He was a prince. Scion of the kingdom Maomori! 22nd in line but still of royal blood. As his family spent themselves as soldiers under verious masters he had taken to acting in a logistical capacity. Though with 11 winters to his bones there was only so much the alchemist apprentice could do for the family, but due to his lack of military environment he was one of few to get a contingent of loyal royal guard.
The thought of those guards doting on him was what he rose to partial consciousness to, he was sore all over, more than morning after a bad brew of potion or encounter with a particular ghost. He stretched his limbs slowly, keeping the shifting of his fur under the soft sheets to a minimum. His fingers and toes clenches and gave a sensation of stretching and relief that spread up his arms and legs till a his hole torso tensed with the strain.
His wrists hurt like when he tried for combat training and got disarmed more and more violently the weaker his grip got, his fingers were fine for the most part as he curled and extended them in waves. The shoulders felt like he'd tried to block an uppercut from behind with some clandestine shield maneuver, and it felt like that on both sides. At his ankles were similar sensations of “that's not the way i'm supposed to bend” though thankfully his hips only felt like a dropkick to the pelvis while his thighs were braced against a railing or bench of some kind.
Mouth dry and thirsty he took a deep breath and checked himself over with his paws. His fur was the worst off with a disheveledness that came from getting wrapped up in ropes for a long period of time, explaining the aches when the checked his wrists and ankles. All that floppy and or dangly bits not shiny piercings were still in place and mostly untouched, nothing clipped or torn, whoever had stripped him was very careful about it too. He'd have to ask them about their methods cause he could barely get half his ceremonial piercings out without damn near pushing them all the way threw, but that could be down to human's dexterous fingers.
Deciding he'd gotten all he could from feeling himself over he decided so uncoil himself from the rough S shape he'd wiggled himself into in his sleep and peak out from the strange smelling bed sheets. Peaking his head out slowly he noted the room, lit by either a central brazier or mana crystals channeling fire or the light from one, the amber flickering on walls decorated with axes pelts scales and swords. Walls of solid timber looking like it was trimmed of bark and laid without another thought, a rough hewn dresser of some kind with lots of herbs and bowls on top sat next to the bed too. As he continued to peak further and further from the sheets he saw what he was sleeping under, a pelt thicker than his arm, and it'd been doing its job as though he was naked and the air was freezing he was plenty toasty underneath. The bed itself was VERY cushy and he almost sank into it but the pillows felt like hard linen packed with cattail, it was so much like...
Shuffling and a deep breath alerted someone else in the room to him and they turned a bit, clattering of iron on flax and fastenings alerting him to those he was supposed to be getting an eye on. But the pillow was full of such fond memories that made his head swim with sunlight and pies of game he figured he could just play dead there for a while more and...
Hearing the clattering again, softer and slower he figured they'd turned back away but he wasn't gonna take his chances and peak before he knew for certain. A few more happy breaths and slight rubles of purring and he pulled himself away from the good memories to peak out enough to see the ones who'd made the shifting noises. He was puzzled, they looked for a moment like cascading fountains of rippling and scarred pelts, some sliced threw but for the most part clean. No matter what angle he considered they looked like an unholy conflagration of animal hides frozen in air, until the top of one twisted to speak to the other.
“I hope whatever they gagged him with doesn't need some sort of antidote” A man said, almost sounding human but his common was gruff and accented.
“It doesn't, it's not a snake venom, its a simple relaxant, they look like they only used a half vile and you saw how tobi took the stuff, barely calmed his sugar high from one orange” The equally gruff woman said from beside the man.
“They must have had a head start on him then or the stuff transmits better by smell cause he's been out for the better part of a day, not counting commuting time” The man sounded decidedly worried though the woman was better at speaking common, and sounded more like how his own people spoke it.
“Worried we'd have to bury him” She asked with some mirth
The man didn't take kindly to the fun poked at him and simply smacked the side of his...
BIG
axe against her side, making her chuckle.
“He's gonna be fine, he should be waking up soon and we should be able to get some water into him then.” she reassured, making the man huff.
“Poor thing is skin and bones though” He turned his head to look back and it made the prince freeze, big amber eyes staring.
“For mountain life maybe but back down near the delta these guys are speedy lil frickers, less great axe and more weaponized needle. Really well suited for crossbow use, ya get?” She said mostly to lighten the mood, only noticing the staring contest when she looked over at him.
Without a second's hesitation she smiled wide and turned to face him with more armor than it would tale to make an anvil on or under her pelts and a smile like it was nothing. Unlike the man with his ax head stuck on the end of a staff reaching his shoulder. She stood with two battle hatchets at her waist a kite shield tucked under her cloak and lots of metal cans and bottles along with two cases under her tailbone. As she tossed one of the canisters over onto the bed the man turned and showed his own load out, a short sword on one thigh and spell book on the other as shiny armor plates lined his form with as many scars as his weathered pelts.
“Go on cutie, we got plenty of water, much less food though en case you were gonna ask on that front” That seemed to be enough to spook the wizard from his staring match with the cat as the cat took the cannister and twisted the cap off, sniffing skeptically.
“How do I know I can trust you?” He asked the huge beast people.
“Well I guess you can't so you're gonna have to judge for yourself, but i'd like to ask you where you're from.” The woman replied back with suspiciously clear common for the accent they both bare not two minutes ago.
“First were'd you get me?” He asked.
“Ah, where do I begin, well there's a nation to our north that had us in a siege for a good few months, its winter so we didn't care for much more than the rocks being thrown at us, but it's getting close to spring so we broke the siege and were sending around some hunting parties to grab up fresh meat and barter with the local caravans only to find half an army of bandits and you, so now we're back in a siege but this time sneaky fuckers are trying to dig and climb their way in so here we are.”
