Lion Head Mesa and not just the muse

Hope you don’t mind! Aqui is plotting in his own way so I’d figure he’d have some questions!

The call rang high through the Mesa.

The Jodai was gone. The blood would spill in his wake. A debt, yet to be collected.

Aquillius hadn’t been sleeping since he had seen the witch. Monotony overtook his days as he worked himself to the bone, regaining muscle as he did. At night, his dreams drove him awake like a cacophony of trumpets, leaving him drawn and wane in his pelt nest, staring at the wall for hours without knowing if sleep would spare him or torment him more.

He imagined the knife. The blood upon the floor. His unconscious mind tortured him with visuals of it, of his teeth shearing through fur and muscle and sinew so akin to his own. Ripping to the bone with no mercy, only rage. He saw into dandelion eyes, going glassy with bloodloss, going cold with betrayal, looking at the treacherous mirror image of a son his father had produced. 

Oh Brutus! the choir in his head wailed, tearing out hair and strips of fabric Brutus what have you done!

So, he did not sleep.

The call that rang through the mesa woke him from a daze, but that was not sleep. He blinked, almost owlishly. Was this an opportunity?

brutus Brutus no Brutus! The choir howled. He ignored them, striking aimlessly at the rocks behind him with a back leg, then seeking out a servant to take him to @Makono .

He would linger by the door until announced and called in, then enter.

Pharoah. Measured, respectful, unsure, a thousand emotions and yet none at all. Aquillius didn’t even twitch.

she had become a statue in the hours that followed. sat rigidly upon the throne, unmoving with tall ears. as if she expected a summon from the mazoi. that somehow, someway, someone had returned with his head.

that she would see him one last time before she tossed his useless body into the serpent lake. let him be useful in death where he had failed in life.

mazoi, she rumbled in a deep voice that lacked any warmth. a report?

her brow quirked only the slightest bit as she set her gaze heavy upon him.

Aquillius saw in this woman before him the stone and steel of a soldier.

The stone mask lightened, just a bit.

Nothing you wouldn’t already know. There was no need to grovel and make useless frivolities about the situation. 

His eye was keen upon her.

Is the traitor a danger to us? Do you believe him to wish revenge? He asked after a moment.

Do you require a hunter to chase him?

"Nothing you wouldn’t already know."

her lips split only for a moment, a brief smile that bordered a grimace. at least one mazoi did not think her a fool, hm?

i believe him a danger to all. who is to say where he might find his revenge upon us? he had learned and seen plenty of akashingo. for the first time, she wished the man had stayed mute.

and he has threatened any hunters sent after him, that is revenge in and of itself. are you prepared to face such a threat?

He thought of her words, for just a moment.

Then, he spoke.

No. It was simple honesty.

He has the advantage over me in size and power. He may also gain allies. I will not bluster and pretend I can take him. He would need to be several inches taller and packed with muscle for that.

He may try to find friends and allies in other packs. I am confident in my training, but not so confident as to question that. He knew what a military minded man would do.

I can act as a runner, to warn those who may work with him. But I do not know if I could take him on.

she stood now. tall, rigid, thoughtful.

the young man that had come to her was the blood of his father, whether he liked it or not. a tactician, a guardian, a warrior. she feasted upon this.

i will send you to the west. to roam along the mountainside woodlands and warn each place you come upon, and in this form a bond with them if they do not know this.

now she looked to gauge his reaction, to see if he had other ideas in this tactician mind he carried — or if he would bow to pharaoh.

She would send him west.

Had he the ability, he would have saluted to her. But that would have looked eternally silly to do, so all he did was bow, deep.

I shall do this. He stood, fixing the woman with his single eye.

Should he or his allies find me on the way, I do not expect to live. Blunt, perhaps, but that was the way of things.

If I do not return, consider me dead. And know, it has been an honor to serve, Pharaoh. He turned on a heel, and began for the door.

fade? <3 ;;

do not die she wished to say.

and yet she found she lacked the compassion suddenly. if everybody wished to think her some barbaric king meant to only steal treasures and worry of her own flesh, then let them. let men walk into death for her if it proved a point.

travel swift.

and she turned to pace off towards a shelf of collected things.

Fade!! Thank u for playing with these emotionally repressed babies with me

Travel swift.

The words floated into his ears from behind him, and they were acknowledged with a crisp nod from the doorway. Then, he marched away.

He would return to his quarters for only a second. To gather the pelts and gently lay them outside the door for a fellahin to take, as he did not know if he would be back.

Ever, really. Aquillius knew what he was doing, at the end of it all. This could be suicide.

He would be seen only an hour or so later, galloping out of the Mesa towards the west, swift as the wind.