Lion Head Mesa puppy

his weakness was a boon to the desert people.

drusk became food-driven to the extreme, so when he was occasionally free of the pit, he was both too withered and too exhausted to fight back, and highly motivated by morsels of food and the calm, pleasing tone of praise.

in this way the boy raised among slavers, once free, became a sort of pet of the palace.

escorted for longer periods, on walks in the courtyard or upon patrol routes; and he learned these angles, these paths and scents, but he did not fight. drusk was not brought inside the palace and for good reason - he could not be trusted, despite all the work done to turn his spirit.

a heavy collar of braided red reeds and sinew had become snared around his throat.

she'd only stolen glimpses of drusk the moments he was allowed to walk free. she'd watched as the beast that writhed to climb the pit had shriveled upon himself. starved of food, water, and love.

the new collar is the first thing that caught her sights as she took a glimpse at him from down the hall. how had he taken to his lessons with Pharoah? she is going to test it today.
good morning.. racharra approaches, but halts just before she could get any closer. have you greeted Ra yet?

he had come to learn that Ra was like the desert people's Great Stallion; that this was an entity they wholly believed watched them from the sky. he did not know the details, his lessons were not yet so complex, but this was one of the topics recently introduced to him.

he rumbled a low note as he contemplated, and the fellahin minding him in this moment gave a tug to his collar, a nip to his cheek. he was beneath even the lowly servants and this particular fellahin was enjoying the power.

no, not. he grumbled.

so he had heard of Ra, and understood what she'd meant by greeting. his lessons proved to be a success, but he's had no choice but to learn. the lessons would only show once the chains were off of him. speaking of.

her eyes sharpen into daggers, pricking the fellahin with her disapproval alone.
i will take him from here. and she leaves no other choice in the matter when racharra takes the leash. she loops the strap around a wrist, and offers a gentle smile.
let's go greet Him, then.

the little ones, those coyote servants, were puny things that often fascinated drusk, because he entertained plots of their demise for having collared him.

how easy it would be to get them alone and placated, so he could tear their limbs off like a child finding a spider on a walk. the beating he also imagined for such a moment was not a good trade, and that stayed his teeth.

then the reins were handed to the Tiger.

his imagination was all he had left; it ran rampant to other sordid sins, tastes that he could only imagine, satisfactions; maybe she would be worth it, he thought. maybe he could lose his life for that.

yet he followed without a word; gone with her now to welcome this Ra, as if there was any meaning to the dawn.

she glances back towards him on occasion, curiosity getting the best of her. what did he think of everything? he was probably miserable, but so was she when she first arrived. her pace is kept slow to avoid tugging — but he was still a beast. worst yet, he could be an ogre. he certainly looked the part, whenever she looked at him at an angle.

and when the sun hits, when both step into Ra's light to greet him, racharra can see it. perhaps if she'd made herself smaller, she could see even more of it. more of her, in him. her gaze rips away from him, and she musters her next words even as the lake sits in the corner of her eyes.

the people of the mountain had their beliefs too. not in the sun, like this palace in the desert. their superstitions were somehow far more commonplace — but still odd to drusk, who had found ways to thwart their more bestial laws, and find a kindship with that harsh reality. he wondered if he could do the same here, except it was hard to fathom a god who lived in the sky, who had no true form; and beyond that, the desert people held many gods at their hearth.

drusk was learning every day that this sun god was not the only one, but he was some sort of king.

the woman, the Tiger, was silent; and so was he.

the silence only draws out the distance between the pair. when she looks at him, she can see it so clearly. perhaps in a different world, they could've shared their woes over noble duties being such a pain, and traveled together to moontide. perhaps shared in the pain of being left behind. 

selfishly, she hoped for a world where the weight of everything didn't fall all on her shoulders — never realizing she already lived in it.

who is your family? she finally asks, wondering how far he has gotten in his lessons.