the bard's last note

There was a small reindeer standing at his side, lingering near his head and close to the bag that was gripped between his aching teeth. Any other wolf would have growled, snarled- anything to protest the threat to his possessions. Then an odd serpent closed in from the front, the undulating motions of its body hypnotic enough to keep him fixated upon its approach. So the sudden presence of a colossal paw on his chest was a surprise, its breadth swallowing his breast beneath its strong digits. The sheer size of his captor was enough that he merely craned his neck over Pluto's body to find out what the animals alerted to. His heart hammered against his ribs, and instinctively he lowered his head, curled himself around the precious few belongings he'd been able to retain. He didn't make a sound. There was nothing in there worth taking- a few more bottles of herbal extracts, the numbers had been dwindling from the start of his journey. The soft, lightweight fabrics that had once been draped over his head and neck on hot days to guard from the sun- gauzy and plainly embroidered. A tiny pillow roughly sewn from scraps of various fabrics, a gift from his sister when they were barely more than infants learning to craft.

The sensation of Basilisk gripping the edge of the worn linen, his massive teeth lifting it up and away, it shattered the fragile illusion of self-control that he'd been mustering the whole time. Tears filled his eyes and tumbled freely down his gaunt cheeks, and he held fast to the bag for a moment or two longer than he should. "Please.." he keened weakly, though he quickly lost the grip upon his possessions and watched through blurred vision as everything was taken away. Held just out of his reach, but not so far that he couldn't see it all the while. Somehow that was worse. Trembling limbs struggled to keep him upright in that moment, a battle simply to keep from collapsing onto the sand again to weep. Though Basilisk insisted he would get everything back- there wasn't anything useful in there anymore, aside from a few remaining strips of jerky and travel breads, and the remains of his extracts- part of him knew that he wouldn't be seeing the bag again.

Quickly he was being ushered away, towards the looming silhouette of a mountain range that reared up from the edge of the black sands. He was being taken into the caverns, supposedly heated from below. Volcanic? He couldn't detect any of the sulphur that would mark the peaks as volcanic, but perhaps they were long dormant. He nodded weakly, keeping his head down and following as best he could with the short, pained strides he could muster. At least he might be allowed to rest soon. "Am I to begin my duties immediately?" rasping vocals spoke gently, emotion carefully reigned in, though his eyes remained glassy. "Or.. may I rest? Just until sunrise." his expectations were guarded, Pluto made a point to focus all of his attention upon the ground as he took each step. Another fall would be disastrous.

"speaking" -- "in another language"