The creature did not look as emaciated as one might expect someone who did not touch all this food to be, but Reiba had solved that mystery weeks ago. She caught it licking the floor with its pale purple tongue, eating whatever dirt it could find off of the solid stone. The food here was not plentiful, however, and it was clearly in poor health.
The creature's blue skin had yellowed and its cheeks were hollow on its human-man-like face. His pupil-less eyes were now slightly obstructed by his sagging antennae, although upon seeing Reiba, he attempted to push them back upon his long, silvery head of eerie hair with the three fingered primate hands he possessed.
The rest of the creature bore little resemblance to a person however. His abdomen bore thick, large scales of blue and purple, and his legs and arms were segmented. He had what appeared to be two knees on each leg, the first similar to a human while the second bent in reverse. The outside of his knees and elbow joints were protected with short, pointed protrusions and his bare feet were four-toed and clawed.
Large claws jutted out from above his wrists. When she had first caught him, he had been using the rock hard protrusions to dig easily through clay and earth outside of the Oaken Wood along the coastal highway on her way back from a visit to Lithen Province. What he was doing there, she had yet to discover, but he was bleeding, and weak from the late summer sun at the time.
In the stone-wrought cell his claws could do less against the granite, but she regularly came herself to file the slow growing appendages to ensure that it was never an option. As well as to ensure that those claws were never used on herself.
He never spoke a word to her; he never tried to communicate with anyone or anything, though his tongue and jaws seemed to function well enough. He didn't beg anything of her, or cry out when days ago she forcibly drew that viscous black liquid that she suspected served as his blood. She had no way of knowing if he understood her words or if he was little more than a stupid humanoid insect.
"I wish I had more time with you," she relaxed, the tension in her shoulders easing in futility, "but I cannot have our spider-spy seeing you. Reiba didn't know why, but she did feel genuine regret, like she was losing a dear friend, at the thought of removing him. This confused her, but her power of purpose let her push this conflicting emotion aside.
The creature grunted as she pulled his unnervingly humanoid face up and forced his weak mouth open. I haven't had the chance to test this she worried privately, Dagleth, make this work. I don't have time! She forced a dark black pill about the size of a quail egg down the creature's throat.
Again the creature grunted and gagged as the object made its way down. He started coughing but he could not hack it up. Satisfied, Reiba backed up slowly. She would never show this beast her back, no matter how weak he was. As she exited the door she eased it nearly shut, but left a thin sliver open to the rest of the dungeon. A thin glimpse of freedom.
"Leave the dungeons alone for the night." she told the Captain as she left to return to her quarters. She suspected he would listen, but even if he didn't, even if he got dangerously curious as her late husband once had, the creature would see to his silence.
No comments:
Post a Comment