baby girl don't get cut on my edges

Lounging in the half-finished doorway of the refurbished shrine building, the early morning sunlight streamed down upon the yearling. He'd be reaching his second year soon, and he was going to craft himself a weapon to celebrate- regardless of how early it was for such things. A few scrap sheets of metal had been pulled from a few key locations around the pack lands, and some leather strips as well. He remembered his lesson with his uncle all those months ago, before everything had fallen apart. There was a loose plan forming in his mind, borne on his observations of foraging bears and badgers. Their claws were incredibly long, well suited to both digging and shredding flesh where necessary. By comparison, his own claws were pig-stickers. He didn't use his fangs as readily as others, they weren't serrated like many others, so he thought to instead use his claws more. The yearling was still perfecting his techniques and overall fighting style, and so now was the perfect time to begin training with a new weapon.

The rusted steel needed to be ground down with sand and rough stone to remove the ruddy blight that covered it. So off to work he went, making use of a pumice stone to slowly work along the length of the metal. There were eight in total, blank slates with which he intended to create a set of sturdy claws that would fit over his own. By the time he had gotten halfway through the polishing process, Pollux had clambered out of his nest within the shrine to investigate the sounds. "Do you need help with that, Ponti?" the small primate chittered, watching his friend work. With a soft grunt of surprise, the young wraith blinked over at his companion. Bichromatic eyes flicked between the assembled materials, and then over to the little tamarin.

"Yes, actually." he said, using a free paw to pull the leather towards himself. The strips were already cut to about the right size, so that was of little concern for him. A few of them still had the buckles attached from their previous life as bag straps, or armour fasteners. "Could you soften these with the end of one of the antlers in the store room? They'll be easier to work with that way." he explained, tipping his delicate crown back towards the dark back rooms. The tamarin's nimble fingers would be better suited to the more involved work of softening the leather to make it more pliant, and then it was one less thing to worry about while he put everything together.

The pair worked quietly in the doorway to the shrine house, and by the time Pontifex was able to get around to the more involved, strenuous task of grinding down the steel blanks into the claws that he pictured in his mind, the sun had nearly reached its apex over the lands. Mist had given way to shadow within the pale woods beyond, and the chorus of songbirds filled the air in full force. It was a matter of shaving away scant centimetres of steel with the sharp end of a chipped stone, keeping an eye on the overall shape he was constructing until it resembled the gradual curvature of a bear's claws. Then the yearling gradually hammered them against the well worn ulna of a deer, using the end of an antler as a hammer. Adding the bend to the base of the metal claw would allow it to fit more snugly against his toes, he figured. That way, they wouldn't constantly be skewed with movement as he fought.

Finally, the sharpened points of steel were finished, and it was merely a matter of fitting them to the leather straps so that they could be secured over his forepaws. He and Pollux worked in quiet synchronicity, with the small primate slipping easily around his massive companion's forelegs as he measured the circumference of wrists and the length of paws. With the short spike of an antler tine, the tamarin was able to punch new holes into the leather that would allow the buckle to be secured around the two points above and below Pontifex's ankle. When both parties were satisfied with the fit, the godling settled back onto his belly in the now warm, well worn spot on the hard packed dirt in the doorway.

"Do you need me to go and find the sinew thread?" the young wolf asked the dark furred primate. A pitchy cackle was all the little tamarin offered up, before vanishing into the recesses of the old store room. A bemused snort was his only response, as the wraith returned to the matter of punching a few small holes in the underside with a stone point. By the time he was done with that, Pollux had managed to sew the straps together into the small harness shape they had constructed to keep the claws secured to his paws. They included a few small, thin loops to slip his toes through and hold everything in alignment with his regular claws in battle. While Pollux was finishing up with fastening the claws to the harnesses with sinew and pitch, the young wolf was lighting the fire that had once burned constantly in the middle of the shrine house. The sun would be going down soon- had they really been working on the claws for so long?

"Thank you for your assistance, Pollux. It has been invaluable." he admitted quietly, as the tamarin ran through the final fitting and tested the straps. Pollux patted his foreleg reassuringly with one little paw, and waved dismissively with the other. Both of them flashed toothy little grins at one another, and then Pollux set the finished weaponry aside where it wouldn't be disturbed- or stolen. "Can we have dinner now? That was more work than I wanted to do today." the tamarin admitted with a clap of his little paws, sidling up to the fire.

(FINAL WC: 998)

"Pontifex" || "Hallux" || "Pollux"