(barely held back thoughts of dog racism)
He made a rough hmph sound in his throat, as if considering it was worth testing out his theory. His gaze briefly moved to the shape further down the beach, another dog. A pure breed from the looks of it, her coat clear of- whatever this mess was.
"You understand me?" He asked in his native tongue, his voice a deep rumble. Smoother in intonation than when he spoke the common tongue.
-- ah.
The akita twitched her ears, shaking water out of her fur. Yarou had gone swimming, while her mother Hakki ran to hunt crabs and feed herself that way. Hakki had always been partial to crab meat. Yarou inhaled through her nose as the man spoke to her, and she was largely impassive, hard to read. Her tail flicked. "Of course I do." She answered his question with a statement returned in the same tongue. Yarou scratched under her chin and cleared her throat before yelling: "Mother! To me!"
Within moments, another akita-- this one with no touch of wolf blood at all, smaller, more demure, came trotting close with a crab in her jaws. "Yes?"
Yarou didn't answer. Instead, she jerked her chin to the stranger before her.
"Ahh. I see...." Hakki squinted at the Hattori before she dipped her head to begin crunching open her crab; it'd already had its shell broken.
His gaze flickered briefly to her mother and it was- well, her situation was rather self-explanatory. It was known to happen, but not exactly something openly discussed either. A dirty secret, hidden amongst the dirtier laundry. Some men were easily led astray and with such vast differences in power and social station-well, it wasn't either of their faults really. Judgement came easily to him, but he didn't think himself entirely unfair. Mostly.
The waves rolled up the beach, covering their paws briefly before retreating. "Hmph. Which estate do you hail from?"
It has rendered her both rather unkind and hard to rattle. The Akita cross glances at her mother at the question and she flares her nostrils.
"Oogami."
Hakki steps forward, offering the Tojo man some crab meat in a shell. She passes over Yarou to do so, but the woman does not so much as blink. "My father is the second son of the Oogami Estate. And yours?"
The second son, well that explained things further. Perhaps he was more reckless because he considered himself to have less to lose, or maybe he just hadn't cared for the consequences of his actions. Hm.
"Hattori." Some time ago his kin had been considered new blood, up starters who did not deserve their station. But their name was well known and mostly well regarded, through blood and grit they'd carved out a place for themselves in the upper echelons of society and were there to stay whether their rivals liked it or not. In a way he supposed such a description was befitting of his time in Boreas and Auster. His kin hadn't been here long, but indeed they remained.
She does not feel this rage often, but sometimes it touches her. He says his family name and she tilts her head to one side, clearly working to recall if she's heard of any of his relatives. And, much like the man before her, Yarou's familiarity is more... passing, than incredibly familiar. "I've heard the name." She says, and then stretches out one of her back legs, letting her toes curl, letting her joint pop.
"Have you an empire of your own?" Yarou's voice is gravel-toned, her ears twitching forward. Back home, back where home had been, Yarou ventured into the old cities and took care of dogs who had evaded justice, true. But she had, in turn, directed herself towards wolves when the need arose. They were always surprised, in the end.
"I am the Kaicho of Tojo-kai." He confirmed, falling silent for a moment before speaking again. "And what did you do?" Because he was curious, she was unlike most dogs he had met. She had a roughness to her, a sense of frustration she struggled to hide.
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