I DREW THING!
Okay, I'm always drawing things, but this one's a bigger piece. There's a story to go with it too! It can be read at my DeviantART over HERE, or, if you insist, if you scroll a bit down on this post.
Talos as well as the akarion specie belongs to thesublimecrime aka. Blinded or Yuroboros or that awesome akarion-person who's good at drawing feet. So does Nocarians, but Balder's only in the story, not in the picture. Kivic is mine. Yup. Enjoy.
Kivic looked at the slightly curled paper in her hands and made a grimace. The stall was rented, and she had used months upon months on crafting intricate belts and headbands that no-one among the common people could afford – nor wanted – to wear. And then her permission to be on the royal market had expired. A week before.
She knew that she’d be in trouble big time if she was caught selling on the royal marketplace without permission, but her money was tight, and she really couldn’t wait another month. She could cut down on food a little and sleep outside, no problem, but Bea and Balder …
Bea, the brown mutt, wagged her curly tail, and Balder tilted his enormous ears and looked at her with his brown eyes. She smiled and handed the Nocarian a treat, and then Bea also got one in the name of equality. The dog carefully approached the piece of dried meat, took it gently from Kivic’s scaly hand and gobbled it down.
“Good dog.” Kivic turned to her stall again.
It was impossible to get a permission less than a week before the market itself, and she had just used valuable time on placing everything neatly on the table.
No-one looked at the dates anyway.
She hung the permission on the side of the stall.
 Kivic handed over the braided belt and received the money, which she put in the bags that hung in Balder’s collar. With a wish for the customer to have a good day, she smiled. She had definitely had a good day. So good that the purse she had in her belt couldn’t carry all the money, but luckily Balder didn’t mind having the extra tied to his collar.
She moved one of the braided armbands to lie neatly after a woman had tried it on. They had been hugely popular, especially the ones with small iron pearls braided into them. There had even been interest in the collar that Bea wore around her neck. Kivic had gotten a lot of nice offers on it, but even though she’d love to sell it, for some reason the dog refused to wear anything else.
A loud bark, rasping and almost like a roar, pulled her out of her thoughts. She leaped down to grab the powerful leather leash and tugged Bea away.
“Oh my, I’m so sorry, she’s adopted from the street and afraid of …” Kivic’s dark eyes grew wide. “Their majesty,” she whispered. Then she got busy throwing herself on the dusty ground, still holding Bea’s leash tightly. Her heart thundered in her chest. She didn’t dare look up, yet almost couldn’t handle not to. What if he saw the outdated permission?
“I … see.” The voice was dry. Kivic bit her tongue. “You can stand up.”
Kivic slowly climbed to her feet. Her hands were fisted tightly around the leather leash. Bea sensed her emotions and began to growl deeply. Kivic forced herself to take a deep breath and pat the dog.
“Don’t worry, girl, it’s okay. No-one here wants to hurt you.” She didn’t look at the tensed dog, but she could feel the muscles under her skin, tight as rocks, and the brown body was vibrating slightly.
Prince Talos Rellkroth looked at the wares on Kivic’s table. He poked a braided armband with small bells and narrowed his eyes. “How did such a filthy merchant get on the royal market?” he said, loud enough for the people around him to hear it. They turned their heads to look at the table. Kivic’s cheeks grew red with shame, and she kept her eyes on the ground. The guard by Talos’s side was the only one to go unaffected.
The prince sent a look to the curled up market-permission and wrinkled his nose. “I really got to tell them to stop giving permissions out of pity.”
Kivic choked a gasp and quickly looked down again. Her hands clamped even tighter around the leash. How dared he!
Talos turned to leave, but stopped in the middle of the movement. The red, slender figure was still as a statue for a moment, and then he slowly turned back. Kivic stood as paralyzed, but his gaze didn’t stop at her. Rather, it continued down to rest at the filthy paper again.
Two long seconds lasted. The blue eyes under Talos’ red forehead grew narrow as the blade of a knife.
“I don’t think it is the fifth anymore.”
The worlds were slow. They had an almost sarcastic edge. For a moment, Kivic and the prince looked each other into the eyes, Kivic’s round and brown and scared, Talos’ as cold as steel.
“Guard.”
Everything went very fast. The guard was at Kivic’s side and grabbed her arm, and Kivic gasped in pain as it was turned around and held against her back. Then Bea was there, a whirlwind of teeth and fur and fury, and the guard grabbed their rapier. Kivic shouted and lashed out with her arm, and Bea stopped and turned away. The sharp weapon hit the edge of the stall and cut an armband in two. Balder began to howl in fear. Bea was ready to strike again. The guard shouted, and the owner of the neighboring stall ran to help and grabbed the fierce dog by the collar. Kivic found herself face-down on the rocks of the marketplace, and she was not even able to yell as Bea and Balder were dragged away from her.
 “So … Kivic, is it?” He put the pressure on the last syllable.
“Kivic Mortansdaughter, yes,” she kept her eyes on the ground.
“And you’re from …”
“Gallogg,” she didn’t have to look at him to see his disapproving look. No-one likes a Gallogg.
Paper rustled. “Well, it is your name on the paper.” Kivic blushed. How dared he to think she had stolen it!
“I forgot to look at the date, sir.”
He grunted. She heard his feet move over the floor. His nails clicked against the stones. Then the door shut, and Kivic was alone.
She sat down on the cold floor of the cell and swore loudly and heartfelt.
 The door opened. Kivic stopped in the middle of her mother’s favourite oath and looked up.
“Did I … interrupt anything?”
The prince stood in the door and looked at her with eyes that Kivic could not read. She opened her beak and said something that hardly qualified as a word. Then she tried to sit up and kneel at the same time, which did not go well.
“I was just waiting for a, eh, conclusion. I didn’t expect to see you-“ she stopped and bit her tongue. “Their majesty down her,” she corrected.
“Oh, it’s not the norm either.” He stepped into the room. “But I thought I’d stop by anyway. You … fascinate me.”
He looked at her with head crooked, expecting a response. She just looked at him with confused eyes, which seemed to bring him a bit out of balance.
An awkward silence hung in the air.
He coughed. “Anyway. You are charged a fee of two thirds of you profit from the market, as well as … ”
“I will give you every single coin I earned if you will just give me Bea and Balder back.”
Talos looked genuinely puzzled for a moment.
“Ah, your animals,” he then said, “of course. The nocarian have been tied outside, and you can fetch it as soon as you leave.”
“And Bea?”
“My guards had a hard time handling the aggressive dog, if that’s what you mean. We had to get rid of it.”
Kivic’s eyes grew wide. “Get … rid of?”
“We have of course taken the worth of the mutt into consideration and have drawn it from your charge. It gives a total of …”
“You killed her!”
Kivic threw herself at the bars, and Talos backed away from the claws that ripped in the air. He held up his hands. “I promise you it was a quick and humane …”
“MURDERER!”
The scream made Talos cringe. He ducked his head and looked over his shoulder.
“Listen, crazy woman,” he hissed at her. “If you don’t take it easy, then …”
For the third time, Talos was interrupted, this time because a rock flew through the air and hammered into the bars that separated him and Kivic. The merchant’s hands were glowing with a faint, weak magic, but it had been enough to pull up a rock from the floor. This cell was made for cheaters who needed to learn a lesson, not dangerous criminals, and it was definitely not magic-proof. Kivic stood a moment and looked at the rock, as if she could not phantom why it had been stopped by the bars, and then she looked at Talos with burning eyes. The rock he stood on began to move.
Talos turned around and fled out of the door and up the stairs. When he had laid a whole floor between him and the aggressive merchant, he heard the sound of rock hitting rock. Something broke. Pebbles leaped over stone.
A few moments after, a guard thundered down the stairs and stopped in front of Talos, who was kneeling on the middle of a step, trying to catch his breath.
The prince lifted his head and opened the black, shining beak to command death, but then he stopped. Thought of her wide eyes, her anger, her scream …
(Murderer!)
… and then he lowered his head.
“Get that woman out of my palace,” Prince Talos panted.
“Their majesty, what … ”
“Just get her OUT!” He yelled. The guard stepped backwards. “Get her out, and don’t let anyone see it. Delete the records, forget everything about her. She has never been here. Erase all evidence”
“And the dog?”
He hesitated.
“I’ll take care of the dog. Just make sure no-one gets to find out …”
(What she screamed)
“… that she was here. Ever.”
 “She dead, my friend.” Kivic was holding Balder’s head against her chest, crying silently, repeating the words over and over. Dead, dead, dead, dead. The orange nocarian just stood, nuzzled her feathers, and occasionally looked for his dog-friend that never came. “But don’t worry, boy,” she said. ”We will revenge her. He killed Bea, but we will revenge her.”
Kivic lifted her head, her sharp beak gleaming in the sunlight, and the brown eyes hard as the walls she stared at. “Prince Talos will regret this. I promise you, Bea.”
 “We’ve tried to get the collar off, but …” the guard trailed off and made a gesture towards the angry animal.
Talos nodded and looked at the dog with narrow eyes. “I see.”
“I can always shoot it if you …”
Talos shook his head. “No need to. I’ll get to the collar sooner or later.”
The guard watched the prince expectantly, but when Talos didn’t make any sign of leaving nor needing help, the guard turned and left.
“Maybe it would have been better just to buy the collar,” the red prince mumbled to himself. “But you’ll make a fine hunting dog, eh, Bea, was it?” The dog growled at him. “You’re definitely aggressive enough, even though you’re an ugly mutt.”
His face turned unreadable. It would be a hassle to train this dog. It wasn’t friendly, the dirty merchant had said it herself. Any rational thinker would tell him to just shoot it and take the collar But the look in her eyes, the scream, made the thought unbearable. He had practically stolen the mutt, he might as well get something out of it.
After all, it was a small price to pay.
