have. Coming from a huge, muscle-bound brute like Jared, the expression made her smile and almost laugh.
Comforted, he melted down just a little toward her again, wanting more than anything to get his hugs the last night he’d ever see kitten.
Thomas had explained this to the girl as well; once Jared was Chief, he would be strapped to the cave for the entire winter, guarding his new eggs… not out of fear of the other males, who would do Jared’s every bidding as the new Chief, but due to the demands of the females, which would have him there day and night, then running errands and hunting out all manner of food for them as they grew with their pregnancy. Once the eggs were laid in the spring, he wouldn’t be able to get away until the hatchlings were learning to fly, in which case he’d have to teach them. And finally, by mid-summer, he might be able to sneak away on a Hunt or two, before Mating came again, and he’d have to repeat the process.
Thankfully, Vidos females did not lay eggs every year, but Jared’s Chief had three women to look after, which meant that he had a good chance of siring eggs every year, and especially the first year, when a female would become more fertile for a new mate.
“You won’t see him for sure until after winter, and if he has eggs, you won’t see him for a year,” the old man had told her. “He may sneak up here by next midsummer, but you’ll likely be on your way back to Sabatton by then… and he may be too busy to come at all. Running a Village and part of a Tribe is not a job for a slacker. I’m afraid you’re going to have to say goodbye to your pet.”
Remembering those warnings, Sarai finally gave in, and pretended she didn’t know where he was going in the morning, or what he’d be doing in a week. Instead, she threw both arms around his thick neck and nuzzled into the crook below his jaw where his skin was softer than kid leather, and warm, and he smelled of forests and open sky.
Instantly he went limp with the sensation of that ecstasy, putty in her hands, slave to a softer touch than any Vidos could or ever would experience from another. A hatchling would curl up in it’s father’s wing, but Vidos never embraced nor snuggled as a cute little human female could. Jared was sound asleep in moments in contentment, his wing throw over her like a great dark blanket, blood-warm. She smiled and felt herself growing dozy in her nest, the pain from her abdomen gone for the moment with almost eight feet of solid muscle and ferocity curled up gently at her side.
She was waked before morning by the movement of Jared. Thomas was still sleeping, but he stirred, and lifted his wing. The sudden coolness of the air over her woke her, to gaze at him as he pulled away. She caught him by the shoulder of his wing, and drew him back, for one last goodbye.
Jared was sorry that he’d waked her, for he’d wanted to sneak out while she was still content, his last sight of kitten being a smiling sleeping face, with all that silly human hair in disarray. But waking, she was difficult to leave behind.
She snuggled with him, she teased, she pulled on his horns, she giggled, and she kept him entirely engaged for an hour as dawn came swiftly, delightfully entertaining him again as she had when she was little. The time passed in moments, as he licked her on the chin and pretended to nip her on the ear, play-fought and then grew so concerned when she winced in pain from her wound that he had to gently feel the bandages all over, to be sure it wasn’t worsened.
She lifted one of his fingers by its talon, and looked at it, remembering when he’d cut her cheek open accidentally. He did too, and ran the back of his claw along the scar. Then he smiled a little, huffed a great sigh, and stood to go.
It was as if Jared forced himself out of the room, and Sarai didn’t stop him. She pressed her lips together and watched him go, feeling cold before he’d even shut the door. Then she closed her eyes and wept without a sound, into the blankets.
“The gypsy-boy, Elsan the Nobleman, and now a Vidos,” she laughed to herself darkly. “I honestly have the worst taste in men,” she sighed, tried to find it funny, and rolled over to face the fire and sleep. But her eyes remained open until she heard the sound of his great leathery wings taking to flight, and listened until he was gone.