Lion Head Mesa peach pit

He's been a prisoner for a while by this point, but I'll be really vague!

A pit had been found outside of the palace, then dug out even further, before he was tossed inside. The walls were steep enough to keep him trapped; he learned this early on, but each night Drusk would struggle against those walls and try to scale them. This effectively made this natural jail cell deeper, or a little wider, but would not lead to resolution.

He was exhausted and, admittedly, afraid. The boy was filthy too; there were carcasses from his meals littering the pit, and a plinth had been structured along one edge for viewings and interrogations, which he refused to participate in.

For now, he paced. It was midday, the sun was beaming and he was openly panting. He sought the small lip of shadow cast by the stone edge to try and keep the sun from his face at the very least.

also keeping things vague!!

the scent of a stranger stuck out most prominently to racharra since her return. and the massive hole dug out was hard to miss. hypersensitive to the clicking of her nails, each step is careful as the nebet peers over the ledge of the pit. her neck cranes just enough to look at the figure nearly swallowed by the darkness. racharra only scoffs.

the fool hasn't realized that by rejecting Ra's embrace he is only increasing the likelyhood of being buried in the newly made prison just for him.

Sometimes he had visitors.

Often there were questions and demands posed to him, which was a highlight to the boy's days, despite not knowing the words spoken. It was entertainment enough to keep his mind from rotting; the frustration of his captors was obvious.

This time, there was someone there but they held their tongue. Drusk felt empowered in the silence which he was so accustomed to, and rumbled from the shadow, Chakat shekh-jano? ha nakhaan mithrat..

A very low, drawling laughter crackles from the dark for a few heartbeats, then silence resumes. It is slow, heavy, and almost draconian.

he speaks a tongue lost on racharra's ears, but its the cocky laughter that slips out of him that furrows her brow.

it took a moment after the imprisoned stranger's gibberish for the dark girl to find her words. quite proud of the trouble you've caused, are you?
her voice remains poised and steady in the face of what she could only assume is a boast. the light outlines her figure, but the shadows that downcast nearly engulf her  visage. all that remains are golden crescents, judging silently from the safety of the ledge.

when she'd first noticed the ruddied features, she nearly had a heartattack, thinking it was somehow the ogress. it took a moment for reason to return, and the boy's voice, for her to realize it wasn't. but something about the scent was familiar. something about it returned her to the days by the lake. what that something was remains in the air, dancing along with the dust motes that tease racharra.

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A cool remark passes from the girl, slips serpentine within one ear and out the other to a chorus of further laughter.

If she recognized him in some way, he did not realize. Nothing about the girl was reminiscent to Drusk—so far removed from the lake and any memory of a home.

He took the way she watched from her vantage point as incentive to keep talking.

Tihilat venat mezahhe? His tone is harsh and goading, even if she does not understand the lewd suggestion of the language there is an aura of that boyish depravity in his voice. What is the worst he can say? What might she intuit?

Ohharat hilekat rhaek, memat qahlan! This time he did not laugh, but his expression grew toothy and caught the sunlight as he peered against it, his pupils narrowing against the harsh sun—daffodil yellow irises overwhelming the dark of his face.

she's being made a mockery of.

in what way, she couldn't tell, but it stung all the same. and for no reason too; what does she care what this boy, so stupid to be intentionally egging on his captors, thinks of her?
he is unlike all of the other boys his age that she has met — boisterous and crude, an attitude so reviled racharra's surprised he's been kept for as long as he has.

she wouldn't stand for this, but she wasn't about to climb down into hell's pit either. after two brief glances — to the left, to the right — racharra spits into the hole. unsightly for a lady, but she wouldn't stand to be disrespected by the prisoner.

ogre.

Oh? Maybe there was some understanding after all. The girl recoiled from the edge of the pit and Drusk did as well, sheltering in the shade again—barely missing her spit as it arched at him.

Mezhah! He croaked up at her, sliding his tongue over his teeth suggestively.

But, the boy quieted down. It wasn't his first time being spat-on, nor his first time as a prisoner. He would find a way out and when he did, he would hold true to his promise.

In the quiet that remained Drusk settled against the earth, laying in the scant shade provided. He glared up at the girl.

Zalat?

anything she does, says, seems to just get the boy to prattle. racharra slouches, and wonders if it's worth even trying to spit just in hopes of it landing on him.

her neck cranes once more in a slight tilt before sighing and shaking her head.
..i don't even know what you're saying. before plummeting to her belly.

do you understand me? a futile question, her head leans over the hole just enough to steal a closer look. he's the first boy who's stature matches hers. shame that it's inhabited by such a putrid soul.

As she descends, he rises. He becomes like a pantherine figure prowling as quickly as he can to the wall beneath where she was standing; his muscles tense, and he leaps with a scramble of claws against the wall so he is propped on his hind legs.

When she peers over at him he is there—closer but not within reach of her. Big yellow whale-eye and clattering teeth as he snaps for her.

He's a big boy; at least as big as she is, oddly. The sun ignites the browns of his coat and shows the ruddy notes, the darker sables.

When he fails, he falls back and is standing at his full height on all-fours again, pacing, with the long summer furs along his shoulders jutting up and spiking. He snorts a few times, likely a result of inhaling the red dust of the pit.

a bad idea. she's quick to lift away from the edge as his canines threaten to snap at her. she bares her own, just momentarily as a warning.

one yelp from me and you're dead, fool. a snarl drips from her lips, and she tilts away from the ledge. crossing one hand over the other, she squints down at him. still by the edge, but still above him. it's on instinct that her tail raises high as he coughs on the red dust.

what is your name? a simple question for a simple man, racharra observes the beast scrambling beneath her with curiosity and disgust all the same.

He wheezes, but eventually his breathing evens out again and soon enough he is panting again. His tongue slides up and over his snout to try and generate saliva, which fails.

Striding to the wall again, he props a leg up and tries to urinate so that the stench of him floods the area—and this works, but also proves how weakened he is by dehydration.

The boy knows the phrase she utters, at least piecemeal. Gavrel had asked the same thing. Others too.

Rakhvazzo. He answers, snorting, dragging his heels through the thin line of piss he managed to produce. As he stalks towards the shadows he is facing away from the girl and mutters something else, hakelat Drusk evethiz-gache.

Doubtful that she would understand anything; but it was the first question he had actually answered from his captors, likely due to the distraction of his thirst.

eugh! what comes out of this man is as putrid as the rest of him, and racharra whacks a lump of sand to bury it or get him to stop. back up on her feet, in this flurry of shame, anger, disgust, and probably something else, racharra can just barely catch the next grunts of the brute.

his name is supposedly rakhvazzo, but a bell rings. it rings, and rings. in all the ringing, did she mishear? desperate, racharra returns to the ledge.

what was it? the other name? golden crescents become full suns, brighter than even the light behind her. racharra's voice lightens to where it becomes as airy and flighty like a feather caught in a breeze.

It takes a lot for Drusk to admit to suffering. His life is one of desperation, and he thought himself crafty enough to escape this pit, or strong enough to withstand his time in this jail; it is not the first time, he's determined it will not be the last.

However—it is possible that this time in the pit, this month in the desert with the sun shifting through spring and in to summer with the only fluid afforded to him coming in his little meals, he knows there is only so long before he will be too weak.

Perhaps it comes sooner than he would like.

All the goading, and the the lunge against the wall, has drained much of his energy; so when she drops sand across him he cannot move out of the way so quickly. When the air clears and he's glaring at her again, he sees an unexpected expression on her face.

She's not afraid, exactly. The boy cannot parse what it is. Rather than demand answers or threaten further, she asks softly.

The boy scowls. Drusk?

red sand parts, and she sees gold. the same gold that she sees before a lap of water. the same gold she saw glaring her down and the same gold she saw when she first greeted the world.

and guilt ripples throughout the nebet. it twists her face, contorts it into something foul. finally she breaks away from her unflinching gaze at the man who she realizes is her brother and yet she does not leap for joy.

i'm racharra. she squeezes out one more question. ..sister?

If she expected a bolt of understanding to strike him, it does not. Her words are not familiar except for their proximity to the language of mountains; he presumes she is trying to introduce herself, and Racharra holds a strange meaning in this tongue that he does know.

Curved Fang of the Watching Tiger.

He rumbles lowly as this translates in his head. When she says sister he hears sisi—thunder.

Who was this? Clearly she was not born of the mountains, but she looked proud enough to be the daughter of a horse lord. He studied her with what focus he could muster. Her body looked strong and healthy, and similar to his own (if he ever had consistent meals), but beyond that he saw nothing familiar.

He huffs, Rakhvazzo remekat. Oma qafat.

When she doesn't move, he bristles and spits, shouting up at her: Zisat azzafrok! Gwe! With nothing left to say to the girl, and no energy left to harass or patience either, Drusk stalks to the other side of the pit and focuses against the wall, flattening there.

he's unflinching. if anything, the playful mockery was gone. he coughs, barks at her, and retreats like a defeated dog.
and her head dips just slightly. she doesn't blame him; even if both were to shed blood, their ties would not be seen. only the gods could, and racharra isn't even sure they would care much for filth of the lake.

Ra is unkind in his judgement of her brother. the light highlights his ragged state, the shine of his teeth as he barks, the hurt in his eyes. for a moment, the dark girl leaves after a long hard look at what He presents to her. but she has an opportunity she must seize.

it takes a moment but something falls into the pit with a splat. the dust rises, obscuring what had joined drusk. the cloud settles again. fermented fruit and a chunk of meat lays unceremoniously. only the nebet's head peers over to the pit, just to make sure it had landed.