Sweeping the accidentally spilled coins on the floor into a few unequal piles, the Wizard’s spotty apprentice; Mouton sighs squeakily.
“That Halfling was a bit cheeky, wasn’t he? Asking for a 25% discount for that 2,000gp Ring of Protection!”
The older, mostly retired Wizard, turns creakily around with a pained expression etched onto his face.
“Please don’t use that ridiculous ‘modern’ system of yours here; just say ‘a quarter off’. Also, cheekiness is baked into their breed. You can’t blame a Halfling for their intrinsically funny nature.”
Pulling his, too long, lilac coloured robe sleeves back up over his knuckles for the umpteenth time, the apprentice Wizard raises an eyebrow.
“He didn’t seem that ‘funny’ to me and his face looked like it’d been repeatedly used as a football during his, obviously rough, childhood.”
The tall, purple clad; Nonogonagal frowns.
“True; he was ‘funny’ but just not in the usual Halfling sense and his ‘cloth’ surprisingly revealed him to be of the Druidic faith.”
Rex, the heavily armoured guard by the door, is usually a man of very few words, but he adds a few more of them now.
“They were ALL funny, but ‘funny’ in the weird sense, not funny ‘Ha Ha’.
The small owl and the tatty Raven on the counter, add their voices to the conversation. Heralding his comment with a throaty cough, the darker bird caws.
“I’ve seen weirder!”
After which, wide eyed, the small owl asks.
“Whoo?”
Looking up at the big, inky-dark, metal encased Human, the extremely well-drilled, young dog tries to make a judgement. The man smells of blood, oil and death but there’s something else…
Fortu, crouches down, removes his magical, strength enhancing gauntlets, holds the dogs muzzle gently in his still strong hands and gazes deeply into its eager and intelligent golden eyes.
Rising smoothly back up, despite his heavy armour, Fortu resumes his conversation with the kennel master. The majority of the words are lost on the dog, who looks instead to the much smaller two-legs next to the armoured warrior. He’d surprisingly spoken to him before in ‘dog’. Perhaps he would do so again. With a series of rapid barks, she tries to get the Halfling’s attention.
“Please Sir; What’s happening? Is it my time? Am I to be sold? Is it to him? Is he a good man? A good owner? Will there be treats?”
Liga Bur reassures her that, although rough around the edges, he does believe that there’s a good man beneath the armour. A good that perhaps the little dog can help encourage.
Sniffing up at the big man’s bare hand again, she thinks she can smell something beneath the sulphuric rage and indignation… Resilience and, perhaps deeply buried, kindness?
Suddenly the empathic dog feels a spasm of fear and pain run through her, as if a dark shadow had fallen across her and an invisible claw had pierced her mind. She whines and cries out but then, as fast as it started, the pain is gone.
Gone but not forgotten.
Dog Seven of Eight (Prize Bitch of the litter)
Small (but surprisingly strong and fast) animal
Str: 14
Int: 2
Wis: 12
Dex: 16
Con: 16
Cha: 6
HPs:11
AC: 15
Move: 40’
Alignment: True Neutral
Initiative: +3
Attack: Bite: +3 Damage: 1d4+2
Reach: 5’
Feats: Alertness / Track
Skills: Jump: +7 / Listen: +5 / Spot: +5 / Survival: *1
Special: Scent / Low-light vision
Tricks: Attack / Seek / Down / Fetch / Track / Come
