[Random adventure times] Kat X Rogue [with Celölas and Lutis!]

Lutis yelped as the sheep suddenly leapt out from inside the warehouse, jumping backwards out of the way at the same time as Celölas. The animal zipped off down the little street they had been in at speed, its little legs peddling comically as it escaped from view. Of all the things to find in a warehouse, that had got to be one of the weirdest of the day.

But the fact that there were more noises from inside the warehouse was slightly… interesting? Something to be wary about? Certainly it sounded like there might be more sheep inside, a general clatter of hooves and movement coming from inside, but for a warehouse district, that wasn’t quite right. The main stockholder’s market and trading and such only ever happened outside of cities, and this was definitely not outside of the city.

Putting a finger to his lips, Lutis slipped quietly inside, beckoning for Celölas to follow him. If they were quiet enough, they might not be noticed before they had worked out what it was that was going on in this warehouse.

Celölas nodded, following Lutis as quietly as she could. The only sound she made was the slight clacking of her claws on the ground, which was barely audible over the noise of what sounded like more sheep inside the warehouse. It was unusual, certainly, but she wouldn’t be surprised if it was just some tradesman’s was of avoiding the proper livestock market – she knew that they charged somewhat to allow anyone to sell their livestock properly.

The warehouse was dark inside (a promising sign, since they didn’t really want to run into whoever owned it), but the open door let in enough light for Celölas to see the vague, fluffy shapes scattered around. Either they were more sheep, or someone had thrown blankets over all of the boxes, but she rather presumed they were sheep.

“Lutis,” she thought to him quietly, “there’s no one in here – just sheep.” She was cautious of disturbing the huge flock, but none of them seemed to even acknowledge that they were there. However, it did seem strange that the sheep were just left here, alone. Surely they had left someone there to guard them, so nobody tried to steal them? Unless there as someone there. The thought sent a shiver down her spine, making her ur stand on end in a line down her back and central tail. She was easily spooked, and just thinking that they might run into danger (again) had thrown a scare into her, and she was effectively frozen to the spot.

"No, I don't think there's just sheep," Lutis whispered back to Celölas, still trying to be as quiet as possible. Thankfully any extra noise they were making was mostly covered up by the noise of the sheep, but he still wanted to be careful. The rumours they had heard about the warehouses back in the pub hadn't been nice, and he didn't want to tangle face-to-face with whoever was behind them, even with Celölas at his side. Anyway, the dragon was too unpredictable- she was lovely, but really, when it came down to trusting her, his instincts screamed not to. She looked really nervous, too.

"Let's stick to the wall, we're less vulnerable here," he said, still walking forwards. Sheep milled all over the place, occasionally bleating miserably or wandering through the rest of their herd. As the pair of them crept along the wall, the sheep moved away as far as they could, despite there not being a helluva lot of space for them to move into. It wasn't perfect, making them a little more noticeable, but there was nothing they could do.
A fence separating the sheep from the rest of the warehouse came into view, propped between a few big crates of nondescript items. Lutis jumped over it, pleased when he managed to vault it without making the metal rattle. As soon as he was the other side though, he shrunk back against the gate, pressed as flat as he could go.
"Celölas! There's a load of guys round the corner here packing stuff out of boxes!" He took another quick look. "Random valuable stuff!"

Celölas followed Lutis silently, dropping to all fours to creep as silently as possible along the wall, pressing herself close to the ground. The sheep shied away from them as though they were wolves or something, but she was still assuming that the warehouse was empty, and that they were safe. However, Lutis’ quiet words removed that idea from her head, and set the fur along her spine on edge again.

So, the warehouse /wasn’t/ empty, was it? Celölas wasn’t sure how she felt about that – it meant that they were closer to solving the mystery of what was going on in the warehouse district, but there was also the chance of more violence. She didn’t like violence – it quite literally brought out the worst in her.

“What sort of valuable stuff?” she thought to him, leaping over the edge of the pen holding the sheep to land silently on the pads of her paws on the other side. She peered around the corner carefully, and saw a glint as the limited light in the warehouse reflected off something shiny. She flinched back, not wanting to be seen, but she had seen enough. They were certainly moving something precious around back there, and the fact that they were covering that up with the mask of sheep smuggling seemed to scream to her that they weren’t supposed to be doing it. Sheep smuggling was already a punishable offence, so they had to be really serious about protecting those crates.

“lutis, maybe we shouldn’t be here…” she said softly, feeling strangely cut off from the world with her sensitive sense of smell cut off by the bandages. It was by far her keenest sense, and without it the world seemed to be in greyscale. It was unnerving, and she was a little uncomfortable.

Keeping his eyes fixed on the men in front of them, he whispered back to Celölas as soon as she had leapt over to his side of the fence, sending the sheep scattering even further away than they had been already. “Like, gold, and silver and stuff. Fabrics too.” They only seemed to be handling valuable goods, not just silver and gold, but less romantic goods too, spices and many long wrapped packages, that looked like they might contain weapons. There were definitely no goods that would normally be found in a warehouse in front of them, and that was enough to put Lutis’ hackles up; it was even stranger they were all in one place.

“Yeah, but where’s the fun in being somewhere else?” he whispered to Celölas’ worried comment, giving her a little wink to try and put her at her ease a little better. Although, he wasn’t completely relaxed himself; they had walked into something big here, and if they got caught, they were going to have to be very slippery to escape again unharmed. “You’re probably right though, we should get outta here. If only to find somewhere better to watch from.” They were exposed from two angles where they were, and a third if anyone else entered the warehouse though the penned sheep, like they had done. He pulled his eyes regretfully away from watching the men pack their crates, nudging Celölas gently in the side before leading off in the opposite direction.

Boxes stacked up high on either side of the “corridor” they were in stopped anyone from seeing them, and it curved away from where the men were working with their goods, so once they were out of sight, they could relax slightly. They seemed to be fully immersed in their work, so it looked like there was little chance of them catching Celölas and Lutis. It was dark too; apparently the only light required was for lighting what people were doing, not for illuminating the whole warehouse. That was a good thing for the sneaking pair, but a bad thing for what came next.
There was barely a couple of seconds’ notice when another man rounded the corner of boxes nearest to them, holding a lamp in one hand that let out the most meagre of lights. Lutis froze to the spot, not knowing whether running or pretending to be working in the warehouse was the better option; as soon as the man saw the pair of them however, that choice was made for them.
“INTRUDERS!”

Celölas peeked again at the boxes of goods. The list Lutis reeled off sounded suspicious, but then again everything about that warehouse was suspicious. She backed into the gate a little way, tucking her ridiculously bandaged nose out of sight, before flinching at Lutis’ quiet words.

“Are you mad?” she thought to him, shaking her head a little, before curling the corner of her mouth up in a smile (her usual toothy grin denied by the wrappings around her face). She felt decidedly nervous – it seemed ridiculous, considering the fact that she was /probably/ stronger than the men in the warehouse, and that she would only get stronger and more ruthless if she was actually attacked, but she was terrified of being spotted. The musty smell of the bandages wasn’t helping, anyway – her sense of smell was vital, being her most powerful sense, so she presumed that was the cause of her excessive anxiety.

She let Lutis lead the way, following him quietly down the twisty ‘corridors’ that the boxes of goods created. The dark wasn’t much of a problem for her – her magic was strong enough for her to feel at home in the dark, at least, and although her keen sense of smell was ruled out, her eyes were just about keen enough to pick out proper shapes in the dim light from the lantern the men had been using to work by. She couldn’t see any signs of danger, and had just let herself relax a little when a flicker of light made her freeze. A person. They were spotted. Time to move.

“Hush, hush!” she thought to the man, her fur standing on end in mild terror. She hoped that, if nothing else, the bizarre image presenting itself to the man would be enough to stop him squawking. That done, she turned her head, and her wide eyes, to Lutis. “I think this is the part where we run…” she mumbled, looking for a way into the open warehouse where they could actually move about. In the network of tunnels formed by the boxes, the men working there had the upper hand, and they surely didn’t stand a chance. Her tails skated across the floorboards with a gentle whispering, as the third stump clicked over the cracks in the floor, showing her discomfort as much as her body language did.

There was a second shout from across the warehouse – apparently the men they had seen on the way in had heard this watchman, and decided that she was not going to wait for them to get to her. She bared her teeth as much as she could through the bandages, and trashed at the boxes in front of her with her tails. A single tower of them tumbled, and she vanished through the hold, racing into the darkness beyond quickly. There was an almighty crash as the boxes landed, but the men already knew they were there now, so she didn’t see how it made much difference. She could only hope that Lutis had his own plan, or was going to follow her lead and get out of the way.

"Good plan!" Lutis managed to yelp back at Celölas as the man rushed for them, his eyes flicking briefly to the frightened looking dragon before up the boxes behind her, scouring them for any way of escape- yes, he would climb if he had to. They were stacked well though, no cracks offering places for his hands or feet to go if he tried to climb. Maybe the opposite way? Maybe backtrack and try and escape through all those sheep again? That was definitely a long shot, there was no way he was going to make it past the men the other end of this tunnel before they caught him. Celölas however, she might have been fast enough. There was nothing like a frightened dragon for a person at speed. He took a few steps backwards anyway; maybe there was another exit they had somehow missed back the way they had come. Or at least some less-tightly-packed boxes that he could climb up.

The shade runner suddenly smashed through the boxes in front of them, the tension of the whole situation shattering like a pane of glass. In all the noise and clatter, Lutis sprinted the other direction, hoping he could perhaps accomplish something on a slightly smaller scale in a different part of the warehouse. But finding Celölas afterwards was going to be a pain...
"Celölas! Meet me where we sat this morning!" he shouted, hoping that the shade runner would both be able to hear him, and interpret what he was saying. He didn't want to outright shout that they had been at a pub; it would make it insanely easy for the thugs to find them again if (when, when!) they escaped, and that was definitely not what Lutis wanted. His head whipped from side to side as he looked for some sort of exit, settling on a thin ridge where a layer of boxes didn't quite come up to the fronts of the boxes underneath them- yes, an escape exit! He ran to the edge of the boxes, jumping and pulling himself up onto the ledge, before heading back the way he had come. It would be less expected, and he might be able to find the dragon better if he was heading approximately the same direction as she was. He leapt across a corridor that suddenly loomed out of nowhere underneath him, yelping as he hit a wall of boxes the other side and almost fell off as they shifted around from his momentum, threatening to topple over. There was a crash somewhere behind, and he hoped the box that had fallen wasn't too near his friend. It made him easier to find though, and he had to move again, despite being relatively shadowed in the space between the crates he had made. Damn, damn, damn!

Celölas dived into a shadow to catch her breath, listening to the madness she had left behind. She heard Lutis’ footsteps take off in the opposite direction (she knew they must be his because he stepped more lightly than the thugs in the warehouse), followed by the clattering of the other man running off in one direction or another. Phew, she was out of harm’s way for the time being. She was just looking around to see if she could see Lutis when another noise startled her. One of the men who had been packing boxes was tearing towards her, sending boxes clattering as he went. Celölas jumped, and took off at an angle, trying to get away. She was faster than the man by a long shot, and the darkness around her lent itself to hiding her better than it would for the humans, but she was still terrified. She was so scarred that one of them would catch an arm on a sharp box, and that the bandages around her nose wouldn’t be enough to stop the smell reaching her.

Lutis’ voice drifted though the chaos so faintly that Celölas almost missed it. ‘Where we met this morning…’ was all she picked out, but she could guess the rest. She relaxed for a moment, before cursing inwardly. Bugger, she thought, where /did/ we meet? The falling boxes behind her were loud enough o drown out her own thoughts, and it took her a long time to remember the bar. Sadly, the thinking time had given the man behind her a chance to catch up, and she felt his fingertips brush the end of her tails, telling her to run. She yelped, before dancing between two towers of boxes and into another narrow corridor. One toppled, and trapped the stump of her missing third tail, making her whimper, but she kept running. There was a crack of light at the other end of the warehouse that could be one of two things: a man with a lantern, or a back door. She prayed it was the latter, and started to weave her way towards it, terrified that the man pursuing her would catch up.

What she hadn’t realized was that the falling box had cracked the scab over the end of her tail, and she was leaving a thin trail of red. The bandages were doing their job, and she couldn’t smell it, so at least the others nearby were /safe/, but it meant she couldn’t go anywhere without leaving a clear path for the men to follow. If she had noticed, it wouldn’t be so bad, but she hadn’t, so she just kept running.

Boxes fell away to either side of her, but she made it to the crack of light and found that it was indeed a back entrance. She dived through it into the light, and ran around to the back of the warehouse, panting. The light blinded her dark-adjusted eyes, but she was sure she was out of harms way. Now she just had to hope Lutis had been as lucky.

(ooc;; sorry if it's a bit messy - hope you have a way of replying successfully without much interaction)

This was madness! Lutis could hardly stop to think as he leapt across another gap in the direction of what he assumed was an exit, arms spiralling wildly until he managed to catch hold of a box across the jump and steady himself. Somewhere over in another part of the warehouse he could hear more crashes and bangs, obviously from where Celölas was trying to escape. He would have worried about why she was making so much noise, but he was a little preoccupied trying to get away himself.

He climbed up a few layers of boxes, so he was nearer to the ceiling, so he could better try and work out where the exit was. A haze of light on one side of the warehouse screamed “exit!” and he made a beeline for it, running along the tops of the crates again. He could see more men running around behind him, and a few in front too, obviously chasing the shade runner, wherever she had got to. It sounded like they were heading towards the same exit- they had lucked out. He gave a breathless laugh as he outran the men following him on the ground, scrambling down a layer of boxes so they couldn’t see him any more. It was crazy, but it was working!

The exit was in sight as he sprinted towards it along the final layer of boxes, a dark shadow dashing through it a little ahead of him- it was obviously Celölas, no man was that shape. She was pursued, of course, although these men were behind her by quite a way, and Lutis would get to the doorway first too. Or he would have, had it not been for one of the men being an archer, sliding to a halt and pulling his bow taut before loosening his arrow in Lutis’ direction. The thief dived forwards, landing on his stomach on the layer of boxes he was on, before tumbling forwards with the learned agility of only someone who had spent all their life running around on rooftops. He grabbed hold of another box to stop himself from rolling off the edge of the boxes, but this time, he wasn’t so lucky, his hand slipping- he fell with an ungainly crash onto the ground, his previous agility deserting him in one moment. The box he had tried to grab came down too, showering wood and pottery pieces (which were inside) all over the place. He started to scramble to his feet, yelping as one of his wrists gave way under his weight and putting the other to his throbbing head, but paused halfway to standing, freezing in place as he was met with the sight of the archer, another arrow levelled at him. He needed Celölas’ help, but at the same time, wanted her to run; there was blood on the floor, and who knew what that would do to her.

The clattering behind her had told Celölas that Lutis must have been following, trying to reach the same exit, so she panted to herself, waiting for someone to emerge from the warehouse, either being Lutis, or to give chase. She waited in silence, panting to get her breath back. What was taking so long? Something had to be wrong…

The almighty clatter inside made her jump, the fur along her spine standing on edge defensively. However, the clatter meant something was /definitely/ wrong, and lutis was probably in trouble. She owed him everything, for still letting her stick around after last time, and she was fairly sure that the bandages were thick enough to handle whatever she could find inside. Besides, even if the worst happened, she could maybe explain to Lutis how to bring her back under control. It was worth a try.

A soft click punctuated the clattering – a sound that sounded much more sinister than the noisy boxes, and that was enough to fully convince Celölas to run. She burst back through the door, snarling as best she could with the bandage around her nose, and saw the archer with his raised bow. Damn, it really /had/ gotten serious. Well, it was too late to run now…

“Lutis, are you alright?” she thought to him, moving to his side. The men that had been pursuing them seemed to have stopped, turning the whole scene into a momentary face-off, which gave her time to collect her thoughts if nothing else. She didn’t like all this – it was too… threatening, but she didn’t feel like running away was a viable option any longer. She looked at the men facing them, and quickly counted them up. There were a good few, and more seemed to be appearing out of the dark, but she knew they she could physically take down a few of them, if only she had the bravery. /your other half is brave/ a little voice told her, before vanishing into the dark. It was true, but she didn’t want to… she couldn’t…

“What are we going to do?” she asked, trying to keep her thoughts close so that the others couldn’t hear them. She hadn’t even noticed the sticky, red pool on the floor (most of which was from the cut in her own tail), which would only have added to their problems right then.

Lutis rose properly to his feet, making sure to move slowly so the archer didn’t get ideas and shoot him. He put his hands in the air, wincing at the pain that shot through one of his wrists- what had he done to it? It would definitely need checking out later on. For now though, he wasn’t going to make any moves that looked even vaguely threatening. More men had caught up with the archer, a couple looking a bit battered from boxes that had fallen on them, but that seemed to make them very angry. No points for guessing why, and the atmosphere was really starting to charge with the arrival of every new spectator.
“If I said I was fine, would you believe me?” he said sarcastically to the shade runner as she stepped across to his side, his eyes flicking over her. She looked to be pretty much in one piece, except for the wreck of one of her tails, which had looked severely worse for wear anyway, but was now clotted with blood and really not a nice sight. “You okay? Your erm… tail doesn’t look so pretty.” He didn’t want to draw attention to the fact she was bleeding and make her panic, but it was probably better she knew, before she potentially went crazy again…

“Just… don’t panic. We can’t really do much without getting shot, so just try and act innocent or something.” He had been looking across at the dragon, but a sharp shout from one of the men made him look up again.

“Stay still, don’t move, otherwise we’ll shoot you. What are you doing here? Why were you snooping around?” barked one man, stepping up next to the bowman, a fierce look on his face. “What have you seen?”

Lutis gulped, then slowly told them that they had just gotten lost, and were looking for a way out. They had picked the wrong warehouse, he said, the label on the door was faded. His explanation didn’t seem to go down well, causing more shuffling and whispers between the others, before one of them said, “Why did you run off then?”

That stumped Lutis for an answer. Hopefully Celölas would have some sort of excuse.

“Erm, not really.” She though back, shuffling on the spot. When Lutis mentioned her tail, however, it throbbed sympathetically. Her eyes were drawn to the red on the floor, and the realisation hit her like a sledgehammer: most of the blood already spilled was hers. Well, better that she knew… and her nose was still successfully bandaged up. “I knew I’d caught it on something.” She though, half to herself, before looking up. Her fur raised a little, giving her back the cutesy puffball appearance, and she sat beside Lutis trying to look innocent, as instructed.

She nodded along with Lutis’ story about getting lost, her eyes wide. She wasn’t /really/ that worried, but when you were as twitchy as she was it wasn’t difficult to fake. However, the accusation caught her out – she hadn’t been expecting the warehouse thugs to be able to /think/. However, after a moment, she took a step forward, looking at the men with her very best ‘upset’ expression plastered onto her face. There was a tense shuffling sound as she moved, but it stopped as the men realised she was going no further.

“You were all carrying knives or crossbows… it was scary…” she thought to the group of men, her mental voice sounding childlike, but accusing all the same. “we thought you were going to hurt us – one of you hurt my tail already.” She added, flattening her ears in forced bewilderment, and letting a thin film of forced tears creep into her eyes. She hoped she was a good actor, or else she could have just gotten them into serious trouble, but it seemed like her best shot. She was a terrible liar, but she was good at faking emotions – she had learned how to do that as soon as she realised how much she had to move around to cater for her… condition.

((Celólas' favourite escape method: turn on the crocodile tears Wink

))

What Lutis didn’t expect from Celölas was what she produced, and he had to work hard to keep surprise off his face as she stepped away from his side, looking like a cute fluffball and acting like a child that had been lost, and was now being chastised for her actions. He probably wasn’t being very helpful standing and looking at her like he was just as surprised by her story as everyone else though, so he stepped forwards and crouched next to the dragon, pretending they were like friends that had been together for much longer than just a day.

“Celö gets scared when people’re loud and shout,” he explained, putting one hand on her shoulder and rubbing her fluffy fur. He hoped she wouldn’t turn and bite his head off for doing it. “I didn’t want to lose her when she ran off, so there was no time to explain. She’d have gotten even more frightened on her own.”
Although still angry, the men seemed to be taking in their story; at least, he hadn’t been shot yet for moving, which was only a good thing. As a precautionary measure, he untied his scarf from his neck and grabbed hold of Celölas’ tail, wrapping it around the bleeding end. Damn, he didn’t want her smelling that. “Will you let us go? She’s hurt her nose too, and it needs seeing to.”
Well, couldn’t have them asking questions about the bandages tied around her mouth, now could they?

He looked up at the men again, who seemed less sure of themselves. Well, most of them. A couple still looked unconvinced, apparently angrier (or more cautious) of being caught at what they had been doing.
“Get up,” one said, moving forwards slightly. There was a small discussion between him and another of the men, then he barked, “We’re taking you over to see the boss.”
It was all very cliché mob-style.

Celölas nodded as Lutis added to the story, and kept up her innocent act throughout, sniffling to herself. She even genuinely twitched in fear as the armed men moved around to talk to each other as she got into the feel of the acting. “Thanks.” She mentally muttered to Lutis as he bandaged up her tail. She didn’t need it bleeding any more, and it also /really/ hurt, so it seemed like a good thing all round.

When the men turned around again, Celölas jumped, and not just to keep up her childish look. She was a twitchy dragon at the best of times, and she was genuinely nervous now. “The b-b-boss?” she stammered, wilting a little and leaning against Lutis. She hoped he thought she was still acting, but in truth she was terrified. This meant her plan hadn’t exactly worked, and she wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep up the act. Before too long it was going to become obvious that she was lying, and they would have to hightail it out of the warehouse /again/.

Her frightened voice didn’t seem to have any effect. She looked at Lutis desperately, as if to ask for the game plan. However, she was curious – as the first man started walking to lead the way, she padded slowly behind him, eager to find out who this ‘boss’ character was. Plus, she didn’t think it would look too good if they ran, and so far there was still a chance of getting out with nothing more than a slapped wrist and a warning.

“No worries. Hey, chin up, it won’t be so bad, kay?” said Lutis quietly, patting the dragon soothingly on the back once he was finished. Hopefully his scarf would stay on, at least until her tail stopped bleeding. And there was another thing that needed to go in the wash! He stood, waiting for some sort of verdict, but when it came, it didn’t sound too good. Celölas certainly didn’t react well to the news, and he rested his hand on her side to try and calm her nerves, sending a wave of thought; It’ll be fine!

“Are you sure about this?” he asked one of the men as they gathered around them and they set off back through the warehouse again, the door dissolving into a little pinprick of light behind them. It was like waving goodbye to freedom. “I mean, we literally were just lost, all we want is to go and get back to the main city again…” he tailed off, wilting at the blank stares he got in return. “Well, okay then…”

They were maybe a few hundred yards away from the doorway when strange things started happening. It was dark, the way just lit by the lamps each man carried, maybe totalling ten in all.
Then one vanished.
Lutis noticed quickly, having been keeping an eye on everyone and everything to try and think of some way to escape. One minute there was a man, walking along with a lantern and as atypical as every other man, the next, there was nothing, just a blank space. Then another man disappeared, again, without a noise, without a trace. At that point, the others started noticing, and an aura of tension started to buzz over them.

The third man’s disappearance was only noticed immediately because he dropped his lantern, the metal clattering on the floor. Lutis stopped dead on the spot, head swivelling before he stepped close to Celölas. There was no way a big dragon like her could suddenly be… abducted. Not like a man could. Right?
“Is it just me, or did three people just disappear into thin air?” he asked nervously, peering into the darkness.

Celölas winced at the uninspiring response that Lutis got from the men when he asked if they could go. It was actually painful to watch, and t made it absolutely official that they weren’t going anywhere. She was thankful of Lutis’ reassuring presence though – she was really getting freaked out now, by both the odd goings-on in the warehouse and the slick feeling of her own blood underfoot. Lucikly they were following a new path, so they’d leave the trail she’d left behind her soon. That left one less thing to worry about.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flicker of movement. She turned her head quickly, looking for whatever had moved, but saw nothing. Just an empty space where she thought she’d seen something. The metallic clatter that followed a moment later mad her jump – fur standing on end in genuine terror. There was a lantern just rolling on the floor, discarded, but no trace of its owner. This was getting freaky. When the third person vanished, she actually saw them wink out of existence, and felt her stomach churn. She stopped mid-step, her eyes wide. “It sure looks that way…” she thought to Lutis, stepping closer to him even as he moved to her side. She was sure she was too big to disappear, but she didn’t trust the warehouse around her anymore.

“Was that supposed to happen?” she asked the nearest man, who looked about as terrified as Celölas felt. She got no answer in the murmering, and looked around, trying to spot the source of the spontaneous disappearances. She couldn’t see anything. Well, it looked like they’d found the warehouse they had set off to look for, but suddenly Celölas wished they were still looking, or had given up entirely.

“Will someone tell me what on earth is going on?” she demanded a moment later, shoving her thoughts rather forcefully into the heads of the men nearby, making one or two of them jump. Enough was enough – either they explained, actually /took/ them to see the manager or let them go – no more milling about in confusion.

Lutis jumped with the other men at the shade runner’s sudden demand of an explanation, patting her lightly on the side. “It’s okay, I’m sure it’s just some sort of… trick.” Although it really didn’t seem that way, there was no good in being frightened, surely everything would be explained reasonably in a minute. Even if it was some sort of tactic to make them scared, and say the real reason they had been in the warehouse… ooh, but that didn’t bode well either.

But the men just seemed as frightened and confused as they themselves were, those that were left behind grouping together. One even had the cheek to ask whether it was Lutis and Celölas causing the sudden disappearance of men, which Lutis denied most vehemently. After all, they were just as confused as everyone else!

Silence descended on the group, too nervy to keep walking or keep up conversation. And with good reason too- there was suddenly a swish of black as a shadow detached itself from the blackness of the warehouse, leaping down from between a few boxes, then grabbed hold of one of the men and dragged him away into the dark again, almost faster than they could see. Lutis just managed to see the shadow just, but he couldn’t work out what it was in the short time that he had seen it. Once again, there was hardly any noise from the man, just a faint whisper of feet as the monster disappeared again.
“Okay Celö, I just saw a thing, and this is not lookin’ good,” he said frantically, pressing his back up against the dragon. Despite a few men still being around, he pulled out a short dagger from his belt, holding it defensively in front of him. Whatever it was, it obviously had the whole situation under control; the last man it had taken had looked pretty hefty.

A hissing noise came out of the darkness, accompanied by a tight voice, “What have you done with my son?”

“Yes… a trick…” Celölas nodded, hoping Lutis was right. However, the actions of the warehouse workers seemed to suggest that it wasn’t a trick they were in on, which made Celölas especially suspicious. What was going /on/ here? He hissed furiously as one of the men accused her and Lutis of causing the disappearances, unable to keep up any sort of manners in the face of such a preposterous suggestion.

She heard the whisper of feet, and turned her head sharply in the direction of the sound. What looked like a section of the darkness melted into the rest – like a bit of black fabric being shaken out, but she didn’t see anything else. However, when Lutis’ words reached her, she realised that she must have seen the ‘thing’ he had disappearing. That didn’t seem promising.

The hissing sound made her leapt about three feet up in the air. She trembled, listening to the harsh words, and looked around for a source. The men were mostly trembling too – it wasn’t one of them – so she looked at the darkness in the direction that shred of darker darkness had gone in. She presumed that was what the voice belonged to…

Only once she’d started looking for the creature did she realise what the voice had said. Its son? The poor thing. In spite of everything, the soft side to Celölas’ heart wanted to find whatever was speaking and give it a hug – it sounded like it needed one. However, she was well aware of the dangers in the warehouse right then, and had no desire to let her mind wander overmuch.

Something about the hissy voice reminded Celölas a little bit too much of the velvety voice at the back of her mind. As if the memory was enough to summon it, the voice settled into her ear, and started to whisper away – taunting away. Celölas gave a snarl, shaking her head to try to dislodge it, drawing a few unnerved looks from the men around them. She barely even noticed. Darkness draws out more darkness apparently, and she was not happy about letting hers out.

“What should we do?” whispered Lutis, jumping at the voice too, but not as much as Celölas did- she really was jumpy now, obviously uncomfortable with the situation. Well, that was a given, but nobody else was this jumpy. He would have patted her again, to try and calm her down, but he doubted it would have helped- and she might go down the accidentally violent route instead of relaxing, and bite his hand off or something. She was certainly volatile enough to.

But none of that solved either of their problems, that they were being threatened by some unknown shadow-monster, or that they were secondly prisoners (but that didn’t seem to matter much now). After a resounding silence from the rest of the men though to the thing’s question, there was an angry, frustrated hiss from the shadows, then the thing attacked again, dragging three men into the shadows, crushing a fourth to the floor with its weight, then dispatching the last man with a slice of its claws. He went down in a spray of blood and Lutis gasped, thankful he was in the way of Celölas’ view.
“Don’t look round!” he yelped, averting his own eyes too. Things were getting quite grim, and the fact that they were the only two left really wasn’t comforting. His hand holding the dagger shook. He really hoped those bandages around Celölas’ nose were tight, because she had gone crazy over just a little bit of blood, and now there was quite a lot…

“I’ll give you another chance, answer my question. Where is my son?” said the voice, this time accompanied by a slight sigh. With only a dragon and one human left, she could take her time, draw out their fear, if she didn’t hear what she wanted to hear. She didn’t like using these tactics, but if it was the only way to get hold of the information she wanted… well, she had few qualms about using them.

Being invisible was less of a necessity too now, although it was almost pitch dark with all the lanterns out, bar one that barely burnt on the ground. She stepped out close to it, crouching near to the ground and letting herself be seen, her yellow-green eyes boring into the pair in front of her. An Ebony Hunter, why she was invisible in the dark. And deadly.

Celölas nodded at Lutis’ words, realising from his tone of voice that she /really/ shouldn’t turn around. She felt a spray of something warm and wet hit her back, and knew immediately what it was. She felt sick, the stickyness on her back feeling completely wrong since she was still in her right mind. The dusty smell of the bandages was lanced with something shark and bitter, but she couldn’t smell the blood through it properly. It was good enough – at least for now.

The voice hissed again, but Celölas managed not to flinch as much this time. She could hear a certain edge to the voice that she hadn’t noticed before. It took her a moment to figure it out, but she soon realised that it was a female voice, and her sympathy for the creature grew, even as the men around them disappeared. She turned around, slowly, turning towards the voice. The carpet of red around her made her almost retch, but she held her head up, looking straight back into the bright eyes that had just appeared out of the darkness. “T-tell us about him.” She mentally stammered, her body actually quivering, but not from the threat of the monster: from the sheer amount of blood. “Your son – tell us about him. Maybe we can help.” The thought was full of compassion, and she tried to let the creature (which she couldn’t recognise as anything she’d seen before) that she wanted to help, but a sharp voice cut her thoughts.
~you’re strong enough to burst those bandages with just your jaw – we both know it.~ the voice said, hissing in imitation of the creature they faced. ~I can stop you feeling sick – I can make that thing go far, far away…~ She gave a howl, squeezing her eyes shut to stop herself seeing any more of the redness that seemed to be egging the voice on. The voice just laughed, and slipped back out of her thoughts, apparently happy to just watch from the sidelines.

Regaining her composure at that, Celölas turned to Lutis. Her eyes were big and worried, but the /terror/ had left them – she was beginning to relax into the situation a little. “We have to help her.” she said quickly, nodding towards the eyes in the darkness. “Then she might stop.”

Lurking at the edge of the light, Illeana eyed the two in front of her angrily, waiting for them to make some sort of move, either to escape, or possibly attack. She hissed as Celölas spoke, flattening the spines around her head.
“What ideas are you spinning? You must know about my son… why else would you be here?”

Her resolve suddenly weakened though- did they really not know where her son was? Dragons didn’t lie like humans did, and this dragon certainly seemed very… well, sure of herself wasn’t the right way to put it, but certainly she seemed genuine. She didn’t relax, mistrusting of both the knife in Lutis’ hand, and the shade runner’s sudden howl, making her flinch and leap backwards, hiding in the shadows again.
“Why do you make such noises? What is there to howl about?” She hadn’t got within a wingspan’s width of the other dragon, preferring to take out those around the pair first.

The whole situation the two were in, faced with an angry dragon, in a warehouse belonging to a group of thugs and smugglers, who might possibly have had something to do with a missing dragon pup, meant that what had seemed like a normal line of thread had suddenly turned into the biggest spiderweb knot ever seen, probably with a dash of glue in there too, just to make things even more confusing. Lutis flinched at Celölas’ howl, almost dropping his knife in shock at the inhuman, tortured sound. He hesitantly stroked one hand along the dragon’s side, hoping it might keep her a little calmer.
“It’s okay Celo, just try and think of somethin’ good, ‘kay?” He was worried about her nearly as much as he was about this new ebony hunter. “I dunno about her son, but yeah, we should help. If we can. But you have to keep it together, right?” He gave her one more appraising look, then turned back to where Illeana had disappeared into the shadows again. She may not be there any more, it was hard to tell, but it was their best bet at where to address.
“We don’t know where your son is, but maybe we could help find him? Is he an ebony hunter too?”

A hoarse “yes” answered his question. Then, following that, the ebony hunter started to speak properly; “He was taken a few months ago, I’ve been searching for him ever since. My mate is… dead. This is the last place I’ve been able to track Vorran to.”

Lutis’ words reached Celölas, and seemed to chase off the little hissy voice nicely. She relaxed, thinking a gentle thanks to the man, before sitting up a little more, trying to control herself. She was getting really uncomfortable, but she was holding together. Her nose was still bound up anyway, which made it all a bit easier to deal with.

“I-I’m sorry about that. I, er, you see, well – there’s blood on the floor.” She stammered, bowing her head a little. She was a bit embarrassed, but the fact that she was distracted enough to actually /be/ embarrassed gave her hope that they might make it out of the warehouse with everyone in one piece. Or at least, if they didn’t, it wouldn’t be her fault.

Stepping backwards to avoid a slowly spreading puddle that was getting a bit too close to her feet, Celölas stood right against Lutis, staying as close as she could to him – especially when they couldn’t see the mysterious ebony hunter. “I’m alright now, I think. We just need to focus on moving quickly.” She said, her confidence sliding back just a little. A hissy voice from a slightly different patch of shadows pulled her attention back to the ebony hunter, and she twitched, looking back into the shadows.

Illeana’s story melted Celölas, completely distracting her from her personal worries. “I’m so sorry.” The thought slipped out unbidden, but she meant it wholeheartedly. She knew she’d never have a mate of her own, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t appreciate the effects of losing one. “We hadn’t heard anything about him – we were looking into some things going missing around here.” She added, forcing herself to keep thinking – anything logical would do as a topic, she just couldn’t let her mind wonder.

Distrustful of Celölas’ dislike of blood, Illeana watched the two from her shadowy position between boxes, noting how the dragon pressed close to her human companion. Were the pair dragon and rider? It seemed odd, to her- a wild dragon- that her natural companions would find a bond with a skinny two-leg and forsake their freedom to bow to another’s will, but there were all sorts in the world. Who knew if some found their attachment with another species? Indeed, she could never have explained her own attachment to her mate, Diarr, to one who had not had the same with another.

She curled her claws bitterly into the floorboards at the dragon’s apology- sorry was just a word. She didn’t want any pity. Before she dwelled on it too much, for her to get angry about it, the sound of voices and boxes being moved again came from across the warehouse, the sounds deadened by the distance and the maze of crates all over the place. Her head swivelled towards the noise and she silently leapt up onto the top of a tower of boxes, standing at the top and looking around before taking off towards the direction of the sounds.
“If you are to help, then help now,” she said quietly, not waiting to spare a glance in the others’ direction before disappearing out of sight.

As Illeana suddenly dashed off after a sound, Lutis relaxed slightly, letting out a tense breath. They were still alive! That alone was fortunate enough. With the Ebony Hunter gone, they could get the hell out of the warehouse complex and away to somewhere safe. And hopefully not come back, because things had turned a little more hairy that he had hoped that they would. Excitement was one thing, being threatened with death was another! But, from the way Celölas had reacted to Illeana’s story, he didn’t think that she would want to leave without giving at least a little help. He hesitantly looked at the shade runner, pointing in the general direction that they had heard the Ebony Hunter disappear off to.
“We’re… going to help?” he asked tentatively.

“Of course we are!” Celölas insisted as Illeana vanished into the darkness again. /How/ they were going to help, however, she wasn’t sure. The sound of shuffling boxes wasn’t promising, however, so that was probably the best place to start. Every part of her was screaming to get out of the warehouse, but she knew she couldn’t bring herself to leave the other dragon on her own without offering some help.

“Well, I think we can safely say we found the cause of the disturbances we came looking for.” She told Lutis, with a hint of amusement. “So, where do we start?” She had no idea which way to go even. Should they follow the ebony hunter, or go the other way and search elsewhere? “You can lead the way if you like.” She hinted to Lutis, looking around for any new signs of danger. She couldn’t see anyone, but the shuffling sounds were getting louder, so they had probably better move soon to avoid another encounter with crossbows.

Wonderful, more trouble! Although, Lutis couldn’t really say that he hadn’t been thinking otherwise- he knew when it was time to make a run for it and call it quits, but he would’ve felt a tad bit guilty about leaving this one behind without giving a bit of a hand somewhere. Or at least, giving it a go to try and help. He nodded, steeling himself for the worst. And they had just gotten out of a pickle, too. Rubbing the back of his head, he bent and felt around on the floor, trying to find one of the lamps that the men who had been escorting them through the warehouse had been carrying.

“Yeah, I guess you could put it that way,” Lutis mumbled, finding a lamp and picking it up off the ground. One of the bits of glass had smashed, but after he shook out the broken bits, he found there was actually a little oil left inside- the container had a clever little design that meant the oil didn’t immediately go everywhere if it got knocked over. He lit the thing and held it up, then started picking his way through the now-visible unconscious (or dead?) bodies around. “I suppose following her’s probably the best plan; we’re gonna get lost again otherwise.”

Taking the lead, they quickly made their way away from the scene of carnage left behind by Illeana, trying to work out the general direction that the Ebony Hunter had run off in. There were a few more moving specks of light now, the remaining people in the warehouse alerted to what had been happening by the shouts and frightened calls that had come earlier. Lutis didn’t like that the lantern he was holding gave away their position so, but it was either that or blundering around in the dark, and that was hardly going to get them anywhere. Eventually though, they did come to where they had been before, the boxes that had been being moved around now either packed, open and deserted, or ransacked. Looked like Illeana had gotten there before they had…

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