PM to join Strangers in a Familiar Sky (Treachery)

[Scorn]

Scorn responded passionately to the male's advances, grinding her hips against his in response. That was when she noticed something unusual. There was...some kind of barrier in the way. Growling low in her throat, her frustration plain, she abandoned his neck and shoved him over onto his back, focusing all of her attention on shredding the thing that was getting in the way of their mating.

Within moments, she had found what she was looking for, and from there, her instincts took care of the rest.

~~~Later~~~

Scorn lay back against the grass, feeling calm and sated for the first time in seasons. She could hear Scourge not too far off, amusing herself by pouncing on rodents. The heat of the male's body gently warmed her side, and she nuzzled his arm. "Not bad," she murmured.

[Treachery]

Groaning loudly when she ground against him, Treachery almost whimpered when she suddenly pushed him off. Watching as her angrily gazed at his groin, he almost panicked when her claws shot forward. A loud rip and the sounds of tearing and Treachery's trousers were ruined and right now, he honestly couldn't care less as the female continued what they had been doing with added passion. ------------ Exhausted covered in gently and not so gently injuries, the zith was truly happy for the first time in seasons. He'd thought finding a pseudo colony had made his happy, no this. This right here. A female nuzzled against his arm as a soft breeze combed though his fur. This was what he wanted. Smirking at the females comment, Treachery brought her closer to him snuggling up to her as he brought his wings around them. The warmth the smell, pressing his nose against her body, he inhaled deeply. He didn't want to forget this smell. “You too, Huntress” was his only distracted reply.

[Scorn]

Scorn was content to lay quietly in the male's arms for some time, but eventually, her curiosity awoke, and she sniffed lightly at his scent, trying to figure out what it was that puzzled her. There was his scent, yes, but where it should have been layered over with the scents of the other Zith in his colony, she smelled only slaves, and other things she didn't recognize.

The puzzled frown grew over the course of several chimes as she resisted the uncomfortable questions threatening to pierce the warm post-mating haze. But finally she could ignore them no longer. "You don't really have a colony, do you," she said quietly.

This thought saddened her. True, it was possible that a strange colony would drive them off, but it would have been just as likely for them to take in Scorn and her sister, especially once they proved themselves. If Scorn's own colony were gone, then the next best thing would be to find a new one.

[Treachery]

The moment she asked the question Treachery's stomach started doing flips. This had been the topic he himself had been avoiding and now he was going to have to come to terms with it. Thinking over what he was going to say for a few chimes, the zith finally had an answer for her. “Not a real colony at least. There is a large prey one that owns the surrouning territory that I've.... adopted.” The word sounded sour and wrong in his mouth but anything else would be out right lying or too uncomfortable to say. So he went with 'adopted'. “They are useful. If I protect them, they help me out and let me hunt as I please. Some days I don't even need to hunt. They know things and teach them to me without me needing to force them, it's comfortable. A bit too comfortable.” He bit his lip as thoughts bounced back and forth in his head about the last year and a bit in the prey colony. His patron waking him up for training, the other squires, patrols, him getting his wings back slowly but surely and that amazing moment when he could fly again. Sighing at the memory, Treachery's mouth moved without him thinking. “There weren't any zith colonies that I could go to so it was a welcome change from scraping it alone. I couldn't even fly....” Shivering in the sudden chill, he clung a little harder to the zith next to him. Why was his mind suddenly such a mess? This was... He didn't want to think about this now. He had been so happy just chimes ago. Visibly frustrated with himself, Treachery decided that curling more into the female next to him and inhaling her scent in hopes it would wash away his niggling thoughts was the best thing to do right now. Dissecting the scent, he could vaguely make out the scent of another zith, probably the other one that from what he could hear was nearby, but noone else. They were alone as well. “What about you? I can only smell your twin on you.”

[Scorn]

A sickening knot formed in Scorn's stomach as the male described his false colony. It was too close to what had almost happened to Scourge, with the stick-men. She still wasn't sure sometimes that her sister wouldn't rather be back in those caves, but to Scorn the place was like a nightmare, sucking away her sense of self and her place in the world. She wanted to commit some form of violence in the face of this atrocity, but the something in the male's tone told her to wait. She sensed his doubt. Perhaps he could yet be saved.

She listened patiently to his story, questions forming in her mind. The worst thing she could imagine was being grounded, and that thought filled her mind before anything else. Gently, she ran her hands over his wings, looking into his eyes to make sure he knew she wasn't going to hurt him. Her fingertips felt the large scars on his wings that she'd been too distracted to notice before. Her face fell into an expression of dismay as she realized the extent of the damage, which eventually elicited from her a small whimper of sympathy.

"What happened?" she whispered, not entirely expecting him to answer. She thought about what it must have been like, being crippled and alone in a strange place...at least she had always had her wings. But then her mind caught up with putting what he said in the context of where they were...

"Wait, how long have you been here? In all that time, you never encountered another Zith colony?" she frowned and bit her lip. What had happened to her family?

"Our colony used to claim this area as hunting grounds sometimes...not always, we moved around a lot, but...they should have been around here somewhere in the time I've been gone. I left to find Scourge. She was taken by the Great Storm years ago, and I left my colony to find her. Now, we are trying to find our family." Scorn curled into herself, fighting the sense of sadness and longing that threatened to overwhelm her at the though of everyone she had left behind. She could never regret hunting for her sister, but...this life was so lonely...She shivered.

[Treachery]

Treachery didn't like the look he saw on her face when he finally looked up to answer her second set of questions, there was pity there and fear. Not what he needed and not what he had expected from the huntress that had nearly killed him a bell ago. He visibly flinched when a hand trailed across his wings, his breathing picked up and just the memory of him falling and falling and falling and they wouldn't help him. They didn't care and he couldn't breathe. Listening to the heartbeat and breathing of the zith in his arms, Treachery desperately tried to mimic it. He barely even heard her question as he ripped his wing away from her, away from the scars, away from those memories, curling it into his side safe and away from danger. Still shaking and trying to breath he just shock his head at her first question, No, he couldn't answer her right. Now, he needed to get a grip on himself first. Mentally shaking himself that he was stronger than this and that was in the past, his breathing started to even out as he listened carefully to the answer to his own question. There had been zith colonies around here? Huh. Most likely the knights would have found them though and then... The same knights he fought with too. There was that uncomfortable feeling again. Then again territory disputes between colonies was normal, just Syliras was so big compared to any zith family colony....That feeling was still there. It made him want to itch the inside of his own skin. “I've not seen another zith in the past two years. I don't think there are any real colonies around here.” He finally answered her second question solemnly feeling her curl up against him as the possible truth hit her too. He waited a respectable while before broaching another few of his own questions. “You said Scourge? Your twin's name, I assume? Do- Do you two get along?” It was a strange question to ask but he's own twin, he... No. He wasn't going to touch that set of nerves yet. Shaking that off as his wings shivered against him, not from the cold this time. The zith then tried for a lighter note. “They call me Treachery around here.... well, they don't actually. They call me anything other than that but it's still my sort of name..... Do you have one? A name, I mean. “ Running his claw through the blue hair adorning his mate's head, the zith noted how it matched her eyes perfectly. Distracted his mouth open and words tumbled out to fill the silence. “It's so blue. How is it so blue? Your twin is an entirely different colour and you are blue. Like a sunny day's sky with her like a clear night sky. How? My....... Mine and I were exactly the same in appearance.”

[Scorn]

When the male flinched his wings away, Scorn pulled her hand back, clutching it to her chest and trying not to feel hurt by the implicit rejection. Not knowing how to comfort her new mate, she just lay there, waiting. Eventually his breathing calmed; moving to other topics seemed to help.

She frowned at his report of the absence of Zith. Two years? She'd been gone longer than that, so whatever happened to her colony probably happened before he'd arrived. Of course, that was assuming she was even in the right place. Her sense of direction had never really been her best asset. "Maybe we're too close to the humans," she mumbled, half to herself. "Father always made sure we stayed far enough away. He didn't want the Knights to kill us. Maybe I'm too close, and they all managed to stay hidden..." She wasn't sure who she was trying to convince.

Luckily, new topics of conversation were readily available. "Scourge? I suppose we get along...I mean, except when the prey only has one liver and we have to fight over it." She chuckled mischievously, partly to distract from the other, unsaid half of the answer: when Scourge wants to hide in the cave with the stick-men instead of returning to the skies. But that didn't matter now. They were almost home, and as far from the stick-men as they could possibly get. Scorn didn't think even Scourge could find her way back there now, and she wouldn't go on her own. Scourge was even more afraid of being on her own than Scorn was.

When he gave his name, Scorn tried it out on her tongue. "Treachery." She shrugged. It was passable, for a name in the slave-tongue anyway. "The slaves call me, Scorn," she said. "But you can call my true name." And she told him her name in the language of the Zith.

She leaned into his hand as he began stroking her hair. She did not really understand his babbling. She was rarely awake during daylight, and any time the sun was out, it was far too bright to see what color the sky was. But that was okay. He was looking at her eyes, and she could feel the solid warmth of his presence. He could babble if he wanted.

Though it was silly how fixated he was on appearance. You recognized your kin by smell. But that did bring up an interesting question, "What...where is your twin?" She almost asked 'what happened' again, but from just their short acquaintance it was obvious that Treachery had been through some terrible stuff. He might not be able to talk about it. Which, when Scorn thought about it, was just inefficient. If you couldn't talk about the dangers you've survived, how can you warn others about them? "Can you tell me about the colony you were born to?"

Part of her felt like she was asking just to give him a reason to stay. It took her a moment to realize why she felt like she needed to. "You...you're not going to go back, are you? To your slave colony. You should stay...with us." Scorn wasn't sure she had the strength to drag someone else from the clutches of a false colony. Moreover, she was afraid that if Scourge had any reason to believe another false colony was possible, she would be vulnerable and want to take it. If she couldn't bring Treachery back to being a true Zith soon, Scorn would have to move on from this place, before Scourge started getting...ideas...

[Treachery]

Her answer to his first question made him laugh. That was good. He'd have hated if they had... they had been like him. Slowly relaxing more into the female's embrace, he mentally rolled his new mate and her twins names around his head. Scorn and Scourge. He'd heard those words before but never had picked up on what they meant. His own meant betrayal that much he knew. It fit him well. Continuing to stroke her head, he noticed Scorn was ignoring his own nonsense. Good. It was just his mouth moving without a brain, his tongue enjoying the feeling using his native language. He just felt relaxed. Right up until she asked about his twin. Freezing up, his wings shivered again, and the gentle stroking of her beautiful blue hair stopped. The next question made him flinch. His mouth felt dry and swallowing was getting harder. She was asking some hard to deal with questions. Nope. No he wasn't going into that. He'd had his round of freaking out for the season. No thank you. She was a great lay but he wasn't going with her into that type of territory. Her final question only made him more certain that he should keep his mouth shut. He wasn't staying here with her. He had given his word and he wasn't scared to keep it. Wrapping his arms around her and bring them closer than before He rested her forehead against hers. “I'm not a coward afraid of keeping my own word.” It wasn't really an answer but it's all he gave her before catching her lips again with a tenderness this time. He didn't want to think right now, he just wanted love. A smirk formed on his lips again as he chuckled. “That owl must have tasted good. It's making me hungry.” With that teasing comment, he kissed her again before drawing away.

[Scorn]

Scorn was starting to get tired of him freezing up every time she asked a question. Bad things happened in the wild, and if this Zith couldn't handle that, then maybe he wasn't fit to live. Still...she and Scourge had been on their own a long time. She couldn't risk turning him away before he proved himself to be a liability. She was encouraged by his closeness, but his words were not an answer, and she was unable to relax even when he kissed her.

When he sat up, Scorn's eyes narrowed, and she raised herself into a tense crouch. "That is not an answer. What word? Talk sense." she hissed. Pitching her voice low to keep it from carrying to Scourge, she added with a menacing glare, "Are you Zith, or are you slave? There is no both. Living in the slave colony has made you confused, like my sister used to be. I will not let you confuse her again. So decide. Are you Zith, or slave?"

Something in his eyes made her afraid that he would not choose the right answer. What if he was more slave than Zith? What would she do then?

And suddenly, the answer is obvious. "If you are slave, maybe I should treat you like one, and capture you for myself," she said, with a wicked, slightly desperate grin.

[Treachery]

Scorn took poorly to his choice of words, raising to a crouch demanding he explain what he meant by word and to 'talk sense' her next few words after that though changed Treachery's slowly warming mood to one of ice cold fury. How dare she. How Dare She. His own rage paralysed him as any affection slid away from his face, only raw hate remained. The damn female continued anyway, taunting him finishing off with a threat of her own and sinister smirk. “I am not a slave.” It was said soo quietly even the zith a few feet from him might not have heard him. Suddenly lunging forward, Treachery tried to grab a hold of Scorn's hair, failing that her neck, her arm, anything. Tightening whatever grip he might have had on her, he leant over and growled in her ear voice dripping with venom but still deathly quiet. “I. Am. Not. A. Slave. And I'm NEVER going to be. I'm never going to be THEIR slave and I'm never going to be YOUR slave. So get that stupid idea out of you skull RIGHT now. I choose where I go and where I stay. My life. My decisions. And my word? It means I have plans I want to see through to the end and THAT involves THAT prey colony. Relax. I won't mention you or your sister to the prey there but that won't stop them finding you on their own. So shut up and keep out of their way. After all as I said one zith can't really hold territory alone but neither can only two.” Done with his little speech, Treachery let go of any hold he might have had on the female and put a good few feet between them, eyeing her up for any reaction for a few tick before his own fury pushed him to start taking off. Flapping hard and gaining height above the trees, the zith hovered a moment to look down at Scorn before slowly starting his journey back to Syliras.