Luneshale Pass oro

soto’s copper penny’s gone. sangre’s scarce too.

soto ranges. he’s managed to find a stale wisp of arslan along the bajada, but it fades over a belt of shale.

his lone eye maps the open wasteland as he settles into careful thought.

rawboned and spindly now, what winter coat the boy might have grown hung loose like an oversized coat.

the bones of a mouse spun in his mouth as if he were tying a knot with a cherry stem. they offered no more nutrients, but the marrow was still appetizing enough to ward off the pains of hunger.

and so the little sparrow pressed onward, unaware of the one-eyed vulture who lingered ahead.

tysm for joining o:

 

movement and sound alert soto he’s got company. 

a starveling carrying a face strangely familiar. 

something held in his mouth. 

soto turns to the boy with tail up, goldcoin eye glittering. quién eres? he sifts out the scents on the boy’s pelt. 

nothing. just dust and desert, and the faint hollowness of hunger.

there is a shift of movement, and sparrow stiffens with a cobra's glare. he slunk forward, aiming to slither past the man without any intention of conversion.

but the stranger speaks, and all sense of caution flees from the boy at the sound of his mama's tongue.

he spun to look upon the stranger with the same hopefully familiarity he might offer his lost family. mouse bones are clumsily spat to the floor.

"hablas igual que yo?"

he doesn’t expect conversation from the boy. half the wolves in this side of the world have left him with a poor impression of their intelligence. 

his brow rises as the boy speaks and in that moment soto is made aware of how homesick he’d become. 

si. he answers as the bones tumble into the grey sand. he reaches and sniffs the boy’s fur again. no sign of company - no risk of rifling in some other gang’s business. it could all be a ruse, but hope cannot be artifice; the boy’s sorrel gaze is aflame in it. 

and so, he states again: quién eres?

the stranger confirmed what sparrow had internally pleaded for, and a breath of relief is exhaled. relief for what he did not know, but there was a great sense of comfort found in hearing the language of his family once more.

the question is again asked of him, and this time the boy digested it fully. "soy sparrow," he answered while looking to the man for any trace of familial recognition.

he finds none, but had little expectation to. "y tú eres?"

burning in that singular eye is a dare: i dare you to one of my enemies - one of the thousand sent by the many-faced syndicates at home.

but the boy is too poorly, and his expression too earnest.

seconds pass as soto mulls his answer. the name is unknown to him, and he certainly does not look like the hard-faced boys from back home.

soto. he relents, unwinding in the reluctant manner of an asp forced to move from its golden pool of sunlight on the trail. adonde vas?

soto. a name he does not know.

what scrutiny might have come from the man was not picked up on by the boy. another question came, and to this one sparrow sunk some.

it forced him to swallow a hard truth he'd been avoiding thus far.

"no sé," he revealed with a shrug. "no tengo a donde ir." he'd been wandering wherever his stomach had taken him, and even that had forsaken him to sand and ruin.

the wary side of soto reminds himself that any unknown is an enemy; he is the rabbit, and the world a stage of predators. enemies come from every side, of every fang, beak, and talon -- this could very well be the expert plot of the wildlings north.

but the boy does not carry their scent, and no mark of khusobek lingers on him. that he spoke soto's tongue was no consolation -- he recalled nino's last moments had been insulted by the stilted speech of the wildling band's seeming leader. soto had not stopped to listen.

this boy's words were mellifluous enough. he drags a wary gaze back over him, as if expecting khusobek's ropes to spring out from under his mercury pelt any moment.

finally, he decides. spitting into the sand, soto speaks. venga conmigo.