Swiftcurrent Creek rasputin

set directly after this thread... for @Muskrat. PP permission given by ebony so we can keep this going and up to date. <3

It hadn’t taken much longer—the weight of him on top of the she-wolf had vanquished the air from her—her grip falling from his daughter before she had gone limp. Concerned, he had looked over Mae’s wounds, asserting she patch herself up before the wound festered to infection. Whether she sought Arric, Arlette or even Reverie, he didn’t care—simply that she look after herself.

It left him to look after the intruder. His gaze was hardened on her—clearly, a creature starving—but he didn’t have much pity in return. Empathy, maybe. But it still wouldn’t gain his sympathy.

He was tempted to yeet her in the creek and let it do the heavy lifting for him—it had worked in the past, had it not?

But no—instead, he gripped her ruff to partly lift her and began to pull—literally escorting her to the outside of his borders where he would unceremoniously drop her back down to the ground.

the strike of her body against the ground somehow jolted muskrat to wakefulness.

pain poured through her entire body. she moaned, drinking in air and refusing yet to open her eyes as agony clubbed through her senses.

slowly it came back to her; the pack, the food, the girl, the man.

the man.

dimly muskrat registered the warrior, keeping motionless as her senses returned. she was no longer where she had been, the ground tasting less of the creek wolves here.

she made no sound and kept her gaze shut.

She released the faintest moan. He tipped his head, gaze raking over her--stalling where blood was beginning to coagulate from his initial attack.

Her eyes remained closed. The corner of his lips tipped up sinisterly. Trying to pretend that if you don't see me, I'm not really here?

He didn't trust her. As such, he shifted his weight, muzzle swinging lower to protect his throat. Do you often take what's not yours?

he spoke, and her eyes opened to yellow slits. he had the face of a shadowcat, his own stare hard. he had seen fighting, muskrat could spot it in the way he held his shoulders, the poised muscles of his forearms.

they were not like her. his words were bulky, tactless. "kunanchu wañuchiwanki, tuta runa?" muskrat asked in a quiet, measured voice as she took in the planes of his face, memorizing her enemy.

she had picked up a few of their ugly words, but why did he need to know that?

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Whether she understood him or not remained a mystery to him. The foreign words drew his ire with a furrowed brow and a rakish snarl, teeth baring for a moment. He didn’t trust she wouldn’t lunge once more—his own anger simmering in the background as he half circled her, rumbling his discontent.

Break her neck? Seemed harsh sentence for a thief of a cache—force her to vomit up what she stole?

Satisfying. But a tad dark, maybe.

Make her stay, and repay what she had stolen? It wouldn’t be worth the effort of having to keep her in line and under a watchful gaze. They were limited in numbers as it were, and his efforts were invested elsewhere—wherever Viinturuth might be, while scouting out for the man who had taken Mae’s eyesight.

“Leave,” he hissed. “Don’t let me catch you in this fucking valley again.”

muskrat hurt, biting the inside of her cheek to keep from making more noise as he stalked closer, circled her. she did not fear the man, for if he had wanted to kill her, he would have done it while his teeth loomed behind her skull. 

why did he not kill her? muskrat's belly was full, the only consolation in a skin of hurt; she would have gladly taken the fullness into death.

he spoke and the harsh lemon eyes flashed with insult. carefully, both to avoid inviting his wrath and to tend her aching body, muskrat sat up.

"you give insult to awqalli. i swamp panther. i fight." a paw raised to touch the thin ridge of ragged pink scar. "i kill." muskrat glared at the man. "you capture awqalli, you keep until repay."

to be sent out into the world injured was not the reason for offense. muskrat had borne her pain and kept herself alive. it was in his refusal to see her own quick prowess that she was insulted. her tribe kept those they defeated in battle for six journeys of the moon. sometimes an enemy warrior, no longer an enemy after half a year, stayed among muskrat's people. but while there, they were expected to do the hardest labor and the most dangerous hunting.

but these were not her people. he was not. muskrat lifted to her feet now, the worthless hind dangling, and took a strong step away from the warrior, though her eyes did not leave him. the rudeness of the man and the rejection of their dance as fighters, it could be left behind if he truly meant to let her leave.

She stood—a glare on her features. There was nothing delicate about her—a fierce stubbornness that emanated from her. Had she not just noshed on his daughter’s ear, he might have found her more endearing.

Instead, the lift of her paw to her scar reminded him the stamp of a child, and he snapped toward her, centimeters before her, a snarl reverberating in his chest.

“The fuck can awqalli do for us?” A challenge, he stood before her—lashing tail, teeth that practically ached to render her flesh. “I kill, too. So the fuck, would you do for us after coming into my land and harming my own?”

he wanted her as a warrior? that was unheard of; she expected to have her other leg broken. the flash of the night man's teeth brought no flinch nor blink.

again, had he wanted to kill her, she would be dead. what then was the purpose of keeping her alive? "not awqalli now," muskrat pointed out with a flare of condescension and even more resignation to the fate as of yet unknown.

she grinned up at him with her fierce citrus eyes. "you kill me, tuta runa?" a pitiful kill for a warrior such as him, but muskrat did not retreat. she would not submit to his murder but she would not flee.

she wanted to know what he wanted.

It was obvious there was a miscommunication with their words—his first assumption was that she had spoken either her name, or native tongue for warrior—now, as she seethed, he was unsure.

He couldn’t even try to clarify—for now she grinned up at him—manical in a sense—asking him if he would kill her. Didn’t she think he would have done so had that been his intention? “For two day old rabbit?” He sneered—she was certainly working hard at changing his mind about setting her free with only a warning. “I told you to leave.”

"for insult! muskrat take, hm? eat. never give back. now you have muskrat, hm? awqalli of swamp panther tribe." she jerked her chin scornfully toward the world into which he wanted to send her. "now you give me rude word. send away. not kind," she told him, and then her face smoothed into resignation.

muskrat sat down then.

"kill me or keep as slave." a hard slim shoulder lifted in a shrug. "i lose. earn back in blood or work." there was none in being cast out. survival could be had at the price of honor. muskrat would not pay it. a warrior captured belonged to the one who had triumphed. you did not wound and send away. kill or keep. this was known in all places! what sort of land did she find herself in?

….Not my circus, not my monkeys… Not my circus, not my moneys… Not my circus, not my monkeys…

Why was she trying so hard to stay in his circus and be his monkey?

He could feel his anger ebbing—giving way to frustration and exhaustion. A paw lifted, swiping across his brow—his eyes still burning toward her as she sat down in front of him—telling him just how it was, as if this was the most obvious arrangement set before him.

Apparently, it was unkind of him to send her away and not kill her.

How absolutely distasteful of him.

He groaned quietly—tempted to simply call Arlette or Arric—anyone with more patience than him. Except there was no way he was letting this she-wolf near their pregnant healer.

“We don’t take slaves,” he replied—trying hard not to grit his teeth. He stood taller then, stern countenance on his features—a rumble in his chest. “Go home to your swamp, little panther.” His eyes drifted over her—to the nape he had bit so fiercely upon. “You’ve paid your blood.”

stupid! her fierce yellow eyes watched the warrior. he was made of hard black stone, but he was tired. of her? of what? weary? enraged? she tried to know in the spare moments she was given.

again a rejection. a fool! muskrat felt the keen cutting edge of his insult to her own prowess, and seethed with ire. he saw her as something to be pitied, released. not a threat. it was in the way he spoke to her, and it incensed muskrat.

little; the proud head tilted. they needed no clan to inflict massive wounds, and for this reason were they called panthers.

"then i go, tuta runa." it boiled her belly to give in, to act as if the bit of flesh he had torn was repayment for what she had eaten and the blood she had shed. fool! this was weakness. you killed or kept to stop that warrior from returning to their people, from saying 'ah! here is a place without teeth!'

but maybe he did not care. muskrat took a limping step backward, and then another, reluctance clear in the tightness of her jaw, and hatred beginning its sordid curl in her belly. nothing else had lived there since cloud singer's murder, but now she had a new reason to burn.

She seethed at him—proud, defiant—practically in far over her head in what could be culture shock—and he glowered back at her. She took a step away—another. New moon eyes cast upon him, all but spitting upon him in her ire, and he felt the curl of his lip.

Tuta runa, she called him, once more.

Asshole, maybe? Probably.

“You don’t have anywhere to go, do you little panther,” he murmured, allowing himself reprieve by taking a seat as his eyes roved across her—such a small thing, and yet the most fiery he had come across.

muskrat did not give back the distance she had placed between them. "your mouth, your eyes. say 'little' mean weak.'" the hard lemon quartz of her own stare had not moved.

"i make raid. fill belly. wound warrior. i not need you to live." she lifted the hindpaw still hanging broken, its agony fierce along her hip but telegraphed no other place. "muskrat live many days before making raid," she said proudly. "i stay for qaqch'a. you say honor."

now. did he understand? or would she need only to leave at this time?

A scoff. “Oh, there’s nothing weak about you,” he returned, features grim.

She dangled a leg—boasting of a raid to fill her belly—and then speaking of honor. “There’s no honor in stealing food,” he snorts, his gaze darkening upon her. “You stay and pay back what you’ve taken? Fine. You see our healer, first.” A pause. “You'll be ranked Omega. The lowest of the pack.”

the yellow eyes glinted in recognition, followed by a low exhale of annoyance. but not for her new rank. "no honor to lose. i lose, i pay. yes." the food had been her reward for breaching not only his borders but cutting flesh on another fighter.

too wearied to waste more time on explanations, muskrat listened silently to his explanation that she would be lowest. was that not the place of a slave? why did he use many words to say one? the offer of a healer surprised her, but then again, it should not. his care was an investment.

"name of land? yours?" muskrat asked. if he would not have her as a slave, then she did not expect to be struck nor that he would eventually want to join with her. this low ranking then, perhaps meant nothing in terms of the harshness she had expected.

tag for reference.

“Mine. Swiftcurrent Creek,” he murmured, a tilt of his head to the direction of the prominent rushing waters to which dominated much of their land. Then, a lifted paw to his chest. “Akavir.”

But this was not where the conversation would end—he stalked forward—brusque, considerate. “Cause trouble and I will finish what I started. Do not make me regret this decision.”

And with pups on the way—another hunter was either for the best… or she would prove to be far more trouble than she was worth.

“Find @Arlette. She will look at your leg. You even look at her wrong… I’ll end you.”

ah-ka-veer. hmph. she did not even attempt the combination of other words, looking at the deluge of whitewater and decided, defiantly, that to her it would be utqay mayu as long as she was here.

the warrior threatened her again. muskrat gave a sharp nod, but otherwise silently limped where she could be seen, amused that he now saw her worth.

but it would be dishonorable to attack anyone here. she had been caught. she had been captured. she had been spared. now she would serve.

Just a wrap up post. PP with those tagged, but can change if needed!

A nod given and she limped away—his eyes hard upon her retreating form. Only when she was gone from his sight did he begin to trail after—at a distance—to ensure nothing went awry for now. He would then check in with @Arric to let them know of this run-on and their newest… He wouldn’t call her a recruit. He didn’t know.

And then he would go to check on @Mae—to ensure she was okay after the entire ordeal.