literature

Burning As We Run This Race | RoK

Deviation Actions

Published: Jun 30, 2015

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Literature Text

"They should be in the valley just across this river." Saiyyda ran a bare finger along the face of a chewed up map, following a line she had sketched on it before the six of them set out for the final rite. The weather was warming up now that it was summer. It was not blistering or muggy, but rather just warm enough for the humans to lose several pounds of fur clothing. The water in the river was cold and fresh, an iridescent blue that had melted from ice and snow and was now gushing through the forest with fervor. Kavik could hear its roar, a heavy calamity of noise that was able to drown his sense of hearing even as he stood several feet from its depths. He could see it, faintly, as a perpetual blur of horizontal brushes where the rapids stirred and eddied. Kassia bowed her head to the natural source to lap up the water, it's white and blue tendrils splashing at her nose and face from the kick of the current. She sneezed when she raised her head, tongue swiping around her muzzle to pick up the drops of water that clung to the fur there. Syd lowered her paper, leaning forward on Kalahira to look past the mountain that was Kavik and at Calloway. She had yet to warm up to him entirely, there were still moments where she would snap and seethe at him, but she was trying. He had saved her life and that earned him more respect than she cared to give at all. "The river's too fast and too wide to cross, and I do not see a break anywhere to the left. Are you able to see a shallow end over there?" Cal raised a brow at the question addressed to him, humming in response, briefly, before it registered that Syd wanted him to scope out his side of the river. He did so willingly, squinting and moving forward on Atworth to try and get a better view of the terrain farther ahead. He appreciated that Saiyyda was trying to be kind to him now, it was certainly better than receiving unwarranted remarks and glares, but, at the same time, he preferred not to talk at all. They both knew they most likely would not run into each other much after this, so there was no point in trying to make friends.

"There is no ford that I can see of, but the river seems to narrow quite a bit over there." He pointed to the constricted area of the river, glancing back at Saiyyda to see what she thought. "It looks small enough to jump over, but we can always walk further down in search of a crossing place." Syd shook her head, directing Kala in the direction Cal was pointing to. Kavik had Kassia follow their familiars, the tokota falling in step with Kala as they trotted side by side. Kala glanced at Kassia with a dark glint in her silver eyes, a silent taunt that the piebald female came to know all to well over the past few weeks.

When they reached the part of the river that was pinched, they paused for a last minute evaluation. The velocity of the water was just as fast as anywhere else, if not a bit faster, which still left the danger of getting swept away, but it was narrow enough that they would be able to make the jump across safely. "Let's go. Trying to find a better place to cross will just waste daylight." Syd backed Kala up, her grip on the reins tightening as she took in a deep breath to steady her nerves. Tapping her heels on the tokota's side, she signaled her companion to move. Kala lunged forward, waiting until all four of her paws neared the edge of ground and dipped into the river to jump. Instinctively, Syd leaned closer to the brown tokota, her fingers curling in fur of her mane for reassurance. With a hard 'thud' they landed on the other side, slipping a few inches forward from the muddy terrain lining the water. The other two followed suit, Atworth pacing nervously a few times before he made the jump and Kassia leaping fearlessly, but falling short a few inches so her hind legs dipped into the water. Kala let out a breath the resembled the sound of a laugh, causing Kassia to shoot daggers at her and rumble a warning.

The group clambered through the forest separating the river from the valley, the cluster of trees and bushes fairly dense and congested. It made it difficult to move fast through the area. The tokotas were either weaving through the obstacles that the trees and fallen trunks provided, or avoiding the curl of vines dabbed with thorns that littered the floor. Atworth managed to get himself, and in turn Cal, stuck in a wall of harmless brush. He thought he could just run through it, but a curving branch hooked onto the fur of his underbelly and locked them in place until Kavik and Kassia came around to help pull them out. Kala stepped on a large gathering of thorns, which made her snarl in pain and reel backwards before falling onto her rear end. After that, she spent several minutes pulling the thorns out of the pads of her front paws with the help of Saiyyda. Considering Kavik and Kassia were last to move through the forest, and they took a slow, cautious approach, neither of them ran into the adversities the other four did. Kassia had to go out of her way to find a placid route to travel on, which ended up being a time consuming process, but she came out unharmed by nature.

After nearly thirty minutes of struggling through the woods, they broke free from the shadows and obstacles behind them. Standing atop a small dirt and rock mound that sloped down to flatland almost vertically, they overlooked the valley the pack was in. Most of the land was simply a sea of green, but a variety of vibrantly colored flowers sprung forth to dot the area. Behind the valley was another river that came down from mountain range in the background. Just in front of the river, a cluster of figures shuffled nonsensically as they walked along the bank of the water.

~*~

Despite being blind, Voltaire led the group of tagged tokotas. He was used to being the bait in the rite of knowledge, but he had yet to be in a group as big as this one. There nine tokotas in total, which meant there must have been three tokotas tasked with catching them. Some of the younger tokotas, namely Sanjar and Enya, were obviously nervous about this new situation and scurried after the rest of the pack with a certain urgency. Chance and Rhaegar attempted to ease the nerves of the other two, bumping them with their shoulders reassuringly and taking playful nips at tufts of fur. Sanjar only lowered his skull closer to the ground, his tail curling around one of his hind legs as he sped up to get away from the good natured bumping and biting. He recognized that they were only tyring to help, but he felt much too out of place to completely calm down. Enya, on the other hand, did the same as Sanjar, but growled at the two males as she walked away. They were all caked in filth, a look she did not desire to take on, and the nipping upset her simply because it was messing up her fur.

At the front of the pack with Voltaire was Apollo, Daemon, and Melisandre. Apollo walked on with a stern look on his face, violet eyes narrowed as he scanned the land for any signs of their pursuers. He certainly was not going to roll over and make the task easy for the tokotas doing the rite, he was going to make them work for it. Daemon and Melisandre walked side by side, glaring at each other until the other snapped and tried to take a bite out of the other. They did that several times, all of which Voltaire was forced to step into so they would not harm each other. The final time they scuffled, Melisandre knocked Daemon over, causing him to tumble into the calm river they were walking by. The tundra male, drenched and weighed down with water, was quick to lash back and wasted no time in pulling her down into the water by her front leg. If a bystander would have seen them, they might have thought the two tokotas were playing, but the aggressive snarls and malicious snapping jaws said otherwise. Again, Voltaire intervened, but took much more charge than he previously had. The dominant tokota rushed both of the quarreling animals with bared teeth, forcing them to separate as they reeled back. Both growled at the act of trying to put them in their place, but submitted nonetheless. Rather than allow them to walk near each other again and start another fight, Voltaire had Daemon fall back and walk with his brother, Rhaegar.

Irikah had remained in the center of the pack until the scuffle. While everyone paused to watch Voltaire break up the fight, a scene she's seen one time too many after being in a permanent pack with Daemon, she kept walking. When the group finally did start moving again, Melisandre was quick to charge to the lead, bumping into Ira and giving her a nasty snarl in the process. She narrowed her eyes at the red female, but kept her casual gait. Voltaire padded up beside her, matching her stride with a cheeky look in his eyes. She snorted and shook her head.

~*~

"There's nine, three for each of us. Should we just split them up and go after them on our own?" Calloway glanced at the other two, who were studying the temporary pack of tokotas just as he had. Kavik shook his head, shifting on Kassia's saddle. "Either way will be difficult, but we may be able to get them caught in a cluster if we rush them all at once. If that works out for us, we could possibly catch at least one each." Saiyyda shrugged, rubbing the bottom of her lip in thought. "I'm fine with whatever we decide to do." Cal cleared his throat and prepared to start moving Atworth again. "Let's just go in as a group at first and then go from there." The other two nodded and they all started their descent down the steep hill and into the valley.

The three tokotas crept through tall grass as they surveyed the group they needed to capture. They stayed considerably close together, which was a mistake on their part, but, if they could react fast enough, they were spaced far enough apart to run in different directions once the chase started. Kassia, Kala, and Atworth fanned out, the piebald female staying behind the gathering of bodies while the other two moved parallel to them. When Voltaire's head lifted and his ears stood erect, that was Atworth's cue to strike. The barred male lunged forward ahead of all of the tokotas and cut them off, Kala and Kassia closing in on them so they were all forced together. The handlers, halters already ready in their hands, roped the animal closest to them, resulting in Enya whining as Kavik's rope tightened around her neck, Rhaegar flattening his ears against his head and sitting in defeat as Cal locked him down, and Chance letting out a loud groan before flopping onto his back so Saiyyda would have a hard time leading him back to the checkpoint. While the first three went down, the rest of the now declining pack scattered.

Melisandre was bold enough to slow herself down briefly by wadding across the river to put distance between herself and her pursuer. After taking Enya to the checkpoint, Kassia did not hesitate to go after her, the large tokota jumping through the water and back onto land to chase the other female down. Rather than run very far, Melisandre turned on her heel and let a snarl rip up her throat at Kassia, who returned the action without a second thought. While the two raised their hackles and snapped at each other, Kavik positioned a halter with a mouth guard on it and threw it at the female. At the last second, Melisandre caught the leather straps in her jaws and gave a hard yank. It caused Kavik to fall off of Kassia rather ungracefully and tangled some of the straps of the halter so he would have to pause to straighten them out. Melisandre took that pause as her chance to turn around and start running again, but another halter found it's way around her head. With the red tokota caught and growling angrily, Saiyyda looked down at Kavik with sly grin. "You're losing your touch, Urso!" With that, she took her second catch to the checkpoint while Kavik clambered atop Kassia once more and let her guide him to a new prey.

They found Sanjar creeping through a small cluster of trees, trying to stay hidden within the shadows until the allotted time ran out. When he and Kassia locked eyes, both paused before running deeper into the woods. Swerving around tree trunks and jumping over fallen logs, it was only a matter of time before one of the tokotas stumbled and lost this game of chase. Fortunately for Kassia, it was Sanjar. The blind halfmane tripped on a root that was jutting out of the ground, giving Kavik just enough time to slip his second halter over the animal's head. Coming back for their third and final catch, Kavik and Kassia found Daemon lapping water at the river while the rest of the bodies were running rampant in opposite directions. The tundra male lifted his head to look at the duo, both of which were higher ranks than him in their actual pack. Tongue circling his chops to catch the drops of water that hung from his maw, Daemon squared his stance in a challenging manner. Kassia narrowed her eyes and left out a rough breath through her nose. This would be the only time the male could get away with such an action without any repercussions, so he was going to indulge in the experience. He dared to go far enough as to raise his tail and snap at the air between them, an obvious show of defiance that erupted a growl from Kassia's throat. "Don't push it, Daemon." Kavik called out to him sternly, but smiled at his spirit. The tokota snorted and charged towards them, thinking he could spook Kassia into jumping off to the side while he made his escape, but, instead, she snapped at his legs, making him tumble to the ground. Standing over him so he could not make another break for it, Kavik fastened the halter over his head. "Nice try."

Atworth's nose was pressed to the ground, following mixed trails for one that was the closest, while Cal's was lifted towards the sky, trying to catch the direction of a scent. Almost simultaneously, both of them looked to their right and slightly upward. Sure enough, the scent that led them to gaze in that direction had them staring up at a dark figure with piercing, deep violet eyes on a small incline in the valley. Apollo shook out his fur, his movements extremely clam considering he was acting as a prey, of sorts, in this situation, before padding off behind the small hill and out of Atworth and Cal's sight. They looked at each other, briefly, before Atworth went loping after him, the energetic tokota taking long strides that felt more like bounces to his handler. Apollo was already halfway across the valley when they caught sight of him again, the black blur of fur heading towards the steep ground up to the forest the hunting party came from at the start. Atworth had no trouble catching up to him, however, and was nearly side by side with the tokota so Cal could slip a halter on him when Apollo leaped up the practically vertical incline of the hill and climbed up to the top in a few short jumps, thick claw marks left in the dirt to show how he managed the act. Atworth was not as readily equipped and he knew it. While digging his heels into the ground in an attempt to stop before crashing into the wall, his body turned slightly so his side collided with the dirt. Cal grunted in pain as his leg was pinched between the earth and his tokota, and Atworth struggled to breathe correctly as the air was knocked out of him. Cal wriggled his leg free and dismounted Atworth, stretching and rubbing the afflicted limb in an attempt to numb the pain. While the human was doing that, Apollo jumped down from the ledge, expecting he could get away while they recovered, but was taken by surprise when Atworth rammed his body into him and they both went rolling to the ground. Cal limped over to them and slipped the halter over Apollo's head, tussling Atworth's mane in the process. "Good boy, good boy."

After guiding Apollo to the checkpoint and a brief moment of rest, Cal hopped back on to Atworth once more to finish what they had started so many weeks ago. Irikah was only a dot in the distance when the duo finally caught sight of her. While everyone was chasing each other, she used that distraction as her time to just sneak away casually. "You got it in you to close the gap, boy?" Cal touched Atworth's neck and leaned to the side to look him in the eye. The tokota hesitated, shifting his weight from paw to paw to test if there was any excruciating pain, before looking out to the moving dot and sprinting after it. Not expecting the sudden burst of movement, Cal was jerked backwards and would have fallen off if he had not had as good of a grip as he had on the reins. Several yards away from closing in on her, Ira turned her head at the sound of thundering feet and heavy panting, and narrowed her eyes. Just as Atworth came to her side and Cal was lowering the halter, she crouched and turned on her heels, bolting towards the river. Already tired and unwilling to play games, which the barred tokota was always up for, Atworth growled with determination and went after the female, leaping into the part of the river she was wading through so she stumbled from the splash his body created. Cal leaped from Atworth's back and onto hers so he would get his final halter on her without fail.

Considering her final tokota to catch was Voltaire, the casanova of the species' community, Saiyyda dismounted Kala and let her distract him by feigning interest in his pale, curly mane. The brown wolverine did her job skillfully, effectively getting in his head when he noticed she had no handler by brushing up against hi affectionately. Demanding his full attention with her advances, the male did not even catch onto Syd's scent as she crept her way behind him and slipped a halter over his head.

Word Count: 3,252

Link or thumbnail of import sheet: Atworth 3219
Registered name and ID number: Atworth 3219
Prestige breeder or Pack leader?: Prestige Breeder
Handler name: Calloway Graysen
Supplementary Items: None
Training images and/or bonus images: Across the Meadow

Link or thumbnail of import sheet: Kassia 2516
Registered name and ID number: Kassia 2516
Prestige breeder or Pack leader?: Prestige Breeder
Handler name: Kavik-Askuwheteau Volkov
Supplementary Items: None
Training images and/or bonus images: Across the Meadow, What A Nice Rack You Have, Bear Hunting

Link or thumbnail of import sheet: Kalahira 4038
Registered name and ID number: Kalahira 4038
Prestige breeder or Pack leader?: Prestige Breeder
Handler name: Saiyyda Muhja Ya'aburnee
Supplementary Items: None
Training images and/or bonus images:

Tokotas mentioned:
Apollo 3363
Chance 3884
Daemon 4287
Enya 3941
Irikah 4189
Melisandre 45
Rhaegar 4288
Sanjar 4094
Voltaire 02

Story +16HP
Handler +2HP
Starter +2HP
Show bonus +1HP
Non-comissioned +1HP

Atworth +21HP
[67/40]
Kassia +22HP
Kalahira +22HP
Apollo +20HP
[35/35]
Chance +20HP
Daemon +21HP
Enya +21HP
Irikah +21HP
Melisandre +20HP
Rhaegar +21HP
Sanjar +20HP

Atworth, Chance, Calloway (c) shire14
Apollo (c) Misuzee
Melisandre (c) HollowSystem
Sanjar (c) starlight-lioness
Voltaire, Tokota species (c) noebelle
Kassia, Kalahira, Daemon, Enya, Irikah, Rhaegar, Kavik, Saiyyda, story (c) EmpyreanSkin

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Jul 2, 2015

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Burning As We Run This Race | RoK

Deviation Actions

Literature Text

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