Screaming in the Dark (Shadowfang)

[Chamaeleon]

Spring 37th 512 A.V

Location: The Pig's Foot Tavern


For most of the night the tavern had been quiet. Or rather, it had been loud and raucous, but to the people who attended to mugs of beer every night in the establishment, it was quiet. Nothing had been broken yet, and yet it was well past the twentieth bell. The arguments that had, of course, taken place, were unusually quiet.

The djed storm of the first day of spring had placed everyone into a morose mood. Some snapped under the pressure of believing they were at the mercy of magicians, the scourges of the past, but they were outside calling for blood.

Still, it seemed to have become a crime to tell an acquaintance in a tavern to have a nice day.

"Are you mocking me, Widow?" The woman bore down over Chamaeleon, her hands like the claws of a harpy at her sides as she interpreted a polite farewell as an insult to honour, or something as equally foolish.

Why was it always something foolish that had to overexcite the people in this city?

"I merely meant that I wish tomorrow to go well for you," the Ethaefal's soft voice was sly off the tongue of the bony little Symenestra. Her violet eyes were earnest, but the woman saw only the eyes of a despicable kidnapper.

"Are you daft, you petching vagik?" She spat. Literally. She spat her words and saliva with the ugly curse word, slipping her own venom into it.

Repulsive.

"The world has gone upside down. The witches have made their move and are going to smear us all off the face of the world, and you petching dare to tell me to have a nice day like the grass is green?"

And, she overexaggerated. Terribly.

"Do you want to burn too, Widow?"

Chamaeleon tilted her head at the woman and just stared. Here she was confronted once again by a violent inhabitant of the dark and murderous city. Here was another asinine beast trying to intimidate her with sharp words and a loud voice. She had enough of that.

Slowly and very deliberately, Chamaeleon pulled back her lips from her teeth in a fearsome approximation of a smile, baring fangs and incisors.

If these Sunberthians couldn't accept that she meant only kindness to them, then maybe just this once age could indulge in her instincts and frighten away a threat before it became violent.

[Shadowfang]

Perhaps coming to the tavern had been a good idea after all.

The tavern was unusually quiet and there had been no brawls. This could be due to the fact that half of the city was elsewhere, hunting and killing supposed magic users. It was the cause of little worry for Shadowfang. The Hunts were not near enough to the tavern to be of much concern. He sat in his chair away from the rest of the patrons. He seemed to have a dark cloud hanging over his head, which gave people even more of an excuse to avoid him. He did not come here to be alone (that was what the back alleys were for), but it was a bonus. No, he had come here to listen, pick up rumors, and gain information from any loose tongues that happened to be in the building. Although he had not heard anything useful, the reduced volume in the tavern was a welcome reprieve.

Of course, the quiet was not meant to last.

Shadowfang shifted his gaze towards the commotion. A woman, hysterically angry, was screaming at another woman. The other woman was interesting, unusually pale skin and midnight black hair were her main features. This was the first time he had seen someone of her kind close-up. Symnestra were always deemed too fragile to take as slaves and they apparently did not taste good either. Shadowfang let out a low growl. The woman’s screaming was getting too loud. He considered, for a moment, killing her. He was hungry after all... He decided against it. While no one would probably care if he just killed her, eating the woman might cause some people to get hostile.

The Symnestra did not appear to be doing anything to try and stop the woman’s annoying shouting, however. It seemed that he’d have to do something about it anyway. He would normally not be opposed to watching an argument but, to his sensitive ears, a shouting match was just too much. He rose, wrapping his wings around himself once more. Perhaps just scaring her off would be enough.

[Chamaeleon]

The woman didn't seem to be phased by the display of fangs between Chamaeleon's lips. So great was her anger, at whatever small insult she believed the Symenestra gave her, that she ignored her own instincts. Chamaeleon found herself impressed, and so she smiled just slightly, a twist of her lips that was anything but menacing.

From the corner of her eye, Chamaeleon saw movement unnatural to the current environment. A folding sound, like silk on silk, reached her ears faintly in the rumble of the bar. She flinched involuntarily and her newfound friend sneered. Her back was to the creature that had moved, but Chamaeleon had a great view of him. Her violet eyes noted his fur and his height, the feral curve of his claws that were so much more dangerous in appearance than her own. If she was a spider, he was a bat.

"Got nothing to say, Widow?" The woman said, seemingly suddenly. Chamaeleon focused upon her again, disoriented. It took her a moment to remember what was going on, and when she did she actually scowled at the unnecessary anger and distraction.

"Are we done yet?" She asked in an uncharacteristically cold voice. The look she received would have frozen hot water in a moment.

[Shadowfang]

Shadowfang skirted around the women, staying out of the loud one's line of sight. He positioned himself behind her and walked forward as silently as he could, using a trick that and old acquaintance had once taught him. Slowly moving forward he put his weight on the heel of his forward foot when he stepped, moving the weight of his body forward on his back foot. Using these slow careful steps, he soon found himself directly behind the hysterical woman. He let a rare smile show itself on his face. If nothing else, this might be fun. He spread out his wings and forcefully flapped them once, creating a small, short-lived vortex around both women.

The woman spun around and set her gaze upon Shadowfang. The look of mad rage contorted into one of fear. She stared at the Zith in front of her opening and closing her mouth in silence. Shadowfang did not speak, did not make any sound. He only widened the sinister grin plastered on his face and brought a hand up to his mouth. He stuck out his tongue and licked his claws – slowly, deliberately – just in case the sight of the dark predator looming over her was not terrifying enough.

To anyone else of his race, Shadowfang would not be very intimidating, but the fearful woman in front of him was not only caught by surprise, but she was also not a Zith. The woman stuttered as if she were trying to find words to say. Shadowfang himself remained silent, staring the woman down. The feeling of domination he felt from instilling such fear in the woman who had been yelling at the Symnestra was among the best he had ever felt.

[Chamaeleon]

Chamaeleon was quite certain that if the woman had use of her voice, she would have screamed at that very moment. The Ethaefal wished she could have seen her expression, the fear that would have shown there. She herself felt it, recognising predator as easily as a helpless doe would have.

The Zith caused quite a stir amongst the humans in the bar. Angry murmurs rose up at the intimidating display. Chamaeleon was not ignorant of them, nor of the suspicion aimed at her. She looked at the Zith rather meaningfully, hoping she didn't have to voice the fact that he had now singlehandedly aroused the attention of everyone she hadn't, before she rose to her feet and circled the table, stalking with all the grace of her Symenestran form out of the pub and into the danger of the streets. She hoped the woman wouldnt follow for she was an unnecessary issue the Ethaefal didn't require.

[Shadowfang]

Meeting the Symnestra's violet eyes with his own red eyes, and understood the message she was trying to send him. He looked around the bar and noticed that almost everyone was staring at him with expressions of fear, anger, and hate. The realization came slowly at first, and then washed over him like ice water. In trying to scare away the noisy woman, he had managed to piss off the entire tavern. The decision to leave was not a difficult one to make. If there were only one or two people threatening him he would be able to take them on but an entire building of people would just get him ripped apart. Giving the woman one last glare he turned, making sure to hit her with his wing, and walked out of the tavern.

He trudged down the dark street, head down and wings wrapped around his body. He wondered to himself why he did not kill the woman or, better yet, simply leave the tavern in the first place. He continued to beat himself up over his decision. Being hasty and irrational was not something that Shadowfang usually did. He told himself to think harder in the future. Perhaps his base instincts still had a hold on him that he could not feel until they kicked in. This troubled him. He wanted to be able to control himself and abandon his instincts but they would not leave him. It seemed he would be fighting this battle for a long time.

After a few more moments of walking, he noticed that he had been closely following someone without his knowledge. That someone was the Symnestra. How long had he been following her? How long had she known he was there? She had to know he was there; there was no way that she did not know he was there. His footfalls were far too loud and heavy to be missed by anyone in close proximity. He remained silent, however; and simply continued walking. Surely she would turn off at one of these streets and he would not have to deal with her presence or worry about any suspicion from her anymore.

[Chamaeleon]

Chamaeleon could sense him following her, although she couldn't hear him and couldn't sense him in any way. It was instinct that caused the fine hairs along the nape of her neck to raise. She felt a sudden chill at the unease.

She felt stalked.

If a rabbit could put into words what it felt as a wolf trailed after it, she would be able to agree with him fully.

The Symenestra didn't turn as the Zith expected her to, but instead she paused. She turned her head to the side, her violet eyes collecting the meagre lighting from the clouded moon and pieced together the image of the very same Zith that had caused a bigger, quieter huffuss than she had.

"Are you hunting me?" She asked him, her voice low. It wouldn't do to arouse suspicion with the climate of the With Hunt still ongoing. "I'm probably not at all that edible, you know." Skin and bones that she currently was, she spoke the truth.

She turned to face him in the street, her eyes absorbing him much more freely than they had during the pseudo-meeting in the tavern.

[Shadowfang]

Shadowfang paused mid-step. The Symnestra had certainly surprised him. Instead of turning and trying to get out of his way like he had hoped she would, she turned to face him and confronted him directly with a question. What a fool, making such a brash comment as that. Especially to a predator. Then again, she did not look very appetizing anyway.

Shadowfang's eyes were much more accustomed to the darkness than her own, allowing him to easily examine her pale face. He could detect no signs of fear on her features. However, that did not necessarily mean she was not afraid. Weather she was afraid or not was not important to Shadowfang. He remained silent for half a minute or so, then spoke in his quiet, gravelly voice.

"I have no quarrel with you, Spider." He did not mean any harm by calling the Symnestra a spider. He was simply calling her what she was, having no other name to call her by. "I am hunted as well." He could not help but cringe as the words came out of his mouth. The Common tongue was so cumbersome and difficult to use. It did not have the same flow or feeling that Zithinese had.

[Chamaeleon]

"Nor do I have one with you, bat," she said, purring her laughter in her silky Symenestran voice. The Common tongue was less graceful than many others, yet Chamaeleon didn't know enough of her current form's tongue to make a decent attempt at it without sounding like some wretched fool. She wished she could change that one day. Maybe she would get that chance. "Yet I must ask, why do you follow me?"

The tension was there in her, the instinct pushed stiffness in her body and solidness in her gaze. She watched him as a sparrow watches a hawk before the fateful strike. He was more relaxed than she, his stance conveying only surprise at her boldness.

"What is your name, Zith?" She asked eventually. The silence following their brief words was annoying. She could hear through it to the rage of others in a distant part of the city. Was that near the Camp? She couldn't be too sure. "Why did you snap at that woman?" Typical her, asking questions of people she should avoid.

[Shadowfang]

Shadowfang felt himself exhale a small sigh of exasperation. The Symnestra was asking question after question. She was certainly a curious creature. Then again, it almost reminded him of how he behaved when he became interested in something. After a long pause, he offered her an answer. "I did not mean to follow you. I was only trying to leave and find a place to be safe." He paused again, thinking of what words to use before answering her other questions. "I am called Shadowfang. What shall I call you?" Another pause. "The human was too loud. She hurt my ears."

His ears detected sounds, footsteps, coming from somewhere behind him. They sounded heavy. They sounded numerous. Shadowfang let out another huff. He knew why they were approaching, for there was no other reason that he could think of. He looked back towards the Symnestra, wondering if it was worth warning her. "If you value your life you will follow." he said. With that, he turned to the nearest alley and began walking, fleeing in a slow, almost nonchalant manner. Whether the Symnestra followed or not was her decision, he did not care one way or the other. How many times had he needed to decide between fight and flight in the recent days? Too many. There was truly never a dull moment in Sunberth.