He regarded her lightly, an arch to his brow, a princely, regal, invisible crown nestled between his ears, as if measuring her statements with noble regard and not in the bewitching way they glided through his skull. It’s a suitable rank for you; like he’d found something, anything, to be in this strange, possessive, cruel world, you’ve grown very strong already; like he hadn’t been floundering, stumbling, and tripping over himself since the moment he’d become so enamored, so fixated, on vengeance and reciprocity. She had no idea how weak he really was. She had no notion of what shaped and chiseled his weary, ridiculous, scarred foundation, what magnificent, terrifying horrors pulsed through his thoughts, his feelings, his sentiments at the image of destroying something that had mauled one of his own. Likewise, he had no idea about her, nothing past the outline of her body and the lineage simmering through her blood. He rarely knew about anyone these days – moments had become sprinkled with small granules of nothingness, earmarks and sketches and watercolors of minute details. They could fill a book up with their pages of naught, meaningless, pathetic attempts to understand and visualize the way the earth worked, the way others thought, the way corruption sunk and boiled and brewed over another’s mind. Each time he turned around, the opportunities seemed hopelessly lost, because his friends died, disappeared, vanished, or simply drew away from him (and why – he wondered, for all he’d ever done was cherish them – but maybe that simply hadn’t been enough). While he never forgot them, while he yearned for their presence and prestige, they didn’t seem to want the same from him, and the notion stung deep in his chest, somewhere in his carnivorous heart. No, I’m not strong, he yearned to say, but admitting it aloud seemed harsher than the sound of his own rancor. Instead, he simply smiled the same everlasting, charming smile, a little bit wicked, a little bit boyish. “Thank you.”

Orsino, however, didn’t have the same possession of charisma or appeal, ceasing his hissing only to glare at the other companion with wily, conniving, menacing eyes and threatening postures. His fur raised, onyx on sable, drenched in the unholy vows of the Stygian terrain, his fangs were brandished beyond his mouth, incredibly, ridiculously foul. Erebos eventually had enough of the tedious, molten display, snarling over their connection with his own malignant claws. Get a grip, he murmured, and the kitsune, somehow, someway, actually chose to respond to the proclamation (a surprise to the lordling, who couldn’t remember many times or places the fox had actually deigned to listen; what on earth was this supposed to mean?), shifting his way further under Erebos’ frame and pouting, away from the griffin’s keen eyes.

The lad shrugged, offering no explanation for his bonded’s antics because there simply didn’t seem to be one. Jealousy? Ruthlessness? He’d shown the latter amidst battle, a raging, burning hostility that swept and morphed and stuck to the infidel’s brow as if he’d relished the release between the fox and himself – the barbaric, savage, sinister methods of their movements and motions.

But he didn’t dive any further into it, because Sjal’s query, the flick of her lashes, the layers of her inquiry pulsed and incensed his attention. His eyes, with their piercing, puncturing hues, riveted solely upon her, upon her question, upon the lacquer dusting and embossing the darkening shades. There was a reason they haunted, they stalked, they crawled, slithered, and crept through Helovia – a purpose, a rime, a conviction driving and colliding with their sinew, their skin, their sanctity and sanity. Erebos thought he knew the answer, and it seemingly came to him all at once, a truth sizzling along his tongue and mouth, carved from his lips without any hesitation. Bold, audacious, it toiled with his grin and allowed it even more allure, even more beguiling, unwavering, persevering glimpses into his presence, into his mind, into what he thought of her, the girl who’d once been looking for something (salvation?), on the snowy borders of the Basin. “You belong here.”