Khemrys (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
homeless_pard) wrote2021-12-06 10:25 pm
homeless_pard) wrote2021-12-06 10:25 pm
A flight long in the running...
Who: Khem and a new world!
When: Start of canon smash here!
What: Terrified kitty arrives in the vague area of St. Louis.
Tired. She was so bone weary that had someone told her that she'd die but it would be in a bed, she might honestly accept that trade at this point. The pads of her feet were leaving red marks along the rough stone she scrambled and clawed haphazardly upward, ever upward, ever away, through so many terrains they all blurred together in a haze of color and snatched hunts.
She should have lost him. Should have, and there had been times over the past turns where she had almost believed him gone. Finally shaken from her trail and naught more than a shadow left in her mind to spur her onward. Any hunter would eventually give up on game when coursing it had run to long...
...surely?
Ah, but she'd little experience with hunters, those near the abbey were more farmers with the occasional lord's man, and even had they needed care it was likelier that they would seek tending from their own ladies. AN isolated abbey was not easy to seek out when ill.
Still, it had seemed logical that he'd stop. At the Wastes perhaps.
At the Falls.
At the turn of blasted scree to strange, new lands past where tales she knew ended...
...and yet here she was, his shadow practically nipping at her heels. She was flagging and he hadn't stopped. This hunt was soon to end, as any chased thing knew in time, escape simply wasn't going to happen. Mayhap it would kinder, cleaner, to miss a jump. To tumble and not reach for ledges as she went down.
Kinder...but she shrank from it none the less. A little further...
...a little further...
...until there was naught left but sheer walls and a deep, dark crack between. A cave, not a passage. No exit. A tomb for one hard worn girl who had thought, foolishly, that finding fur had granted her freedom. And so it was to end.
If he hounded her even here, his bootsteps harsh on the stones behind her, then she was determined he would know who he was to slay. Not some cat that had teased him, not some furred prize, but as a woman. If he was to slay her, let him slay a woman and be haunted by her face. An unkindness perhaps, but she was far past ability to feel for him.
To wonder if she could explain, or beg her safety somehow.
No, let him have a flickering pang of conscience as he did his fell deeds. And so as the mouth of the cave darkened she set her back to the stone, fingers rather than claws lifted to shade her face, skin covered in long, dark hair and gooseflesh that gave some semblance of proper depth to her too-thin frame.
Let him slay a woman.
And yet, as she watched the dull, metallic sheen of a dart gun rising, it wasn't pain she felt burn through her chest but warmth where her single item, the amber stone on a string about her neck graced to her by Gunnora, flickered like sunlight and the wall at her back faded to naught so that she was falling...
...falling...
...falling...
...there was a brief scream, she couldn't help it, as her shoulders struck beaten grass and tree roots, shock making the sound choke off as abruptly as it had started. A heartbeat, two, as she stared up at tangled tree limbs and dappled light she shouldn't be seeing then she was sitting up with a gasp, trying to espy the Hunter.
And he was not there. Somehow, somehow...he was not there, and she sat in a wood far younger than the one before the stones she'd climbed, hands and feet still bleeding harshly from the abuse she'd pounded into them over the many moons of travel. She was alone and she was...naked. The stone upon her breast cooling from it's earlier warmth. She'd give thanks somehow, later. For now she shivered back into fur in a blur of mist and achingly, carefully, hauled herself up into a tree to try to determine where she might be.
A how would take much longer no doubt, but...
...rest seemed a blessing, and she was still so very, very tired.
With luck there would be no fresh, strange beasts to contest her claiming the crook of a tree, there to watch, or likelier pass into blessed unconsciousness.
When: Start of canon smash here!
What: Terrified kitty arrives in the vague area of St. Louis.
Tired. She was so bone weary that had someone told her that she'd die but it would be in a bed, she might honestly accept that trade at this point. The pads of her feet were leaving red marks along the rough stone she scrambled and clawed haphazardly upward, ever upward, ever away, through so many terrains they all blurred together in a haze of color and snatched hunts.
She should have lost him. Should have, and there had been times over the past turns where she had almost believed him gone. Finally shaken from her trail and naught more than a shadow left in her mind to spur her onward. Any hunter would eventually give up on game when coursing it had run to long...
...surely?
Ah, but she'd little experience with hunters, those near the abbey were more farmers with the occasional lord's man, and even had they needed care it was likelier that they would seek tending from their own ladies. AN isolated abbey was not easy to seek out when ill.
Still, it had seemed logical that he'd stop. At the Wastes perhaps.
At the Falls.
At the turn of blasted scree to strange, new lands past where tales she knew ended...
...and yet here she was, his shadow practically nipping at her heels. She was flagging and he hadn't stopped. This hunt was soon to end, as any chased thing knew in time, escape simply wasn't going to happen. Mayhap it would kinder, cleaner, to miss a jump. To tumble and not reach for ledges as she went down.
Kinder...but she shrank from it none the less. A little further...
...a little further...
...until there was naught left but sheer walls and a deep, dark crack between. A cave, not a passage. No exit. A tomb for one hard worn girl who had thought, foolishly, that finding fur had granted her freedom. And so it was to end.
If he hounded her even here, his bootsteps harsh on the stones behind her, then she was determined he would know who he was to slay. Not some cat that had teased him, not some furred prize, but as a woman. If he was to slay her, let him slay a woman and be haunted by her face. An unkindness perhaps, but she was far past ability to feel for him.
To wonder if she could explain, or beg her safety somehow.
No, let him have a flickering pang of conscience as he did his fell deeds. And so as the mouth of the cave darkened she set her back to the stone, fingers rather than claws lifted to shade her face, skin covered in long, dark hair and gooseflesh that gave some semblance of proper depth to her too-thin frame.
Let him slay a woman.
And yet, as she watched the dull, metallic sheen of a dart gun rising, it wasn't pain she felt burn through her chest but warmth where her single item, the amber stone on a string about her neck graced to her by Gunnora, flickered like sunlight and the wall at her back faded to naught so that she was falling...
...falling...
...falling...
...there was a brief scream, she couldn't help it, as her shoulders struck beaten grass and tree roots, shock making the sound choke off as abruptly as it had started. A heartbeat, two, as she stared up at tangled tree limbs and dappled light she shouldn't be seeing then she was sitting up with a gasp, trying to espy the Hunter.
And he was not there. Somehow, somehow...he was not there, and she sat in a wood far younger than the one before the stones she'd climbed, hands and feet still bleeding harshly from the abuse she'd pounded into them over the many moons of travel. She was alone and she was...naked. The stone upon her breast cooling from it's earlier warmth. She'd give thanks somehow, later. For now she shivered back into fur in a blur of mist and achingly, carefully, hauled herself up into a tree to try to determine where she might be.
A how would take much longer no doubt, but...
...rest seemed a blessing, and she was still so very, very tired.
With luck there would be no fresh, strange beasts to contest her claiming the crook of a tree, there to watch, or likelier pass into blessed unconsciousness.
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About ten minutes after he'd come back downstairs, he gently knocked on the door. "Khemrys, you ok?" He didn't try the door, but he was listening carefully.
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If he knocked again there'd be the yelp and splash of someone trying to jerk awake while in a tub though! And finally, "...lord?" Um?
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When he heard the surprised splash he flinched slightly. "Yeah, it's me," he answered her. "You ok in there?"
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Then, well..."um...lord, the clothing..." was out there.
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He turned and picked through some of the clothes he'd pulled out at her stammered observation. He gave the door a gentle rap. "Here. These should be a little better fitting: the pants have a drawstring and the shirt is pretty form-fitting on me, so it won't be as loose as my emergency clothes."
He paused a moment and added. "Not looking, just open the door a crack and I'll just hand them in."
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It took her longer than she liked to convince herself to unlock the door, then longer yet to reach through for the clothes; it wasn't him, no, it was just...past experience now. Likely she'd be one of many who would be haunted by past events now. "My thanks." At least getting dressed took very little time, and her hair was even longer damp as she stepped out!
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He waited patiently for her to open the door and take the clothes, and when she finally did he handed them off without looking and stepped away from the door. When she stepped out, he tried not to stare at her long, damp hair plastered back, showing even more of her face.
"I've got the food set up over here...sorry, I don't really have a real table." He'd set up the food on a little bed tray that Jean Claude had bought for him one year. He rarely used it, but it made a nice little setup. He gestured her to sit against the pillows on the bed and moved to sit across the bed tray. "So there's chicken and dumplings, pot roast, and pork and sauerkraut here, and mashed potatoes, corn, peas and carrots here. And these are the only rolls they have, but we can hit some bakeries tomorrow that have lots of different kinds of bread."
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..."I...should comb my hair before eating," she admitted. Else it would dry a mess!
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He nodded, slipping gracefully from the bed and padding to the bathroom. He came back with sort of paddle brush. "My hair is a lot finer than yours, so I think this will work better for you. It's my friend Nathaniel's and his hair is pretty long and thick."
He offered her the brush before awkwardly adding, "I can help if your hands hurt, but I get if you'd rather do it."
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"I've not had anyone touch my hair in...many turns. Since I was a child..."
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He moved behind her, helping adjust the bed tray. "You eat. I brush Nat's hair for him, so I've got some practice with long hair."
He helped position a towel around her shoulders to help keep her shirt dry and began gently brushing the ends of her damp hair. Any snags were carefully picked through with an experienced, delicate hand. He had had practice, but he was extra gentle with her as he doubted she'd have the same reaction to her hair being pulled as Nathaniel did.
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"You've a deft hand."
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"Like I said," he replied softly, "Lots of practice. It can be calming having your hair brushed." He was slowly working the tangles from higher and higher on her head, pausing to pat the excess water from the ends. He chuckled, "I can braid it if that's how you like it. I'm not as good as Stephen, but I can manage a basic braid."
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That and he'd ordered far more than enough for two? "Shall you eat?"
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It was almost hypnotic for him as well, the long dark hair under his hands, her soft, relaxed voice...
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"A strange land yours," she admitted, almost purring. It was tasty, though hunger might add spice...
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"Most of this food is very Middle America; American comfort food. But most of these foods were brought over from the Europeans who came over and kind of mixed all together with of cuisines when they got here. But if you've got your chickens and rabbits and venison, you'll probably recognize some of the flavors."
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"And I failed geography in school, so I can't name all the countries, but we're in the United States of America, which is the country here." He gently poked the spot in her back, then traced an abstract shape of the country.
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"I assure I'm literate....such would not be wasted on me..."
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He went back to her hair. "I didn't doubt you were literate..." He paused. "That was kind of presumptuous of me though, huh? For all I know, your world could be against women learning to read. I mean, there's still places in my world that try that bullshit."
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He'd worked his way to the crown of her head, her head being gently pulled back with each long stroke of the brush. He swallowed silently, trying not to fixate on her head flexing gracefully back towards him.
Finally, he set the brush down and patted her hair with the towel. He rummaged on his nightstand and found a hair tie left from Nathaniel (they were usually scattered everywhere around the room). He divided her hair neatly into thirds and began to quick and easily braid it into one long plait.
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At least she was honest in the fact she was drifting? How could anyone blame her really? "If you might aid in rebandaging...I fear I may fall asleep before too long."
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"Did you get enough to eat?" he asked, eyeing the food. He carefully moved the tray away and peeled the covers back. "You don't have to apologize. Go ahead and get comfy while I grab the bandages. I won't be long since everything is already clean."
He slipped back into the bathroom for the first aid kit and started quickly and methodically re-applying ointment and re-bandaging her hands, then her feet.
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