Madness and selfishness easily coincide

Ira couldn’t understand why Sitri had done what he had, why he had taken the abuse but then again though they were something of kindred spirits their situations were on opposite scales of one another. Both had known horrible things but Sitri’s life had been utter shit until he had broken free whereas Jinx had been the best thing to ever happen to Ira. It wasn’t easy for Ira to forget the massacre he had watched from the deep shadows, the rancid and putrid scent of blood and open bodies and then, later, the sweet scent of decay that hung like a veil over the Red Keep. He had been extremely young when Tark had scooped him up elderly and covered in blood as he had been and had carried him to the Teekon Wilds, but Ira could not forget those images no matter how many times he had attempted to burn them from his brain. They were always there in some closely guarded, abysmal corner of Ira’s brain. Sitri had been a slave and Ira would rather die then become anyone’s bitch. Was life preservation really so important that it justified doing horrible things to innocents? Ira’s moral compass was a broken thing, yes, but he believed feverishly in justice and protection of the innocent. It was, perhaps, one of the few good things that proved he had something of a heart even if it was black with rot (maybe like his soul).

For a brief moment horror showed on the Prince’s face before he carefully composed it back to a haughty mask. He had been joking when he had said about her eating children and there Sitri was confirming it. If Sitri had felt any shame for it, it had been lost on Ira who was torn between feeling disgust for Sitri and some kind of twisted fondness. “How could you justify doing those things to innocents? Was the preservation of your life really so much more important? I get that she probably would have found someone else to do her bidding but at least it wouldn’t have been on your conscious. Unless you tried to help them,” But it didn’t sound like that was the case to Ira. Silvered irises hardened and his pupils narrowed harshly within the crystalline flecked metal pools. He sighed then, realizing that it was probably utterly useless. Sitri had done what he had done and there was no taking it back, and he couldn’t make the male repent for his actions even though the virtuous things that writhed alongside the deadly sins inside the Prince demanded for it.

Ira did not dominate Sitri with the intention of making him a slave, or abusing him. He dominated him because he was the Prince and Ira didn’t like being treated like the child he still was; because he would defend Jinx for his life and if anyone was wavering on their loyalty to her he would kill them. And not with his teeth and claws, oh no. He would use his poisons, subtle, deadly and silent. Sitri, had seemed to forget who he owed his loyalty too and it was that, more than anything else, that had caused the Prince to lung and dominate. “Your loyalty to Jinx wavered for a moment there, my friend,” The Prince explained though he didn’t care. If Sitri chose to attack Ira would use his agility against the bulk that was Sitri and hope to lead him down the treacherous paths that might cause the massive creature to tumble to his death. As it were, they were not friends — Ira didn’t have friends — for a moment, with his back against the outcropping he stared Sitri down, cautious and then smiled as if it had never happened, and turned his back only to leap back onto the outcropping of rock he had been on previously, claws digging into the rock surface as his hind legs scraped against it trying to find purchase for a few seconds, the sharp rocks digging into his armpits (if wolves have those) before he pushed himself up and lounged back down on his rock; because walking around and finding the path would be way too long.

“So tell me, how did you meet Jinx?” Ira wasn’t sure how Sitri came to be apart of their little band, he only knew that Sitri, like Ira and Lecter (and maybe one or two others) had been there since the beginning.