Basilisk was still housing the slave in their spare room. He caught Spiders scent at least once heading into the room. He shook his head, hoping his Heir wasn’t going to lose their head over a slave. Perhaps bringing her in this close had been a mistake. More multiple reasons. Well, he’d done it. You could live in what-ifs.

He trotted to her door and rapped on it sharply twice. Wylan had told him she needed to strengthen her fractured leg. She couldn’t lie in bed all day. He stuck his head through the door. “Up. We have plans today.” He informed her, and backed out again. Heading to the door of the den to wait for her there. He fully expected her to obey.



"Speech"

She was bored out of her mind. She felt like her leg and her ribs were taking forever to heal. Sketching and making notes of what she'd seen on her travels, different poses of Idalia her possum and what doodles she could make of Basilisk, Wylan and Spider, and even one of Tethys in there wasn't holding her attention for long. She was about to drift into a bored snooze when she heard the sharp rapping on it and Warlords's head poked in and demanded her obedience.

She blinked and got up in a fluid motion, even forgetting her leg for just a moment until she put weight on it.

Did he determine she was done resting already? Was she saying goodbye to the plush polar bear fur?

At least he had plans for something and she was more than eager and interested for something different.
She hobbled and winced behind him, slower than her typical rushed pace.
"What's- theplan?" She asked between steps.

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

He didn’t have to wait long before his little Songbird was at the door with him. Limping along, but up quick. She was doing well with obedience. “Wylan said you need to stretch that leg, Doctor's orders.” He explained, heading out the den door and down the cliff.

He did keep his pace a slow one, keeping in mind that her injuries weren't going to make the descent an easy one. But eventually they made it to the bottom, and he led them into an open space at the bottom of the Col. He’d considered taking her to the training cave, but once they’d climbed the mountain into that one, her energy would probably be spent. Instead, he turned to her. “What do you know about defences?” He asked her.


"Speech"

The Songbird followed him diligently down the cliff. She had to stop halfway down for a breather but tried her best to get back up and continue. So Basilisk was taking her for a walk? That was very kind of him, surely the Warlord had more important duties than helping his slave walk again -

"Defences?" She replied when they reached the bottom, tilting her head. Her eyes darted to the ground searching for her knowledge, the ancient library of her home was full of books she read cover to cover and then some, "Trenches... ditches, moats, palisades.... oh and scout towers, boiling oil, catapults, trebuchets, and that giant arrow thingy, a ballista! of course shields and armor..." She would go on but she got the feeling those weren't what he had in mind and titled her head the other way, "What." Suddenly feeling shy she tucked her chin into her breast, not sure what she did wrong again.

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

He smirked at her surprise, having a little fun at her expense. “My Grandfather had a rule. All wolves should know how to defend themselves. I’m going to apply that here. It’ll stretch your leg, and your knowledge.” He decided, and like many things since she had come here, she wasn’t going to have a say in it.

… and he was rendered speechless. He stopped, and blinked at her. Once, twice, thrice. Without a word. He opened his mouth, and then closed it again. “Wait… wait.. Do you know about all these things?” He asked, completely derailed, and a little excited. What boy (even a grown one) wouldn’t be excited over a little burning pitch?


"Speech"

"Oh defend myself! Nope, not a thing. Run and hide mostly?" She replied sheepishly. Then grew even more flustered and embarrassed as he got excitedly derailed by her intense knowledge of ancient human medieval defense systems.

"I mean... Yes? I've even built my own trebuchet, the Alpha didn't think it was cool, it didn't really throw very far and it was very small." She had started dragging her paw on the ground, sketching a very basic sketch of the trebuchet that only shot once before it fell apart. "The cheval de frizz came in handy when a pack of hyena's were trying to chase us out when I was..." She pondered for a moment "I was probably 10... months old?"

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

He shook his head in astonishment as she spoke of what she had built already. ”You and I are going to have a more detailed conversation about that later.” He warned her. Yes, he was going to put her on pack defences once she had finished in the storeroom. He really had found a goldmine with her, and she didn’t even know it.

“Running and hiding is well and good, but that didn’t exactly save you in the Veteran’s Plateau, now, did it?” He asked her pointedly. “Defences. You're going to learn them. Place your paws evenly to set the centre of your balance. Bend your knees a little so they can absorb impact. Well start there.” He said, and got up so he could pace a circle around her, watching as she - assumably - did as he told her to.


"Speech"

She sat up straight as he changed the subject, saying they could talk about those kinds of defenses later. Well, he warned her with his harsher tone, but regardless she straightened up and brought her wandering focus back to the task he was setting her up for.

He pointedly remarked on their first meeting, and she swiveled her ears back and forth with some shame. Ignita was going to learn how to defend herself, she wasn't sure if she could do this very well.

He told her set her paws evenly to center her balance. Okay, one paw then the other, evenly... To him, her paws would have looked spread out a little far on both sides. Bending her knees, it was a little difficult with her healing fracture but she did it! She looked like she was squatting.

"Like this?" She set her face into her best grimace, a comical rendition of scrunching your nose just before a sneeze.
"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

Basilisk rounded her form one last time as she settled into her… interpretation of his descriptions. He squinted and tapped one of her tiny little knees with a claw. “Ignita.” He said, his voice oddly gently. “Unless you're planning on taking a shit right there on the Col floor, straighten your knees. When I say bend, I mean a little elasticity. Think fluid, and light. Like a willow tree in the wind.” He told her, and bent his own knees, before springing back, and then down again. Showing her the ease and comfort in which he put a little bend into his body.

“It’s to prepare your body to absorb an impact” he started to circle her again. It only took a few movements of his body. She truly was a tiny little thing.


"Speech"

Ignita smooshed her lips together in concentration, pulling them back and unconsciously holding one side of her mouth tighter than the other side with a slip of her pink tongue showing through. He tapped her knee, she straighted it stick straight. She watched him bend his knees as an example and swayed her hips back and forth in response. She sat down, she straightened it back out, almost as if she had never bent her knees properly in her life.

She sat down again, why couldn't she figure this out? This seemed so simple! He made it look easy! How come her brain could run a calculation faster than she could blink but it was next to impossible to just bend her knees like he did?

As she focused on her knees she clenched her jaw over her tongue, it stuck out comically on the side now. Her front paws had completely retreated from the mark and one was braced directly under her chest and the other uplifted some.

She stopped her hinds from going up and down finally as if finally bracing. And looked back at him, "this?"

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

Watching her, he let out a soft sigh and realised this was going to be harder than he had expected. How had his grandfather always managed to spin clumsy slaves into fighters? He looked at little Ignita critically. Was it his teaching skills, or the material he had to work with?

“That’ll do” He decided as she asked him if her stance was any better. Moving on. Still watching her critically, the young Warlord continued with his instructions. “tuck your chin, and dig your claws into the earth a little. You want to be limber, and bendable, and hard to grab. Now, circle me, and consider those motions and how to keep them going as you move.” He instructed her.


"Speech"

Ignita wagged her tail as he relented to her efforts. He went on to instruct her to tuck her chin in and dig her claws into the soil some. At first, she tilted her head to the side wondering how tucked he wanted her chin to be. In her mind's eye, it looked silly but she didn't have an accurate image of fighting wolves in her head, sheltered as she had been. Perhaps it was a special Armada move that kept their throats protected.

Keeping her legs braced she tucked her chin flush against her chest and raked her claws into the dirt, shuffling and hopping like a deranged stiff bear around the Warlord.

He watched her as she waddled like a fish out of the ocean across the Col floor around him. She looked… She was the most ridiculous thing he had ever seen in his life. He leaned back on his haunches and put his head in his forepaws for a moment. He held them there and silently counted until he found some measure of patience. “Ignita. Stop. you're embarrassing me.” He said, his voice was a sigh.

“Alright. You are not allowed to leave Armada’s three territories until you’ve mastered your defences to my standards.” He said, upping the stakes for her. Offering her something to work towards. That seemed to have an impact on her in the past. Freedom to leave the Armada hadn’t been granted to her before. “You're welcome to gather other references and aid from Armada warriors to learn.”


"Speech"

As he grew more and more exasperated she tried to shift her chin as she bounced and hobbled around, her front paws flailing like limp fish as she tried to circle him, adjusting her posture as she went, in all the wrong ways.

He told her to stop. She was panting hard, her leg was starting to ache, and the bone tired fatigue was starting to wrap her in a suit of wet sand. He told her to stop, she was embarrassing him. She came to a slow stop. She didn't face him. She was embarrassing him. Her golden eyes bore into the dirt of the Col.

She could barely hear his statement, not allowed to leave Aramda's three territories...
"Three?..." She said to the ground, her body immobile, her voice soft and distant.
Oh she could go to the other ones? She faintly thought through the fog of memories about how she thought she had been pretty confined to the Col. But three was a nice change.

As the image of others laughing and hiding their faces from her floated through her mind's eye she heard him say she could get others to teach her...
"References..." So she could embarrass others with her honest efforts. She barely whispered, trying to fight her way through the disembodied laughter in her ears...

She didn't mean to embarrass him... She never meant to embarrass anyone, least of all herself. She just... Couldn't make her body do the things they were showing her to do. She promised... She was barely breathing and slowly, slowly sank to her knees, her eyes distant and dissociated.

"I'm... sorry... I didn't mean to... embarrass..." Her voice cracked through the raspy half-hearted sound.  

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

“The woods, the Col, the Beach” he said a little distractedly, thinking she wasn’t sure which ‘three’ he was referring to. But he had shown her all three by now, hadn’t he? Actually, he couldn’t remember if he’d taken her into the woods. But he was too distracted to remember, because his eyes were on her. She was refusing to look at him, and her body had locked up in a strange way.

“...Hey, Ignita? What's going through that silly head of yours?” he asked, but his voice was gentle as he stepped forward and crouched down before her. Silly slave or not, she was his responsibility. He was starting to realise there was more emotion attached to that than he would have expected. Or wanted.

He placed a paw on her shoulder, steadying her as she seemed to sag against the earth. “Ignita? Is it your injuries?” Had he pushed her too hard, putting her into forms unfamiliar to her while she was still healing?


"Speech"

Silly... She had just been a child! Children were silly as a matter of course! Her eyes could no longer see the grey rocks and soil of the Col. Pillars of bright yellow sandstone, adorned with ancient hieroglyphs, gold paint pried off around the bases, surrounded her vision. The Alpha lay on her long couch laughing as she tossed a fruit pit at the child trying to show her the new invention she made. Nobles and escorts surrounded her, chuckling and giggling. She didn't understand...

Another scene started, her trebuchet falling apart as laughter surrounded her. The Alpha shooed her away, You're embarrassing us Ignita... She didn't underst...

Was she the unwitting court jester of the palace? They always seemed so interested in what she was learning! The Alpha always called her out at parties to show the guests Ignita's newest observations...  

She shuddered and blinked, gasping for breath as she felt a large paw over her shoulder. She flinched and ducked her head, trying to catch her breath and avoid a swipe of his paw if he was trying to grab her attention.

But he wasn't taking a swipe at her. Suddenly finding herself back in the Col she looked around as if realizing where she was. Her head started to ache as she began to get dizzy, her breaths coming in starts and stops, hyperventilating. Her chest ached, her paws felt numb, was she dying? Her pupils were tiny pinpricks. Was he going to punish her for not responding? She didn't know what was happening! Was everyone looking at her? Was everyone laughing at her again? What had she done this time? Why didn't anyone tell her the joke?
She numbly backed herself into a tall boulder and flinched away from it, confused and panicking she backed herself in between a large stone and another boulder, crumbling and shaking she sank down and pulled her ears down over her eyes muttering over and over and over, shaking her head, I didn't know, I'm sorry, I don't want to embarrass...I'm sorry, I didn't!

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

Basilisk was not fatherly, at least not naturally. He fumbled and stumbled and learned as he went with Spider. He didn’t know what Ignita was seeing, what was going on with her. But he could hear her hitched breath and the quickening of her heart. She didn’t respond to him, except to flinch when his paw came down gently on her shoulder. She backed up into a boulder, and at first he let her. Giving her room.

But when she started muttering softly, and shaking her head, he moved forward again. Slowly, and carefully, as if trying not to startle a wild animal. He was starting to guess what was happening to her. Only because of his association with Halo, who was like a mother to him. She knew what a panic attack looked like. She had told him about them, and told him that one of her children had them after the flood. He didn’t know exactly what had triggered Ignitas, but if her mumbled words were anything to go off… he could guess.

He reached forward and scooped her up, as if she was a very small child, instead of just a very small wolf. He sat back, pulling her onto his lap, and cradled her. As if she was his child, instead of a disobedient, silly slave. How she wormed her way into his heart he did not know, but even as she frustrated him, he had already realised he didn’t like to see her in pain. He didn’t speak, he didn’t try to say anything. He was not good with words. Instead, he rocked back and forth gently, holding her, and hoped the episode subsided.


"Speech"

She could barely perceive the motions her body was doing. Instead of the cold rocks surrounding her and her head thrumming with pressure she was suddenly enveloped in soft warmth.

Her tiny body trembled and shook as her panic attack gripped her to the very edge of her being. But the rhythm pressed against her ear began to steady her breaths. As her own heart began to slow and match Basilisks the pressure and pain in her head began to subside. It felt like ages when she finally started to grasp her surroundings properly again. As her breath slowed and the feeling in her face and paws came back she only half realized she was pressed against some dark fur. Her shuddering melted away as she was rocked in his arms and her body became overcome with exhaustion.

She felt something entirely different now. Something she had never known to feel before. She thought she had known what it felt like, but now... now she knew what it felt like.

Comfort. No one had ever held her or comforted her before. Tenderness, no one had treated her this tenderly before. She could almost say safe. She wondered if this felt safe. She had never ever been safe. It wouldn't last long.

She knew where she was fully now, and who was holding her. She was too exhausted, ashamed, defeated, and sad to push him away or try and get back on her own feet. She wanted this to last forever. She knew she might never get this again.

She sighed and tried to nuzzle into him for a traitorous second, trying to absorb all the fatherly love she could before her paws reached solid ground again. He'd make a good father.

"I... Thank you. I don't know what happened... I'm tired." Her eyes were downcast this time in a sorrowful way, "May I go lie down?" She asked dutifully, her glassy tearful eyes full of a grief she didn't know she had lifted barely halfway up his dark height. Too ashamed to meet his gaze.

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.

He rocked gently and held her for a time. Caught in emotions as he did so. He was a little disgusted with how soft he was. When he had brought himself home a slave, it hadn’t been so he could get attached. But, holding the little wolf, he reflected that it was also far, far too late. She was clever, easily distracted, and the intricate workings of her mind puzzled and awed him. She was defiant, but almost by accident more than anything else. She was… she was his friend. His responsibility. That he left her as a slave was more a product of his stubborn nature than anything else. Refusing to see what he already knew was right in front of him.

He held still when he felt her neck nuzzle against his shoulder, refusing to react until she had slid from his grip and was on solid ground again. “Have you had a panic attack before?” he asked softly, regretting that Halo wasn’t still around. He had no one he could go to for advice except for a baby, and a new, angry slave. “Yeah, go ahead.” he said, indicating back to his den with a paw. He’d catch her a rabbit. Food had always fixed his woes growing up.

"Speech"

Her paws felt like lead bricks as they met the solid earth. She noticed just how cold the air was biting at her coat as she left his embrace like a ghost.

He asked a question, the sound traveling to her ea drums clear as a bell.
"Panic attack? That's what that was? I don't...' She thought for a moment, she couldn't remember. "If it comes to me later I'll let you know. I don't think so though." She had felt like she was dying and reliving the past all at once.

Her ribs hurt, time for bed. She nodded her thanks to his permission to lie down and slowly made her way up the steps. The Alpha of her past had told her many things, that she was her daughter, that she was like a daughter, that her parents would be embarrassed to know her... It was confusing. She knew for a fact now, that she had never received any real parental guidance or comfort. She almost wished he had yelled at her instead. You can't grieve for something you never had if you didn't know you never had it and needed it. What would her life have been like if she were raised differently? Would she still be a confused silly slave or a scientist of great renown or at least on the path to becoming one?

She was certainly starting to see what Spider saw in him now.

"Ignita"

Basilisk may enter her threads without warning.