smile
02-24-2017, 10:39 AM
The stranger's figuratively and literally pricked up at Enrico's words, and he replied with a question in a language that was simultaneously soothing and terrifying to hear.
Italian.
Enrico's native language, the language of his birth and childhood and years as a mafioso. The sooty-gray male's pelt immediately rippled at the sound, his eyes going hard and wary. The only wolves he could absolutely know in these lands who spoke Italian were men of honor, and men of honor were, with a price on his head... immediately suspect. But as the male continued it became obvious to Enrico that the male was no native speaker, though he was certainly fluent. There was a certain undefinable something in the words of someone who had spoken a language regularly since childhood, and this male clearly had not. It made him safer, but not... safe.
Oh, but to hear Italian again.
"Il cibo è molto più comune nel sud di qui. Mi può risparmiare qualcosa per un viaggiatore affamato, e sarebbe bello condividere un pasto con qualcuno che conosce la mia lingua nativa." He spoke the language cautiously, but to feel them roll off his tongue bathed him in pleasure. To so long be silent or to struggle through speaking a clunky, ugly, unfamiliar language... To speak his birth tongue again was heaven.
He eyed the other male, suspicion unabated. He did not want to turn to follow the dik-dik and have a stranger at his back. To be so vulnerable after having revealed one of the very parts of him that his former brothers knew set him apart as a stranger in this land would be unacceptable. Instead he carefully stepped aside, and made a gesture to the blood-scent trail the dying creature had left. "Si prega, dopo di te. Il percorso dovrebbe portare bene." He hesitated, manners warring with caution a moment as it was rude to avoid giving a name to someone you were becoming acquainted with. He settled for a pseudonym. "Sto chiamato Mask. Quello che ti posso chiamare?"
Italian.
Enrico's native language, the language of his birth and childhood and years as a mafioso. The sooty-gray male's pelt immediately rippled at the sound, his eyes going hard and wary. The only wolves he could absolutely know in these lands who spoke Italian were men of honor, and men of honor were, with a price on his head... immediately suspect. But as the male continued it became obvious to Enrico that the male was no native speaker, though he was certainly fluent. There was a certain undefinable something in the words of someone who had spoken a language regularly since childhood, and this male clearly had not. It made him safer, but not... safe.
Oh, but to hear Italian again.
"Il cibo è molto più comune nel sud di qui. Mi può risparmiare qualcosa per un viaggiatore affamato, e sarebbe bello condividere un pasto con qualcuno che conosce la mia lingua nativa." He spoke the language cautiously, but to feel them roll off his tongue bathed him in pleasure. To so long be silent or to struggle through speaking a clunky, ugly, unfamiliar language... To speak his birth tongue again was heaven.
He eyed the other male, suspicion unabated. He did not want to turn to follow the dik-dik and have a stranger at his back. To be so vulnerable after having revealed one of the very parts of him that his former brothers knew set him apart as a stranger in this land would be unacceptable. Instead he carefully stepped aside, and made a gesture to the blood-scent trail the dying creature had left. "Si prega, dopo di te. Il percorso dovrebbe portare bene." He hesitated, manners warring with caution a moment as it was rude to avoid giving a name to someone you were becoming acquainted with. He settled for a pseudonym. "Sto chiamato Mask. Quello che ti posso chiamare?"