Old Deal, ch 2
#2 of really old fic
see prior post.
A half-hour later, Ryu carefully made his way down the steps. Rei followed not far behind, water still dripping off his body. Afterwards, Rei had taken an actual shower, as had Ryu. Ryu, however, was already dry, a side-effect of having a body not covered in thick fur.
Ryu slowly walked into the kitchen. Rei followed behind while trying to pull on a pair of pants, an endeavor which was not going well considering his wet fur. Ryu looked over his shoulder at Rei and sighed. Then he sat down on a stool and lifted the lid covering the omelette he had cooked. It was cold but otherwise edible. Ryu bent over the counter and started picking at it with a fork.
Rei had given up on trying to put on the pants and threw the wadded up (and now rather damp) fabric across the room to land on the couch he had been sleeping on earlier. Rei pulled a chair up to the other side of the counter and sat down, his chest pressed against the back of the chair as he looked over at Ryu.
The kitchen drawers rattled as Rei pulled them open and Ryu paused in his eating for a moment, but resumed a half-second later without looking up. Then, a fork thudded down into the omelette a half-inch from Ryu's face. It stuck in the omelette for a second, quivering slightly, before Rei yanked the fork back, bringing with it a large chunk of the cooked egg to eat.
Ryu blinked. "You know, I cut it in half for a reason."
Rei shrugged carelessly, an action which sent small droplets of water flying from the longer patches of fur on his shoulders. "I'm hungry," Rei stated simply. He turned to the window, as if something had caught his attention outside. "It's hard to believe it's after noon."
"Nnn," was Ryu's response. He poked at the omelette a bit, then looked up at Rei. "So, what do you plan on doing now?" He had been wondering about that. Rei had vanished for around a year, and Ryu was wondering why he had come back.
"Well..." Rei laced his fingers together behind his head and leaned back, and Ryu watched the muscles in his abdomen pull taut to prevent him from falling backwards. "I didn't think anyone would be here. I figured I'd just stay here for a few days and then leave."
"Leave... where?" Ryu blinked quizzically.
Rei started and sat upright on the chair, which made rather ominous creaking sounds as his weight shifted. "Oh, right, I didn't tell you about that." He actually looked rather sheepish, and he scratched the back of his head while looking down. "I, uh, found other people like me." Ryu blinked. He had read some of the old history books stored in Dragnier a while ago, and they said that the Woren clan had left and settled down... elsewhere, they hadn't been very specific. But it sounded like Rei had found them.
"Oh," Ryu pondered that for a moment. "And you were planning on leaving without telling any of us?" His eyes narrowed and he pointed his fork rather accusingly at Rei. Rei raised his hands, palms facing towards Ryu, in a gesture of conciliation.
"Hey, I'm not now, and..." Rei trailed off and looked down as he dropped his hands to his sides. "I would have felt guilty about it anyways, but I guess now I don't have to!" Rei sat forward and rested his elbows on the smooth counter. "Yeah, sorry. I just... I don't really like other people."
Ryu sighed and dragged a hand through his blue hair. "So, what do you think you'll do now?" He neatly placed his fork down next to the plate his unfinished food was lying on.
"Well, I talked to the chief and they're okay with me living there. I said I'd be back their way in a few weeks after I finished tying up loose ends." Rei looked up at Ryu, then back at his hands, which he had placed palms down, fingers spread, on the countertop. "I dunno what to do now, because it's not the gentlemanly thing to just take off after, uh, what happened." Which while true, did not exactly hold true to the spirit that Rei lived life with-- things like this had happened to him before and he usually felt very little guilt about taking off afterwords, but it was just different when it was Ryu sitting on the other end of the table, looking sad and a bit guilty.
Ryu looked up and over at Rei, who was now looking down at the floor with a rather guilty expression on his face. "I could come with you," Rei looked up, his face expressing surprise. "I don't really have anything keeping me here."
Rei ran a hand through his still-wet hair. "I, uh... thanks." He shook his upper body and droplets of water sprinkled all over the kitchen. "I guess we should get packed, then."
Ryu blinked. "So that's it? We just pack up and leave?"
"You have anything else to do?" Rei toyed with Ryu's discarded fork. "I'm looking forward to seeing the other Woren again."
Ryu sighed. "I'll go get my backpack. You should get some clothes on." Ryu turned and walked upstairs, while Rei sat at the table and grinned.
They stayed at the cabin for another night at Ryu's insistence, and set out fairly early the next morning. Ryu spent several hours trying to figure out how to properly turn off Momo's various odd machines, but eventually settled for just removing the chunks of chrysm ore that made the things run.
They had a rather uneventful trip across the countryside, as Rei steadily lead the way towards the northern checkpoint. They had to stop once for nightfall, but the next day they arrived at the area around the checkpoint (roughly, the middle of nowhere) before noon. Neither of the two guards assigned there (positions they undoubtedly earned due to their ineptitude) were actually guarding the gate. Which made sense, because no one actually went through the checkpoint in either direction with any amount of regularity.
Ryu leaned against the walls of the small canyon the checkpoint was built in, making sure not to squish his pack between his back and the rock. "So I guess we go over and knock on the door, huh?"
Rei turned and looked at Ryu as if he had grown a second head (in fact, Ryu tended to avoid that particular dragon transformation for the exact reason that he didn't enjoy those kinds of looks) and actually looked agape at Ryu for a moment. "You're the worst thief ever, you know. Of course we're not going to alert the guards. I was planning on just sneaking by."
"I'm not a thief," Ryu stated rather matter-of-factly.
"And don't I know it," Rei countered. "But I'm good enough that I'll be able to cover for your bungling." Rei rolled his shoulders and headed towards the large wooden wall and gate that was the functional part of the checkpoint.
Ryu rolled his eyes but obligingly followed Rei, who quickly inspected the gate, then angled off to an obscured section of wall, behind the wooden building both guards were likely napping in.
"The hinges on the gate are rusted shut, or at least enough that we couldn't open the door without making a awful racket. Not that we'd want to use the door in any case." Rei slung his pack off his shoulders and rummaged around in it for a few seconds, then pulled out a long length of rope. "So we'll just climb over the wall. Gimme your pack." The last bit was addressed to Ryu, who obligingly removed his pack and handed it over to Rei.
Rei carefully checked the ties on both his own and Ryu's packs, then carefully (or as carefully as possible) flung them over the wall. Ryu heard them land on the other side with a slight 'thump'. Rei went next and scaled the rather short wall with the aid of his claws and a leap or two. Once at the top, Rei unspooled the rope and let one end drop down at Ryu's feet.
Rei slid down the other side and vanished from Ryu's sight, only to call out a few seconds later: "Okay, feel free to climb up any time now, I've got the rope anchored."
Ryu grumbled for a few seconds before he climbed the rope rather awkwardly. Once at the top, he jumped down on the other side and landed next to Rei with a 'whomph' of expelled air. Rei nodded appreciatively and gave the rope a yank, which sent it over the wall and onto the ground at his feet in a tangled mess.
"So," Rei said, as he put his pack back on, "Shall we be on our way?"
"Whatever, Rei."
Much later in the afternoon, Ryu found himself walking through an old dense forest, far away from civilization. The reason the checkpoint had been established in the first place was because the land beyond was simply endless wilds, full of savage beasts and inhospitable lands. The Wyndian kingdom didn't really have much interest or fear of the lands beyond, but occasionally there would be notice of horrible beasts emerging from the wilds, or of people wandering off and getting themselves killed, and they figured it would be better to just block the area off and forget about it.
The forest was an average temperate one, and leafy trees along with pines and other hardier plants were growing all around. The path they were walking on started off as a wide wagon road, but as they went further and further it narrowed as plants sprung up around the edges. At their current spot it was hardly more than an animal path. The close greenery and abundance of water (they had passed over more streams and creeks and rivers than Ryu cared to remember, first by bridge and later by fallen logs and fording) made the forest oppressively humid, even if it wasn't that hot. He had pulled off his coat and shirt, and stashed them in his pack as they had travelled.
They trudged on and on, and Ryu found himself getting bored. He focused his eyes on Rei's back and let his mind wander. Then, after another half-hour of hiking Rei froze on position and Ryu almost walked straight into him before he managed to snap back to paying attention.
"Did you hear that?" Rei turned around partly and said, gesturing off the path ahead on to their right. Ryu mutely shook his head no. "It sounded like some big animal going through the brush. Hopefully a large predator and not something that hunts in packs." Then the noise came again, the loud sound of some heavy paw snapping branches in half. Ryu himself couldn't tell if it was from an animal or just a tree falling, but he figured Rei would know about these kind of things.
"I'll head towards it. You circle around the other way and try to figure out if there's anything else lurking around." Rei pointed and gestured as he was talking. "If you find something you don't think you can handle alone-- which isn't very likely, I know-- then just start yelling and I'll get over there as quickly as I can, okay?" Ryu nodded, then watched as Rei silently moved off the path, towards where the sound was coming from. Then, he moved off the path in another direction as he tried to not make too much noise.
A few minutes later, as he crept through the brush, Ryu had started to worry. He hadn't heard any weird sounds, (or in fact, many sounds at all) and he hadn't seen either Rei or the animal. He was about to turn around and backtrack back to the path when he heard an extremely loud roar echoing through the forest. After a half-second he got a rough idea of where it came from, relative to himself, and he set off in a quick run towards it.
He emerged in a small clearing maybe thirty seconds later, panting slightly with his sword pulled from its sheath. The animal Rei had heard was lying in the clearing, either dead or dying quickly. What it resembled most was a gigantic boar, although only slightly second in resemblance was a lizard of some sort. Either way, it didn't look too intimidating with several large chunks of it clawed out and scattered around the clearing. Of more importance was Rei, who stood over the corpse of the thing in full-on weretiger form, growling.
As Ryu burst into the clearing Rei tensed up and swiveled his head around to stare at the blue-haired man with his large, deep-set eyes. He froze, as he knew that Rei didn't have much control over his weretiger form, and that what he did was mostly just what his tiger instincts wanted. Rei crouched over the dead piglizard and growled at Ryu loudly.
Ryu slid his sword back into its scabbard and raised his hands, palms outward. "It's okay, I'm not after your kill... c'mon, I'm harmless." Ryu tried to placate the beast. The giant tiger carefully walked its way over to Ryu, sniffing at him inquisitively. He started a bit, and carefully walked backwards while keeping his eye on the tiger. He may trust Rei, but he wasn't quite so sure when Rei was running on wild animal instinct, not to mention several hundred pounds heavier than him and armed with claws that could take off a normal man's head. Turning into dragon form would tilt the odds drastically in his favour, but it would also take several seconds that he wasn't quite sure that he had. In retrospect, Ryu thought, maybe putting away his sword wasn't the brightest of ideas.
Still, Rei kept creeping forward, and Ryu kept stepping back. Until, that is, Ryu felt his pack press against the trunk of a tree. In the short time it took for Ryu to instinctively look over his shoulder and back again, Rei had pounced. His large muscled arms sunk their claws deep into the wood of the tree, and Rei's large fanged mouth was less than an inch away from Ryu's head. Ryu froze as the tiger sniffed at his face, and then flinched backwards (banging his head rather badly on the tree trunk) when Rei opened his mouth wide and sloppily licked his face.
Ryu let out a sudden burst of laughter. "Oh, you're harmless, aren't you?" he said, while carefully scratching behind Rei's ears. Rei purred loudly and butted his head into Ryu's shoulder, almost knocking him over.
Rei pulled his claws out of the tree, a move which also took out several large chunks of wood. Then, he licked Ryu's face again and started to make his way down Ryu's chest, like a mother cat bathing her young. Ryu laughed uncontrollably from the tickling sensation of Rei's rough tongue and fell backwards, moving into a sitting position with his back against the tree. Rei followed him down, his furry body rubbing against Ryu's bare skin in a rather pleasant manner.
After a few moments of sitting, Ryu noticed Rei's fingers (while shorter than usual, they were still fully functional as hands) prodding at the waist of his pants. However, he couldn't manage to unbuckle Ryu's belt in his weretiger form and so he lifted Ryu up with one arm effortlessly, in preparation to simply rip the pants off Ryu's body with his claws.
Ryu wasn't quite sure what Rei was after, but he did know that when a gigantic killer animal wanted something, it was best to not get in the way. Also, he liked those pants. So he unbuckled and removed his belt, then shimmied his pants as far down his legs as he could manage in his current, awkward position. Rei dumped Ryu into his lap, and Ryu spent a few seconds with his mouth full of tiger fur before he managed to orient himself. He pulled himself up into a sitting position, his legs crooked to reach around Rei's large waist.
Rei carefully prodded at Ryu's newly-exposed skin for a few moments before focusing his attention on Ryu's mostly flaccid penis. He reached over with his furred fingers and carefully stroked the organ, paying especially close attention to how Ryu's foreskin rolled back and forth over the head of his cock. Then, when it was looking fully erect, Rei bent down and gave it a long lick. Ryu squeezed his eyes shut and groaned, then thrust his hips forward. Rei continued to tease him with fleeting touches on and around his cock.
Ryu shifted in his seat on Rei's large lap and reached around through the thick and shaggy fur on Rei's crotch. After a few seconds of sliding his hands around Rei's body, he found the thick sheath and heavy balls. Rei's response was immediate and loud. He threw back his head and roared, then spread his legs so far that Ryu slipped onto the ground beneath.
As he reoriented himself, he also slid off his tangled pants and pack and tossed them to the ground where the rest of his clothes had fallen. Then, he focused his attention to Rei's currently flaccid cock. He rubbed Rei's balls, and even carefully stuck a finger into the taut sheath to coax the large member out. Soon, the dark red tip slid out from the sheath, and Ryu switched his ministrations to that. The head of Rei's weretiger cock was as large as a whole apple, and it was covered with tiny rigid spines. It was far too large to even attempt to fit into his mouth, so Ryu conceded to simply lick at the heavy flesh. Above him, Rei groaned and sunk his claws into the soil.
Ryu lapped on the tip of the cock and tasted the acrid precome that shot into his mouth. Rei's cock was covered in slick inner fluid, like before, only now with him in his tiger form it was far more copious and concentrated. The cock continued to slide out of Rei's sheath, now at least as long as Ryu's forearm. Rei's fingers were constantly tugging and stroking on Ryu's cock, which was also oozing precome into Rei's fur.
Ryu licked up and down the sides of the shaft, and the head smacked across his cheek, leaving a smeared mark from the fluid caught on it. Eventually, Rei's cock looked to be fully exposed. It was about as long as Ryu's arm from the elbow to his fingertip, and thicker around than his wrist. The entire shaft was a deep red colour, and with every beat of Rei's heart it shuddered. Clear sticky fluid was constantly leaking out of the slit at the top of the glans and down the shaft into Rei's fur. Ryu was pressed against the giant organ, his own cock reddened and aching from Rei's ministrations. He leaned in close and licked up the entire shaft from bottom to top, his mouth closing around the very tip of the glans as another spurt of precome shot out.
Rei roared again and raised one of his giant hands to rapidly stroke his cock, his body tensing up as he approached the point of no return. Ryu's cock as pressed tight against the shaft and he bucked his hips against Rei's massive cock. The massive amount of fluid coating their cocks made an audible sound as Rei pumped up and down, his grunts becoming louder and louder as he picked up pace.
Soon, Ryu felt Rei's cock tense up as his orgasm came on, and reached down with one hand to prod at Rei's tightly puckered anus until his tail. At Ryu's touch Rei let out a bellow and came, his hips slamming up into the air as bolts of semen came shooting out the tip of his cock. Very quickly, most of Rei's fur was matted down with his seed, and almost all of Ryu's skin was lightly coated in smeared semen, with a dusting of loose cat fur stuck to him.
Rei collapsed, unable to keep up his weretiger transformation after such an event. As Ryu watched on, Rei shifted and shuddered, his body shrinking in size until Rei was back to his normal form.
He panted loudly, his still erect (but much smaller) cock still spasming seed. Ryu looked on, his hardened cock still pressed against Rei's. "I... Oh fuck, Ryu..." was all that Rei stuttered out before he kissed Ryu deeply, his mouth panting against the other's. Then, he pulled Ryu over and contorted himself into a position where he effortlessly swallowed Ryu's entire cock into his throat. His own cock was now bobbing in front of Ryu and dripping fluid onto his face. Ryu carefully took in as much of Rei's cock as possible, licking and sucking around the length of the comparatively thin head. After only a few seconds of this, he felt his own orgasm come on with a shocking ferocity. He didn't even have time to make a sound before he unloaded his pent-up seed into Rei's mouth, who swallowed it with ease. The varying pressure Rei's throat made against his cock only enhanced his orgasm, and he continued shooting until Rei pulled off his cock with a slurp.
Rei, who was panting even harder now, moved himself around until Ryu was lying on his stomach between Rei's legs, with his cock pressed firmly against Ryu's throat. He pulled on Ryu's stiff hair firmly with his own sticky hands, forcing his cock down Ryu's throat until his nose was pressed firmly against Rei's fur. He grasped Ryu's face firmly and thrust savagely into Ryu's mouth for a few seconds. Then he came again, his second load shooting straight into Ryu's stomach as he pistoned his cock into and out of his face.
Ryu pulled off of Rei's cock after he had finished, then wiped his mouth as he coughed. Rei kissed him again, rather awkwardly, as they were both quite out of breath by this time and kept snorting hot air onto their other's faces from their noses. Eventually Rei broke away and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and Ryu coughed some more and rubbed his rather raw throat.
Rei spoke first. "Holy fuck, I've never done that before-- that was incredible."
Ryu grinned back and spoke. "Ne-" His voice came out hoarse and cracked. He coughed loudly, then swallowed. "Next time, warn me before you do that, okay?"
Rei untangled himself from Ryu and leaned back against a tree trunk while laughing. "Will do!" He grinned over at Ryu. "But, we're all gross now, and all the dirt we stirred up sure isn't helping. We should take a bath." Ryu snorted. "There's another stream we're going to run over in maybe five minutes, and if I remember right this one has a beach and everything." Ryu rolled his eyes, but did pick up his scattered belongings and attempt to pull his pants back on. His skin was sticky and tacky to the touch and his pants kept bunching up as he tried to put them on.
After they had spent a scattered few minutes collecting their things that had ended up in the most preposterous places, Rei lead the way back to the path. Quickly they were attacked by swarms of flies that were attracted to their disheveled bodies, and they spent the next few minutes swatting them away and hurrying towards the next river.
Just a few minutes down the path, it did in fact intersect a small river. The water ran alongside the path for a short while, then turned and veered away into the forest. Almost before Rei could even point out the sparkle of water to Ryu through the thinning foliage, Ryu had let out a happy yelp and jumped into the water, already scrubbing the caked-on fluids off with his bare hands. A few seconds later he threw his sodden pants up onto the jagged rocks that made up the edge of the creek. Rei had been wrong about the whole 'beach' thing, Ryu thought. Rei followed afterward with a splash, after he spent a minimum of time removing his clothes.
Rei waded over to where Ryu was busy washing himself off and tossed over a washcloth and some soap. Ryu murmured a thanks before he quickly covered his hair with soap suds. Rei stealthily grabbed the slippery soap from Ryu and lathered up his own fur, washing away both the remnants of several hours travelling in a humid jungle and the evidence of their recent activities.
Ryu quickly finished rubbing the gunk off himself and turned to Rei, who seemed to be having a bit of trouble lathering up his own body. He sidled over to the other man and took the soap in hand, then firmly rubbed the soap against Rei's back. Rei groaned appreciatively, closed his eyes, and leaned forward against Ryu, who almost slipped and fell from the sudden weight. His arms were encircling Rei's body, and Rei's face was resting on his shoulder. He meshed his slippery fingers into Rei's thick coating of fur, giving him a back massage as he washed. Ryu moved his hands down lower slowly, until his fingers were playing with the fur directly above Rei's tail. His tail was flicking back and forth as Ryu ground his hands against Rei's skin.
"You keep this up and we're going to end up having to take another bath, you know." Rei murmured, smirking, into Ryu's ear, as Ryu slid his fingers around the circumference of the woren's tail.
"Good." Ryu said, grinning. He slid a soap-covered finger across Rei's tightened asshole, which was quickly followed by a load moan. He could feel the pressure of Rei's cock pressing against his body and he continued to rub his fingers against Rei's body, further exciting him. He continued teasing Rei for several minutes, until Rei's entire body had lost its relaxed posture and instead was tense and focused on Ryu's every touch. Rei's erect dick was sandwiched between their bodies, twitching every so often when Ryu touched a particularly sensitive part. He thrust occasionally, which slowly ground his cock against Ryu's own.
Ryu kept lightly touching Rei's body, from the highly sensitive area right below his tail to the very base of his cock, as his fingers caught the heavy fluid that collected there and spread it across Rei's skin. The pointed tip pressed against Ryu's taut abdomen and left marks from the fluid leaking from the slit whenever Rei ground his hips upward.
Eventually Ryu pulled back, intent on finishing Rei off. His cock was steel-hard and twitching slightly with Rei's rapid heartbeat. He tugged at Rei's heavy balls for a few seconds, his slick hands matting down Rei's fur further. Then, he took the shaft carefully in both hands and slowly rubbed it. He dragged a rough thumbtip against the very base of the glans, then as he felt Rei's entire body tense he rapidly stroked the cock as it started to spurt out long threads of semen onto his chest.
Rei leaned back and fucked his cock through Ryu's enclosing fist, his seed pelting out from the tip onto Ryu's body and into the stream. As the spurts became less powerful they caked onto Rei's matted fur in long strings, then subsided to short pulses that slid down his shaft. Ryu leaned close and licked Rei's cock, taking the thick precome and ejaculate into his mouth. As his lips reached the tip of the dick Rei sent one last shot spurting into Ryu's mouth, which he swallowed thickly.
Rei fell back into the stream with a splash, only to resurface a half-second later. He grabbed on to Ryu's body and swiftly stroked his erect cock. He brought a furred fingertip up and scratched it lightly against the thin bridge of skin that connected his foreskin with the glans head and Ryu fell backwards, his cock spurting wads of semen into the stream.
Ryu surfaced a second later and flicked his sodden bangs out of his eyes. He stood up as gracefully as could be expected when he stood on rough, uneven rocks that kept shifting around underneath him. He picked their washcloth up from the bank of the river (where it had been tossed after they had moved on to more intimate matters) and looked down at his once-again stained skin. Rei shot a glance at Ryu, as if to say 'I told you so'. Ryu simply rolled his eyes back and started washing himself off again.
After several tries, they managed to get clean and get back on the path. Once again they both had nothing else to do aside from converse.
"So, uh, what exactly should I be expecting when we get there?" Ryu opened with.
Rei shrugged. "It's a village. I don't really pay that much attention to that sort of thing."
"What, 'that sort of thing' as in looking at things? You're a horrible thief."
At that, Rei pinned Ryu's hands behind his back and refused to let go until Ryu admitted that Rei was a wonderful role model, and also was the best thief who had ever thiefed. Ryu kicked him in the shins.
"But I'm not going to get like... quizzed or anything, am I?" Ryu rubbed his wrists absentmindedly.
"Maybe. Who knows." Rei shrugged again.
"You are not helpful at all."
"I do try." Rei looked remarkably pleased with himself.
"Well, it's just I'm the slightest bit worried about them noticing I'm a giant dragon."
"Oh, right, that. I guess we might need a cover story or something, huh?"
"Just maybe."
"How 'bout this? You're a friend of mine I met when I was a thief. There."
"...That's your entire cover story?"
"Well, yeah."
Ryu rolled his eyes and decided to drop that line of conversation.
Several hours later, they reached the Woren settlement Rei spoke of. It was a smallish village, situated between the forest they had just emerged from and a craggy line of mountains. They stood at the top of a smooth hill, and there was a narrow band of plains left between them and the village. The sun was starting to set, and at the moment Ryu wanted nothing more than to just have a place to lie down and sleep-- the day's activities had been rather strenuous. They both ambled down the hillside, both glad to have an end to their not-so-long journey soon ahead.
Upon entering the village Ryu noticed how the few people out and about the town seemed to look at him oddly. He assumed, rightly, that a non-Woren like himself entering the village was not exactly a common occurrence. Still, they seemed mostly just curious and not hostile, so he continued ambling relaxedly behind Rei.
It was a small village, so they quickly found themselves at their destination, a larger wooden building that seemed to function as a city hall of some sort. Rei knocked on the door and was quickly ushered in. Ryu followed behind and felt somewhat uneasy. It was still not a very /large/ building, however, and so a single doorway later they found themselves in front of the elders.
They were located in a smallish room (at least compared to the Wyndian throne room, Ryu thought) that was filled with the odor of woodsmoke. A small fire burned in a fireplace on the far side of the room, which was the likely cause of the smell. Near the fireplace, seated on several firm pillows, were the elders.
Ryu had to admit, they weren't quite as awe-inspiring as he would have expected. But perhaps his expectations had been skewed slightly when /his/ clan elder had turned into a gigantic dragon upon their first meeting. They were several Woren, older than the ones he'd seen around the village but obviously still very capable.
The one sitting in the middle, directly in front of the flickering flames, was the first to speak. "Rei, you are arrived early," She paused. "And with a friend in tow, also."
Rei looked somewhat bashful. He nodded as he looked down at the floor and scratched the back of his head. "Yeah, you could say that some of my loose ends got tied up for me."
"I see. Very well, but first you must explain why you think he is trustworthy enough to stay here."
Rei walked over and sat down on the floor a few meters away from elders. Ryu, not quite sure what to do, followed and sat near Rei.
"Well, you know how I told you about my days as a thief?" Rei lead with, and Ryu was inwardly surprised-- such a statement would likely get someone driven out of town back in Wyndia and here Rei didn't even get a second glance. "Ryu here is a friend I met back then. It wouldn't be right to just ditch him without a word, and besides, we are quite close friends."
"I see. Well then, Ryu..." She started off, and Ryu braced himself for a rather long, awkward conversation. "what's that sword you've got strapped to your waist?"
Ryu did a double take. The sword strapped to his waist was the ancient Dragon Blade, one of the most renowned relics of the Brood. He had just had it for so long it became little more than a very good sword in his mind. "It's just, uh, a sword of mine." He felt the beginnings of a blush rise up.
"Most thieves don't use swords, do they?" She looked at him shrewdly.
"Well, uh, to be fair I'm not really a very good thief. Uh, ma'am." Ryu scratched the back of his head. Rei was probably laughing it up on the inside, he thought.
"I see." She quirked an eyebrow. "It certainly is an ornate sword."
"I, uh, got the sword from a rich merchant."
She looked at him oddly, but eventually moved on to less pressing matters-- Ryu still managed to embarrass himself at those, too.
An hour or two later they were both sent off to one of the bunkhouses, after much talk between the elders and Rei. Nevertheless, they had stuck to their hastily-conceived cover story and they had managed to avoid any mention of Ryu turning into large scaled monsters.
At their beds, (separate ones, to both of their disappointments) Rei turned to Ryu. "So, what do you plan on doing here first, huh?"
"First, I plan on sleeping," Ryu dropped his pack heavily on the ground. "Then, the next morning, I plan on getting you alone with me somewhere."
"Good plan," Rei said, chuckling.