#lohs

Najma, her eyes enormous:

Mr. Atomic:

Night Raid:

Monkey-Girl:

Tsunami:

Inferna:

Captain Invincible:

Eclipsar:

Vladimir:

Dark Star:

Vague:

“Go on. Go.”

Standing on a curve of the ancient road that wound through the Dravanian Forelands, Breandan reached up to grasp the creature clinging to his pauldron like a lifeboat. Gauntleted fingers curling around her midsection and trying to pull her off without hurting her too much.

In response, Lohs let out a miserable squeak, turning her face to the side of his neck.

He took a moment just to let out a sigh.

“I’m going to have to be away for awhile.” He went on, trying to get his grasp back. “I don’t like the idea of you hanging around camp by yourself. I don’t know who all comes that way.”

“Nooooooooooo.”  Lohs answered, a pitiful little wail and found a place to dig in a claw

“Ow! Hey!” Breandan hissed, digging his fingers i  in return. He yanked the little dragon free, only to have her immediately latch on in a death grip to both his gauntlets.

“Come on.” For good measure, he gave her a gentle shake. “These are your…own kind. There a reason you don’t want to stay with them?”

Lohs hung her head with another sad vocalization, and Breandan narrowed his eyes. He’d tried, of course. When he’d first picked her up, he’d left her here and hadn’t stayed around to hear what the Dravanians had thought about it.

She came crawling back to his campsite out here more often than not. Came and went and stayed around. He was sometimes a little concerned some trapper might find her there and get the wrong idea. Peace was sometimes for leaders safe in their cities and didn’t always hold in the backcountry.

“because….I can’t…” Lohs squirmed. She tried to bite at one of his armored fingers. 

“I can’t sing.” She answered with that mournful tone again. “Not like the rest of them. Can…you? Can you sing?”

In response, Breandan laughed, once. A terrible sound, ragged and harsh around the edges. Looked away from her beady eyes on him, bright and searching for something that wasn’t quite available in his profile.

“No.” He answered. “I can’t.” 

After a stilted pause, he went on.

“I have friends who can.” It came out awkwardly, half-mumbled. As awkwardly as the hand he shifted so he could press his thumb to the crowd of her head, giving the scales a little stroke.

“I like to go listen to them. There’s…places. People get up and do it for…mm. Money, sometimes, but because they like to. And even if I can’t, it’s still…nice, yeah? Being there with your friends. Seeing them do things that make them happy.”

His lips pressed together in an effort to keep himself from talking too much. His attention shifted back to her.

They must have been a ridiculous sight, he thought. The small creature twisting in his grasp, sunlight bouncing off the golden gleam of his armor. Taken from a cache that had turned into a grave, reforged and re-enchanted as a gift. Blessed, some might say. How much the action of returning Lohs to her people had counted towards that was hard to tell.

He wasn’t interested in keeping score.

By contrast: the lance on his back that hummed violently to the creatures that dwelled within. The blood and anguish of their fallen kin enchanted to the core of the weapon even before he’d picked it up and started killing with it.

The Dravanians still smelled the blood on his hands first, sometimes, before they picked up any other intent. It wasn’t always easy out here, and it wasn’t always pretty.

“...want me to go in there with you?” He asked, looking up at the triune spires of the old ruin that lay just beyond the bend of the road. Another sigh escaping from somewhere deep at the bottom of his chest.

“Maybe they’ll show us both around.”

His answer was a slightly brighter chirp, as the dragonet finally began to unwind from between his hands.

I once traveled with a guide who was taking me to Faya. He didn't speak for nine hours. At the end of it he pointed at the horizon and said, "Faya!"

-Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

Mehryde's Meyhene saw a steady trickle of customers in the heat of the afternoon. People drifting in and out. Drinks being poured liberally in the wake of world-ending catastophe. Food stirred up in the kitchens in the back. Dancers on the small stage most afternoons to entertain the sparse crowds.

Lots of locals. Not too many travelers, even in the wake of the Tower offshores destruction.

Just a few.