I can't destroy what isn't there

At the crack of dawn, instead of finding his way to his new recruits' den, he made his way to the border. Starting a patrol instead of waking one that needed time to heal. It was honest logic, and not a softness on his part. That was all.

He paced the familiar range of his territory, his breath warming the cool air before him as he made his way from plains, to beach, and back again. Finding nothing amiss as the sun slowly began to rise, and turning back towards the temporary den he had dug for Deathbelle - and apparently for Iris.

He arrived at the door and seated himself there, “Are you awake yet, Little Iris?” he called in.


"Speech"

It was strange for her to sleep so deeply and for so late into the morning, but she did today without trying. There was no brute coming to use her, there was no screams or cries from new additions to their hoard of slaves, there was no muttering and haggling from buyers coming to take one of them away. It was quiet and peaceful - things she hadn't felt in a very long time. She had only just begun to stir when she heard Sirius' voice outside the den and her head popped up in response, which quickly reminded her of the sore wounds that were still healing. She winced slightly, but they felt significantly better than they had the day before. "Yes, sir!" she called back, pulling herself to her paws.

She was also quickly reminded of the fact that this was her first time standing up on her own in quite some time. The chains had only been long enough for her to stand, without enough slack to walk anywhere and for the last hand full of days before Sirius found her she had been too weak to try and stand. She wobbled for a moment before she found her footing, stepping carefully out of the den to answer him. If she was being honest with herself she was still really in now shape to start training. Her bones were still very much visible on her sides and spine, her wounds were still fairly fresh, and her muscles were pretty much non existent. But she refused to not try. She refused to let him think that she wasn't worth his effort.

She walked out of the den and dipped her head to him, giving him a small smile. "Good morning, Warlord," she greeted, her voice naturally soft and gentle. She made every effort to stand up properly, silently praying she didn't look as bad as she felt. "Where do we begin?" she questioned, not even knowing where one even started when it came to learning how to fight.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

Her voice piped up immediately, and he was content to sit back on his hunches and wait. To give her some time. He heard the slow movements of shuffling as she found her feet. After a moment, she was popping out the entrance of the den. His expert eyes trailed across her body, noting the ribs and crusted blood in the parts of her coat not occupied by wounds - and therefore had not been washed in her healing. The unevenness of her gait told him she had not been walking for some time.

God dammit.

He bit back a sigh, knowing it would do him no good. Before he knew it, she was going to have him wrapped about her little paws. “First, we get you cleaned up. Then, we will go through some stretches. The sort that slowly gets more complicated as we go, to find your limit. Today, you will not push yourself too far, and you will speak up when it's too much, even if it's the very first stretch. There is a time and a place to push yourself, know it, know your limit.” He ordered briskly. He moved past her and back into the den, moving through the stock he had placed here for Deathbelle until he found the soaps and cloths he had loaded up for her. Next stop, to Io’s old den. He had, sadly, let it fall a little into disrepair, but his sister had built up a means to heat water. “Come on, it's not far” he instructed, grabbing the stuff and moving out.


"Speech"

She saw his eyes move over her and the look on his face, perhaps seeing her for the first time in broad daylight. The way he looked at her didn't encourage her confidence, but she could only imagine how she must look if she felt this horrible. She was surprised when he mentioned how she would get cleaned up first before anything else and then only stretches was on the agenda after that. It was a relief that she didn't want to show. She wanted to feel like she could handle whatever he threw at her so that she could prove herself to him, but as he spoke of knowing her limits she gave him an understanding nod.

Waiting as he dipped back into the den, she looked curiously at the items he returned with. She had never seen soap before so she wasn't sure what it was, but she didn't question it either. She simply nodded when he said it wasn't far and followed after him, her gait slowly evening out and becoming more steady as they walked. She wasn't able to move very quickly, but she kept up with him well enough and soon enough they reached their destination and she waited quietly for him to tell her what to do next.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

Sirius kept his stride slow, knowing he had a bullheaded tendency to go striding along at full speed when he had his mind to a plan. The injured wolf would do her best to keep up with him, and with that in mind he kept a gentle pace.

It wasn’t too long before the two of them reached Io’s cottage, and he led her to the back. The contraption there was a container big enough for a wolf, with room for a fire underneath. He tipped the container first and swept out any leaves, before keeling and beginning to start the fire. He left Iris standing - likely confused - nearby while he fetched a bucket and began to fill it with water from the man-made and algae-cleaned pond. If she tried to help, he would be quick to give her a quelling look. It took the Warlord a few buckets before it was enough, and he turned back to his wolf. “Alright, climb in. Do you need a hand?” He asked as he laid out the soaps on a shelf beside the bath.

"Speech"

Iris waited and watched as Sirius walked back and forth, starting a fire, cleaning out the tub, collecting water, feeling useless as she waited. A couple of times she tried to offer her help, reaching for a branch to add to the fire or going to take the bucket from him so she could make a trip, but he wouldn't allow it. She wasn't used to being cared for, something that had become exceedingly obvious since the day before when even just a nice meal felt like he was moving the world for her, but this felt like too much. By the time he was done she didn't really know what to do with herself and she continued to worry that eventually his patience might run out and he might give up on this weak, broken woman all together.

"Oh, um... No, sir, I can do it," she insisted when he offered her help to get into the tub. She hadn't been allowed to help with the set up with this whole contraption the least she could do was get into the bath herself. She carefully pulled herself into the warming water, a bit awkward and struggling in her movements and she ended up slipping slightly right at the end, but she did manage to ungracefully get herself into the bath in the end. The water rose almost to her shoulders and she was immediately surrounded in warmth from the fire that heated the bath. She couldn't help the relieved sigh that escaped her as her eyes closed contently, the warmth seeping into her bones and loosening the matted blood and dirt from her fur.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

The Warlord sat beside the tub for a moment as the girl collapsed into it, just about turning to jelly at the warmth. Displaced dirt and blood rose to the surface, clouding the water. There had been even more muck hidden in that sandy coat then he had realised. He grabbed some brushes and cloths and set to work. Being the Warlord he was, he didn’t bother to stop and ask if this was appropriate or if she would want his help.

Instead, he helped himself to whatever he wanted, and in this case, that was a clean wolf. He started to scrub what he would reach of her with the way she was seated, starting with her shoulders. Scrubbing with firm but gentle motions as he avoided her wounds, and scrubbed out the dirt.

"Speech"

A sound to the side of her made her ear flick, but it wasn't until she felt something on her back did her eyes pop open and she jump a little at the sudden touch. She blinked, turning her head to see Siris leaning over the edge of the tub toward her scrubbing at her coat with some of the tools he had brought. He caught her off guard and she immediately, instinctively tensed up just from how close he was to her, but she forced a breath into her lungs and she let it out in a slow sigh, reminding herself of all the kindness he had shown her so far. He hadn't done a single thing that would make her think that he would hurt her, but those old instincts still died hard.

"You don't need to do that, sir," she told him softly, glancing back at him uncertainly. He had the same look on his face as he did when she had tried to help with setting this whole thing up, but she still felt strange having the Warlord bathing her. She was supposed to be here to give someone else baths and be their handmaid - this felt like the opposite of how their interactions should be. Besides that, his presence still made her nervous despite his kindnesses. "I um... I can bathe myself, sir."

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

His lips curved into a half smile, but he stopped and stepped back. “I have children you know, Iris. Eigh… Seven of them.” A flicker, gone again, shaken off. “Five of which are girls, but, as you wish.” he agreed, pushing through his stumble. He put the brushes into her reach, and then moved even further back. Taking a seat with his back to her to help with some of the uncertainty he could hear in her.

He looked up at the skies, leaning back to appreciate them properly. “And two grandkids, too. As obsessed with the stars as their mother is. You’ll likely see those two scampering about. Full of trouble and mischief and love. “ He spoke to put her at ease, and because these two children were easy to talk about. In them, he could see children that did not know loss, did not understand pain. They were just filled with wanderlust and hope. It was easier to talk about them here, in the place his sister had built. A woman he did not know the fate of. Was Io still alive? So long since he had seen her last. So many holes in his heart. No room for another that might one day put a hole there.

"Speech"

Iris half expected him to push on and continue what he was doing, but he didn't - something she was thankful for. She watched him curiously as he mentioned that he had children, stumbling briefly over the number of them, and pointing out that five of them were girls. She assumed that was supposed to be a way of helping her feel at ease as if this was something he would have done all the time, but it didn't quite relax her completely. It was hard to separate the massive, imposing male in front of her from the darker memories of her past, but luckily he backed off and left the brushes and rags beside her before moving a short distance away and settling with his back to her. She breathed a soft sigh as she allowed herself to relax again with a soft sigh.

Just as she began to wash out her coat, working the tools over her chest, legs, and stomach, he started to speak again to tell her about his grandkids. She looked up at him with a soft smile pulling at her lips. He was such a strange combination of soft and hard between his exterior that clearly was build for war and this softer side of him that spoke of children and grandchildren with such obvious adoration. "It sounds like you really care about them," she commented thoughtfully, bringing the brush across her shoulders and sides. She was quiet as she thought back through her past, trying to see if she could even remember the faces of her parents.

"I haven't seen my parents since I was a few months old," she admitted, distant and lost in thought. She hadn't spoken to anyone about her past before and it was strange to do so now, but once she started speaking she didn't really want to stop. With all this change so suddenly it was cathartic in a way to tell him what had gotten her to this state. "A man stole me. Used me until I was too old to be entertaining to him any more. Then sold me to the slavers." It was a very simplified version of her past, but it got the point across. None of it was pleasant, none of it was anything she wanted to relive.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

“I do.” he agreed softly. Family was… complicated and terrible and painful, yet somehow they made it all worth it. He couldn’t do this alone. Couldn’t be Without those he had wrapped about himself. It was painful, yet necessary, to give a part of himself away to them.

“I’m sorry.” he said simply. “I do not remember the faces of my own parents as well.” though his situation had been different to hers, there were some similarities. His parents had died when he was under one, and he had been made a slave.
“If we ever find this man, I will kill him.” he said it like it was a simple course of events, inevitable.

He was silent for a moment, watching the sky. “The family I have now I chose or made, once I found my way to freedom. Now, the Armada is your family.”

"Speech"

Iris nodded quietly as he spoke his sympathy and mentioned how he didn't remember his parents either. The memory of her parents was foggy at best and far buried under years of other memories and traumas to try and remember. She didn't remember what they were like so she didn't even know what she could be missing. It was almost as if she didn't really miss them as much as she missed the life she had before she was captured. The innocence and simplicity of it. She had made her peace with her place in life a long time ago just for her own sake. If she kept wishing for better or kept hoping that things could be different then she would just be constantly miserable and filled with disappointment. She was a slave that had been little more than a toy used by brutes for a long time. That's just how things were.

She thought she would be more surprised or bothered by his statement that if they ever found that man that he would kill him, but she wasn't. He had already told her that she was his now, part of his Armada, and he seemed like the type to be pretty possessive of those that were his. She had been owned by a couple of men that had been that way, though not in the caring, protective sort of way that he seemed to be. They had all grown tired of her after some time. Would he eventually grow tired of her as well? Would she be sold away again? "You won't find him... I haven't seen him in a couple of years. Though I wish you could," she replied softly as she finished scrubbing all the parts of her she could reach and started making sure her fur was washed out. It would be nice to know that the brute that started all of this would finally be punished for what he did to her and that he would be stopped from doing this to any other girls, but who even knew where he was? He had taken her far from her original home when he first captured her and had taken her even further to deliver her to the slavers. She had been carted all over the place since then and she was certain she had no chance in making it back to where she had originally been held even if she wanted to.

She caught something in his statement when he spoke again, talking about how his was the family he chose and made here in the Armada and how the Armada was her family now. Her mind picked out the bit about how this came about after he found his way to freedom. She stopped what she was doing, watching the back of his head curiously since he was still facing away from her. She had never heard anyone else speak of freedom before - no one besides other slaves. She put the bush down on the side of the tub where he had originally placed it and was quiet for a moment as she sat in the warm bath water for a few moments more, reluctant to leave the relaxing, steaming water. She rolled that thought around in her head a few more times, the Warlord becoming more and more of an enigma to her the longer she was with him. "Sir, I hope you don't mind my asking, but..." She hesitated for a moment, her ears flicking with uncertainty. She had never held a conversation like this with one of her masters and most certainly had never questioned them about themselves. He wasn't like the others though, he was different. "Were you also a slave?" she finally asked quietly, orchid eyes on him curiously.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

The Warlord nodded his head at her words. The chances were slim, but the promise was there. He might as well be the walking dead, if ever he showed his face in her life again. The Warlord took no competition over what was his, and the man that had first taken her would never lay claim to her again.

There was silence in the bath, the little splashing of her cleaning stilling. He glanced away from the sky to find her staring at him. Once again she seemed baffled and surprised, a thought that amused her. She had seen much, yet he still seemed to catch her unawares.

He didn’t keep his eyes to her for long, before he leaned back again. Content to wait, through the silence remained from her for a time. Her question was permission to ask a question, and he held his silence, giving her the space to find it. “Not in the same way you were” he admitted. His slavery did not leave him with the same scars it did her. “My parents were generals in an emperor's army. When they died and left me an orphan, the Emperor gifted me as a slave and guard to one of his daughters. That daughter became my oldest friend, and she eventually gifted me with my freedom.” It was there the story grew harder. The reason he had reached for freedom was dead. He did not elaborate any further.

"Speech"

His answer came much faster than it had taken her to ask it and she listened intently as he described how he had landed in a form of slavery, acting as a guard to this woman in his past after the death of his parents and how she had eventually given him his freedom. She hummed softly as she look it in, looking down at the surface of the water around her for a moment, her blue paw sweeping slowly across the surface to absent mindedly move around some of the bubbles that had collected from the soap she had used. His experience as a slave had been very different than her own. He had been friends with his master and had eventually gotten his freedom and had the chance to have a family, build a pack... Extensively different from her own experience. She felt a strange jealousy toward him and his life, but she pushed the thought away. Thinking those kinds of things weren't going to do her any good.

However, it was still interesting to her that someone as large and imposing as himself could have ever been under the control of someone else. "Well... That was kind of her," she commented softly after a moment of thought before she finally decided to stand, the water rolling off of her. She started carefully climbing out of the tub, once again moving not so gracefully, but at least this time she didn't nearly face plant as she got her paws back onto the ground. The warm water made her muscles and joints feel so much better. With her coat clean once more the blue and purple markings in her fur stood out more brilliantly and the subtle variations in her cream and tan fur were more noticeable. However, the wet fur clinging to her body make her slender, boney state all the more obvious. She gave herself a shake to get off some of the water, but she couldn't shake very hard without messing with her healing wounds too much.

She turned back toward him, feeling a bit self conscious with her wet fur, but she was sure that she still looked far better now than she had before even with her bones being accented more. "Thank you for the bath," she told him with a grateful, respectful dip of her head. She waited till the fire had been put out before she asked, "What kind of stretches would you like for me to do?"

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

He grunted softly in response. Giving him up was the hardest thing she had ever done, and she had done it anyway. “By then, the Empire we had been born in no longer existed. A drought destroyed it from the inside out. The parts of her family that would never have let her release a slave were dead.” he brushed a paw through the grass in front of him, thinking about the past. Far into the past, a fallen kingdom was easier to remember than the personal parts of his more recent loss.

At the sounds of water falling from a standing body, the Warlord turned back to her. Finding her climbing free of the rub. His mouth drew into a line at the sharp contours of her body. She had been starved, and thin white lines of scars showed out sharper beneath her wet fur.

He got to his paws, brushing past her to put out the fire, and pick up a coat he had snagged from his supplies, holding it out for her. “Dry off a little, so you don’t get a chill, then we will warm you with stretches.” he said, gently tossing it over her back so she could do as he ordered. He took an ‘at ease’ stance to the side, waiting until she complied. “This is to test the limber of your body, and how far you can move without pulling at your scars. Twist your back like so.” he commanded, displaying what he meant. “Now stretch your paws forward as far as you can, bend your head down to touch them…” he would slowly work her through them, seeing how far she could push herself without hurting.


"Speech"

He seemed to try and justify why his former owner's decision had been easier or more justified than maybe she had thought or maybe he was trying to prove how it wasn't necessarily a kindness, but either way it didn't really sway her opinion on it. From her experience with other wolves, they were innately selfish. Even with all of these factors this woman had still been his owner, his master. She very well could have continued to keep him if she wanted, but she had let him go and that was a concept that she wasn't sure she could ever understand. She had changed hands quite a few times in her life, but every time an owner gave her away it wasn't to free her, it was to gain something else. Sometimes she was a bartering tool, a piece of property to trade or exchange for. Other times she was something to loan or borrow for favors, used and returned in exchange for something her owner wanted. Never had the possibility of her freedom ever crossed her mind. This was the closest she had gotten and even now she knew that she had to answer to him in order to continue receiving these kind things like food and a place to sleep.

She noticed how he looked at her and she glanced down at the ground in front of her paws to keep from looking at that hard expression she didn't really understand. Her current state seemed to bother him and she tried not to think about it too much, but it was hard to not feel self conscious and nervous. As he drew closer to brush past her she tensed, taking a couple steps back to create some more space between them. She tried to act as if she was just getting out of his way, giving him room while he worked on putting out the fire, but silently she knew it was simply because her instincts didn't trust him yet. Logically she hadn't had any reason not to, but old hair trigger defenses wouldn't let her fully relax yet. She looked up at him again when he mentioned drying off, holding still as he tossed the warm coat over her. She quietly did as she was told, pulling as much of the moisture out of her coat as she could. When she was done she laid it off to the side and turned to face him again, awaiting his instructions.

She started following his motions as he demonstrated a couple of different stretches, bending this way and that way before stretching out her legs. None of her movements were really quite as far or as deep as his, not wanting to risk reopening her fresher wounds or bothering some of her scars that were newer and the skin still fairly thin from her lack of nutrition causing things to not heal properly. She made herself continue on with the motions even if they were slightly adjusted or adapted. It was hard to remind herself of his rule to not push herself too far. She wanted to mimic his moves exactly and show that she wasn't as weak as she felt, but that just wasn't an option. Right now she hoped that it was enough that she was just trying.

"Speech"

I can't destroy what isn't there

The way she flinched away from him set his back up. Did she really think, after all that, that he was going to strike her? He was already doing her an honour she would not understand, letting her into the place inside of him that he held all the people important to him. Foolish woman. He set his teeth and kept his silence as she let him drap the skin over her back.

Once she was dried, the exercises began. She did a good job of mimicking him. More so than most trainees, and he wondered how much her security in life depended on her being able to complete a task for her Masters in a timely manner. There was strength to her too - but he was not prepared to call it muscle. Not without a proper diet. Food and nutrition would build the muscle, for now she was just skin, bones, and determination.

“Alright, enough for now.” he said, calling an end. “You strike me as having a good memory, so go through these stretches each day while you build up your strength. It’ll prepare you for the movements you’ll be making in spars” he explained.


"Speech"