“Noooo! No takey!” Kiri whined, biting her quivering lip as tears spilled over from her wide eyes. “My Lycurgoose!” she whined, burying her face in Lycurgus’ jacket.
There came a sudden flash of silver, making Mastiff freeze in place, not moving a muscle, feeling the sting of cold metal against his neck.
“You make her cry again and I’ll kill you,” Lycurgus smiled, his expression a little too cheery.
“You got me,” Mastiff’s face was apologetic, he slowly raised his arms in surrender. “You surprised me there, you’ve always been good at surprising people, but now-- You’re just outright scary....” Mastiff laughed, his brown eyes meeting Saubre’s unnaturally green eyes, pleading for her help, but not counting on it as she was frozen in horror, shuddering from her place beside him.
“Ouch, that’s cold,” Mastiff forced a smile, his teeth chattering a bit as a new wave of dark energy sent another shudder down his spine.
“Do you understand what I’ll do if Kiri gets hurt?” Lycurgus asked.
“What?” the Mai Shashi asked, obviously very amused at seeing him angry, secretly a little nervous too. She was looking for possible weaknesses he might have, knowing if she figured some out they would turn out to very useful in the near future....
“Well, first I’ll turn that person into ground meat,” Lycurgus pressed the tip of his sword closer to the vulnerable skin of Mastiff’s neck, just below his chin, grinning darkly when he saw his Adam’s Apple bounce when he swallowed hard.
“And then, I’ll turn that ground meat into patties and grill them, then eat them and then once I’ve shat those ground meat patties out, I’ll use it to fertilize grass and then feed that grass to a cow, who’ll shit you out too, and then so on and so on,” Lycurgus finished, loosening his grip on his weapon.
“You understand?” he asked, receiving a desperate nod from Mastiff, whom had broken out in a cold sweat.
“Good, then I don’t think we’re going to have any more misunderstandings are we?” he asked.
“Nope,” Mastiff popped his p to annoy Lycurgus, but not daring to shake his head, a drop of sweat running down his forehead.
“Oh yeah, and the same goes for if you hurt wither the Mai Shashi or Saubre too,” Lycurgus added, sheathing his sword and crouching down next to Kiri.
Saubre let out a sigh of relief, clapped her hands together once and forced a grin, shrugging to Mastiff in apology.
Mastiff smiled and waved it off, not wanting to annoy Lycurgus while he was still in a dangerous mood.
“Kiri, he’s not going to take me,” Lycurgus’ expression softened as he pried her arms carefully from around his waist so he could look her in the eyes, brushing her newly trimmed hair from her face, sighing when he saw how blotchy and red it had gotten.
“M-m-m-m,” Kiri hiccupped, unable to get a single word out.
Lycurgus had a soft spot for crying girls--especially children--and was unsure of how to calm Kiri. “I’m still here, look, Mastiff didn’t take me, did he?”
“No-“ Kiri sniffled, rubbing at her eyes with the sleeves of her dress, which was really nothing more than an overly large sweater. The dark green sweater hung down past her knees, but she still had shorts (luckily they found a pair small enough) and a shirt on beneath (also a little too large for her).
YOU ARE READING
Falling Up
Mystery / Thriller*sequel to Ashes* Sharon has remembered her name, but is still no closer than she was to finding out what happened to her friends, Joshua and Markl, who think they finally have a lead on what Alice wanted them to get for her... but Alice has other t...
Chapter Five
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