[Training] Predators (Miharu)

[Siiri]

Siiri flushed at the compliment, not used to receiving them. She did or she didn't, there was no middle ground. If she failed at something she tried to do, she simply did it again until she succeeded. Such was the practicality instilled in the Myrian warrior. She basked in the girl's smile however, enjoying every moment that Miharu was happy. The small kiss did not go unnoticed as well, sending a jolt of electricity through her body and raising the hairs on her skin up on their ends.

“Must be all that practice with the potatoes,” Siiri said, embarrassed.

As the Miharu explained about removing the bits of meat still on the hide, Siiri already started to work them off. She was not worried about cutting herself as Miharu had teased. Such a thing would not seem so out of place among the numerous scars all over her body. The task of scraping the meat off was easier than the actual skinning, quite similar to cutting slices off an apple or an unripe mango, and she moved at a reasonable pace. Each sliver of rodent flesh she cut off she just popped in her mouth, offering every other slice to her bondmate. The meat tasted like pork, even when uncooked.

“How are you finding Taloba?” Siiri asked as they shared the light snack. “Adjusting well enough? You should see the rest of the city, even without me.” She snapped her fingers, as if suddenly remembering something. “That reminds me, we should get you marked. So others will know you are with me. How do you feel about tattoos? We'll get you one once we are done here. Wait here.”

Handing the girl the now meat-free hide, Siiri stood up and grabbed the skinned rodents by their forelegs and carried them with ease to the barracks kitchen. She spent a few minutes inside speaking with the barracks cooks before rejoining Miharu outside.

[Miharu Mindi]

Miharu chewed her way through the bits of meat, and once she had a taste she realized how hungry she was - she was always hungry after shifting, and the long walk had served only to build it up. While Siiri finished up on the hide, she used her knife to make a swift cut to the rodent she'd killed, careful not to spill all it's innards. She reached a hand in and pulled out the heart, only about the size of her fist but it would serve to quiet the ache in her belly.

"Taloba suits me well," she said, offering Siiri another shy smile. "I... I understand the way things work here. I did not always fit in with the Sylirans, or even the people in Avanthal. They found me..." She hesitated, embarrassed now as she had never been in front of the people who'd judged her, but then their opinions had meant nothing, less than nothing, and her bondmate's meant everything. "Crude, I suppose," she finally said, wiping the last of the blood from her mouth with the back of her hand. "I wasn't allowed to feed in front of humans," she admitted, eyes downcast a moment before she glanced back up to Siiri.

When the woman started talking of marks and tattoos, she felt a chill of confusion, not really understand what she meant. "You mean like the drawings in your skin?" she asked, reaching out to trace the one on Siiri's left arm. "I don't know. If you'd like for me to have one, I'd be glad of it." She smiled again, nodding to herself. Anything for you, she thought fiercely.

While Siiri dragged the carcasses into the mess hall, she went about folding the skins and readying them to be brought to a leatherworker, and simply sat quietly as she waited for her bondmate to return.

[Siiri]

Siiri returned moments later, a smile on her lips. She carried two wet rags, one of them soiled as she finished wiping the last traces of mud from her body. The other one she handed to Miharu. She jerked a thumb at the door she just exited. “Most excellent, I just found out that Neshka's manning her booth today. We can get that tattoo as soon as you're done cleaning yourself up.” She assisted the girl in scrubbing off any remaining bloodstain on her body and then they were on their way.

The market was full that day, as it always was, but fortunately, Neshka was not entertaining any client at the moment. They found her fanning her sleeping child in a makeshift hammock beside the stall, the hammock tied to two massive trees that sheltered them from the heat of the sun. The woman stood up and gently lowered her child in the hammock, rocking it gently before attending to them. Siiri greeted her with a warrior's clasp, introducing herself and then Miharu, mentioning that the girl was her recently acquired Kelvic bondmate.

“I'd like to give her a mark, to let other's know she is with me,” she added. Siiri did not have to explain why, for Neshka knew that strangers in the city were often trailed and questioned when not in the company of a Myrian. Those who could not provide a satisfactory answer for their presence in the city were dealt with swiftly and brutally.

“Good, good. You're actually my first customers. It's been a slow day,” she chatted, speaking in Common as Siiri did. “What design do you like, girl? And where do you want it put? Something visible, I imagine, for you are not Myrian.”

“The Crocodile is the mark of my tribe,” Siiri suggested. She pointed at the angry red scar on her face and grinned. “The Scarred Eye is my personal one.”

“We have designs if you cannot come up with one of your own,” Neshka supplied. “Kanabi! Come over here and show the girl our samples!”

Neshka's apprentice came out of the stall carrying a pile of thin wooden plates which she handed to Miharu. The tattooist's designs were etched on them.

[Miharu Mindi]

Miharu chuckled let Siiri help her get the worst of the blood off her shoulders, and scrubbed at her face with the damp cloth as they started back towards the market. She was getting used to this walk, and decided that it would be the first place she went when exploring Taloba on her own.

By the time they reached Neshka's stall, she gotten the blood off her face and throat, but the cloth was nigh useless by this point so she wrung it out and folded it up, just holding it until Siiri wanted it back.

She smiled shyly at the tattooist, not because she feared her but because she hadn't been expecting such friendly acceptance - she was starting to get the impression that if she didn't get marked soon, she might be in danger, but everyone Siiri had introduced her to was friendly enough. Maybe that was simply because Siiri was there.

When the two women started discussing what she should get, she simply stared around her curiously, bright golden eyes watching the woman's pup as it slept. She was actually surprised when they consulted her, as if she'd expected them to simply pick something out and sit her down for it, and it took her a blinking moment to recall what they'd asked her.

"The... the Scarred Eye," she stammered, waving a finger at her own face a little hesitantly. "If the point is to have it seen, then best to place it on my face. Perhaps, um," she murmured, stepping over look through the different designs. "Oh! Like this one," she said, grabbing one that looked like the mark of a tiger's claw. "Four marks, from the jawline up, with one going over my eye? Stylized a little, so it isn't so obvious the same clawmark. I wouldn't want to offend anyone who's in a... I don't know, Tiger-something tribe," she said, stumbling over her words as she tried to figure out what might or might not offend those around her when she didn't have the protection of Siiri's fierce green gaze. Her own halting words made her cheeks blossom pink, and she glanced at Siiri for help. ...just not good at this... The words echoed over the bond between them, an apology that she didn't want to voice in front of a woman Siiri respected, lest she seem weak - and she was quickly learning that appearing weak was perhaps the greatest offense to her bondmate.

[Siiri]

Siiri nodded slightly as she got a sense of the girl's discomfort. It was understandable; Miharu wasn't Myrian and would not know what such markings represented for the people. She thought the girl had great taste for the skin art though. The clawmarks would truly stand out in her pale white skin. Siiri approved. If anyone had any problems with it, well, they could take it up with her. Who would have someone else's tattoo removed anyway? Such things held deep personal meaning to the ones who wore them, and if Miharu thought represented the connection between them, then Siiri would stand by her bondmate's choice.

“An excellent choice,” she said, handing the template to Kanabi and clapping her on the shoulder. “Regular ink for the girl, and make it painless. I want my Kelvic returned to me undamaged,” Siiri added in Myrian. Her tone was light and she smiled at the girl but her intentions were clear: no harm as to be done on Miharu. The hidden threat might have been unnecessary with Neshka present, but Siiri knew there were tattoo artists who took pleasure in inflicting pain on their clients. There were Myrians who specifically ask to not to numb the pain but she's heard stories of visiting foreigners where the tattooist 'neglected' to apply any anesthetic during the procedure. It had been a fiasco when someone had tried such a thing on an unprepared Akalak.

She waved the two of them to begin. “Go on. I have something more elaborate in mind I want to discuss with Neshka.” She watched at the tattoo apprentice led Miharu to a bench before following Neshka into the privacy of her stall, winking at her bondmate as she passed by.

[Miharu Mindi]

Miharu's eyes followed Siiri as she left her alone, and then she snapped her attention back to the assistant who was leading her away. "Ah... greetings," she said haltingly in Myrain, the only word she'd really picked up so far. She seemed nervous and tense, but she sat down on the bench and then lay down when Kanabi put a hand to her shoulder.

She kept her eyes open as the assistant applied the anesthetic, wrinkling her nose and coughing a little as the smell of it invaded her more sensitive nose - and then the entire left side of her face went numb, and she yelped a little, an animal noise of fear. The woman shushed her with a reassuring smile, and was so calm that Miharu settled again, though some wildness remained in her eyes.

The next few hours were spent in a haze of strangeness. She watched as the woman's dark hands worked on her face, but she felt nothing besides a faint pressure and the touch of fingertips when they brushed against the rest of her face. It was, perhaps, one of the most unsettling experiences of her life, and poor Siiri spent most of it being psychically assaulted by every flutter of confusion and apprehension she experienced. Her eyes watered of their own accord, and the assistant murmured to her in Myrian and wiped the tears away with the ink left over from her needles. For all of that, though, she made no sound after that first bark of surprise.

When it was finally over, the woman spread another salve over her face and patted her shoulder, indicating that she was finished. Miharu immediately started to reach up to touch her face, but Kanabi gently grabbed her wrist and shook her head. "Do not touch," she said in Common, and the wolf-girl nodded that she understood.

"Is Siiri done?" she asked, looking around, still a little off balance from not being able to feel her face, and the overwhelming smell of salves and anesthetics and inks and the sweat of Kanabi, and she had to brace herself as she sat up.

Siiri was right, though. The black ink looked magnificent against her skin, and there would be no question to anyone gazing at her that she belonged to a Myrian warrior.

[Siiri]

As Neshka began to work on her with her needles, Siiri felt fear claw at her breast. It was a strange sensation, one she could not rationalize, for there was no threat around her. It couldn't be because of getting another mark. Did she not have her whole left arm tattooed with the mark of the crocodile before? She was so much younger then and she went through the whole thing without flinching. And Neshka, right now, was only marking her with a tattoo no taller than the length of her middle finger. So Siiri could not understand why she was feeling this way. When it was followed by a sense of apprehension, the kind one felt when going through something completely new and alien, she realized that these emotions were bleeding off from the connection she shared with Miharu. The warrior felt the girl's tension and worry at what must be, to her in her innocence of Myrian ways, an invasive procedure. Siiri tried to soothe the girl's fears through their link but the feelings persistent.

It served as a distraction at least, from Neshka's piercing needles. Siiri blocked out the pain of each pinprick as she focused solely on her link with Miharu. If she were to describe it, it would be like holding the girl's hand through her mind.

Neshka finished with her about the same time her assistant did with Miharu, and this with breaks to check upon her child. At one point she stopped altogether to prepare milk for the little one. Siiri stood just as her bondmate did, though her back was to the Kelvic. She fastened the front clasp of her chest binding, making sure that her breasts did not press against each other at the cleavage and mess up Neshka's work. She did not bother putting on her blouse, to allow the wounds and ink from the procedure to dry faster.Turning around, Siiri beheld the mark on her companion's face. It stood out very well with the girl's alabaster skin, and the woman thought it added even more to the girl's appeal now. She smiled as she moved to join Miharu.

“The mark suits you,” she said as her fingers locked with the Kelvic's for a moment. Siiri gestured at her chest to show off her new mark as well. “I had to get one, too. Do you like it?”

Her skin was glaringly raw and red even with her tan complexion, but she pointed at her newest tattoo. Nested between her breasts was the image of a spirit wolf, its forelegs pawing on the side of her chest where her heart would be. Like her own eye, and now that of her bondmate, a scar had been drawn down the wolf's eye.

Siiri's Tattoo :

OOCThe image is watermarked but whatever. The design's just perfect. XD

[Miharu Mindi]

Miharu stared down at the ink scrawled across her bondmate's chest, eyes widening as she recognized the form. A few breaths passed as she wondered at it, and then she felt Siiri's fingers twine with her own and she snapped her head up, a bright smile tugging her cheeks - which made her hiss a little, and she immediately stopped smiling. "Ow," she said, chuckling under her breath. But she reached out and touched a careful fingertip just beneath Siiri's collarbone, where tanned skin met the angry red patch surrounding the mark. "It's beautiful," she breathed, and joy now replaced the tracks fear had traveled between them. She loved it, and was honored by it - hadn't expected that Siiri would etch her likeness onto her body. She wanted to hug her, suddenly, but was afraid to upset her artwork, so she just leaned up on her toes and pressed a kiss to her bondmate's cheek, just a hair's-breadth shy of the corner of her mouth. She hadn't know she would do it until it was done, and she caught her lip between her teeth in a flash of embarrassment. "Thank you," she murmured, and settled back on her heels.

She blinked down at Siiri's chest again, and then back up with a quirk of eyebrows - which, again, caused a ripple of soreness to spread across her face, and she snorted a laugh. "Is that what my face looks like? All red and angry?" she chuckled, squeezing Siiri's fingers. She smiled again, though this time only one side of her lips rose as she remembered herself, and amber eyes sparkled with love and adoration. "I'm glad we did this. Not just so people will know," she added quietly. It felt like more than that, and though she couldn't properly put it in words, she knew that this would strengthen their connection - not the magical connection that wove their bodies and minds together, but the friendship that grew within their hearts.

She realized suddenly that this couldn't all be free, and she flushed a little as she realized that Siiri had basically taken care of everything since she'd arrived. "I should give you my money," she blurted, turning to look for where she'd left her pack, catching sight of it under the bench. "I have a lot, I've been saving up. I can pay for this if you like," she said, eyes snapping back to Siiri's face.

[Siiri]

Siiri saw the girl's lips coming and almost reacted by turning her head to meet them fully. But then she debated whether she wanted to do such a thing openly in public, what with Neshka and Kanabi watching them and all. Before she could decide, the girl had kissed her – almost on the lips – and was looking embarrassed as if shocked to realized what she had just done.

“You're welcome,” she said with a wry smile.

She felt the girl's hand squeeze hers as she returned her gaze on the mark. The tattoo still prickled slightly, nothing uncomfortable, but the skin where Neshka had applied the ink had puffed up slightly so the mark looked as if it was embossed on Siiri's chest.

“Not your face, no. Only half of it,” she laughed. She was glad Miharu liked the mark so much. She did not say it to the girl, but it represented the connection between them and would, for Siiri, serve as reminder of what the Kelvic had come to mean to her. She would never forget now, even should they become physically apart.

As Miharu spoke of payment, Siiri shook her head. She and Neshka had already agreed on the work fee, Siiri haggling with the other woman that the hides they brought would serve as payment enough for the Kelvic's mark and the anesthetic used while she would pay for her own tattoo in Bikka. In fact, she had already given the payment before she had left the stall.

“It's all taken care of,” she reassured the girl, squeezing her hand once more. “Besides, they have no use for the silly coins humans use in their lands. Though there are some merchants here who can exchange them to Bikka for you.

“Come on, that ordeal had me work up an appetite. You can pay for our next meal instead!”

-FIN-

OOCLedger: - 2 Bikka for Siiri's tattoo

[Cayenne]

Great thread. I really do enjoy reading the pair of you, and each thread is always interesting in terms of the development and the bond, and it's so well-written and well-played. I hereby award the following: Siiri Tracking - 1 XP Knives (Thrown) - 1 XP Tactics - 1 XP Greatsword - 2 XP Hunting - 2 XP Wilderness Survival - 2 XP Skinning - 2 XP Teaching - 2 XP Interrogation - 1 XP Lore - Tiger Roarer Lore - Capybaras Lore - Myrian Tattooing Techniques Miharu Mindi Tactics - 1 XP Tracking - 1 XP Hunting - 2 XP Wilderness Survival - 2 XP Unarmed - 2 XP Skinning - 3 XP Teaching - 2 XP Interrogation - 1 XP Lore - Tiger Roarer Lore - Capybaras Lore - Myrian Tattooing Techniques Language: Myrian (Smattering)