For Lecter. :) I had Bazi follow the smell - I hope that's OK.
No sooner had her new leaders departed than Bazi faced a new problem. Following the scent of blood was all well and good with a functioning nose, but Bazi's was still significantly impaired from whatever event had caused her black-out. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine the scent. Fresh blood smelled metallic, and.. warm? The yearling shook slaver from her jaws; she hadn't been able to distinguish hunger from fear until now.
What about old blood? Musty, less metallic, and a bit ...
off. Unless Lecter was a walking carcass, this was going to take all night - no wolf could smell so acutely of old blood that they were instantly traceable.
He must double as a cache manager, Bazi decided. That was the most logical explanation - it wasn't the actual medic that smelled, but his job, and all she had to do was locate the winter cache and wait there. Satisfied with this explanation, Bazi padded into the heart of the creek, senses working hard to pick out the scent of pack mates in the darkness.
But she didn't find any caches. Only a long, winding scent trail that even her crippled nose could not miss, and it smelled strangely like walking death.
lecter's fave cologne is eau de zombie. and that's totally fine <3
Since his altercation with the brawny male on the edge of the Vale, the pale shaman had kept to himself. Coupled with the wounds he had received that day, the agonies that clutched his heart in hot talons had not lessened; the remembrance of Jinx entwined with the dark male.
He would not go to her again, Lecter had decided in a fit of anger. If she no longer wished for him, in the same way that she had been so quick to sacrifice his children to Sos, then he would not press her to love him any longer.
Hunger gnawed at his belly and eventually forced the old witch out of seclusion, toward a nearby cache. Unbeknownst to him, a young wolf followed his trail in the opposite direction, and icewater eyes alighted on a lithe form in the darkness. Halting, Lecter growled a warning, unwilling to entertain unwanted company at this point in time.
The growl stopped Bazi dead in her tracks, lower her tail and ears submissively. She had almost forgotten that it was a wolf she was tracking, and didn't clock that the intensifying smell of decay meant that Lecter was near. "Wait -" she blurted out, "You're the medic." Or voodoo high priest - she wasn't sure. "Fox sent me to get checked out." There was a whiff of chemically treated air about her that didn't belong in the natural world, but the shakes and stiffness had gone completely. She felt fit as a fiddle (if slightly hungry), and hoped Lecter wouldn't be in the mood to diagnose her with Filthy Foreigner Plague.
She was small, plush, pale. Lecter narrowed his eyes at her; a wolf he could ignore, a wolf sent by his leader he could not. Nares flared as he stepped forward, pushing brazenly into her personal space, and took her scent. It was overlaid with that of Fox and the Creek, but still held a vaguely unnatural tang. "Why did she send you to me?" the witch demanded; there was a reason that the small red wolfess had not merely accepted the young creature.
Awaiting her reply, Lecter felt pain race through his lacerated shoulder, but did not stand down; he would not appear weak in front of a solitary soul, let alone a new mouth to feed.
Bazi held her breath and waited. She caught glimpse of a fresh injury, partially disguised by the strange doctor's crusty robes, and wondered silently how he had come about it. He was older than her - 7, maybe 8, it was hard to judge the natural state of his coat - and glared at everything through cold, grey eyes. There was no welcome, no introduction, and no hint of kindness in his question - Bazi instantly had him pigeon-holed as a gruff, mean, dismissive old man, and yet she felt much less afraid of him than Jinx. The surly beta seemed volatile, somehow, whereas this wolf - who might not look half bad after a bath, actually - was at least consistently insane.
"I was knocked on the head," she told him, twisting the truth - she had no concept of what it meant to be sedated, and figured the effects were the same, "And when they found me - the alpha and an angry white female - I was just waking up. I wasn't walking right, and they thought I might be sick." The fact that she and her entire family had been very sick a few months prior was technically not relevant to the question.
Her story was non-linear and therefore hard to follow, but Lecter listened all the same, jaw tensing at the mention of an 'angry white female.' Only one wolf inhabiting the Creek fit the description; he remembered her name through a hazy mixture of rage and desire. The witch's eyes narrowed, and he returned to the present.
"You have an odd scent, but I do not smell sickness on you. Avoid red meat for four days, if you can help it, bathe in the sea, and eat fish. The salt and the flesh of sea creatures will draw any lingering illness from your body. If you feel you must vomit, do not fight it." Lecter could not explain what expelling food and bile from the stomach did to benefit a creature, but he sensed all the same that it was necessary for healing.
Bazi nodded slowly. She had limited experience it healing, which had always been practiced behind closed doors and never on her, but the coherence with which her suggested treatment was delivered made her trust it. "And.. where is the sea?" the yearling asked meekly, grasping at any opportunity to prolong their interaction. She had seen the doctor's expression tighten, and took it for growing impatience to get away.
“”
Lecter could sense the young one's apprehension, and it pleased him, softening his icy countenance toward her. It was apparent that she was young, and perhaps had not yet ventured far; perhaps he should have offered to take her there, but obligations bound him to the Creek presently. Add to that the fact that the youngling would need to travel at some point, and Lecter's brief spate of pity abated.
“ It is the walk of a day and a half to the west. One day, if you make haste.” Icewater eyes appraised the girl, to see what she might say.
Shall we wrap up? :) Can't wait to follow the Silvertip Mountain pack formation.
Bazi was too disoriented to correctly identify west, and didn't want to shame herself by guessing incorrectly. She watched Lecter for a moment, hoping he would say something else, but the doctor just regarded her with an expression that she could not read. The thought of beginning a long journey after so much trauma made bile rise in the back of the youngster's throat, and she dismissed the idea in favour of a solid night's rest and a pre-dawn start.
"I'll go at first light," she promised, and dipping her head in thanks. With her head bowed, she stole a few looks at Lecter's dank, crusty coat. Though he hadn't said an ill word to her, she struggled hard not to judge him for his peculiarity - were there health benefits? Was he just a bit unkempt? Or was there some kind of insanity behind his choice to stink? The newcomer dared not ask out loud - not yet. She lingered for a moment longer, said a stilted
"Thank you" and backed away into the darkness with many burning questions unanswered.
of course! i'll archive <3 let's have another sometime :)
Lecter grunted, dipping his head in a nod at her planning. Nothing more was said; icewater eyes watched the young wolf slip off into the gloom, before he lost interest and continued his deliberate search for a cache that would sustain him until he was able to do so for himself.
/sneaks another post in :)
Bazi turned her head for one final look, but the witch-doctor had already evaporated into the darkness. She wondered what he was up to, prowling around in the dead of night - probably something incredibly mundane, but the youngster's imagination filled the blanks in with more sinister activities. The thoughts made her shiver.
But there were more pressing concerns to deal with. First light was not for another few hours, and she was in desperate need of both food and sleep.