The 33rd of Frost, 120
It was wonderful. Gods did he need it, more than anything in those moments. The feeling of the morbid warmth running down his throat and neck scales with every press of his teeth ran shivers down his spine, it promised relief with just a few more bites. Always within reach, always so far. The taste, the texture, the smell, it all put him at such ease despite the circumstances.
Like an animal, he fed on the carrion of Lorien's dead. Tucked away in the darkness of a littered alleyway, he continued to bite, gnash, and rip away at the flesh of the... Human? He hadn't thought to take notice. He couldn't recall if they were a man or a woman before he ate away their features, what their race was, or even the color of their eyes. Ultimately, he didn't care for who they'd once been. As a Botchling, all he knew was the endless hunger; the pit in his stomach, the abyss in his core. It longed to be filled with a token of flesh, though no matter how much he ate, it would not be so.
It was the third body he'd dragged into the dark of the alley, hidden away from the screams and cries of the broken. All the sounds of pain and grief fell on deaf ears, as the blasts of horrified, blood-curdling screams in the initial attack had rendered him deaf. Deep, distant muffled rumbles shook above the constant ringing that filled the space around him, and he paid them no mind.
The only sense he could muster was to drag the bodies out of sight before feasting on them, away from the eyes of the public. It was oh-so-hard to pull away when the grim reality of the world was on his doorstep, but the feast offered such comfort and wellness. That was until he was taken by the scruff, and was lifted clean off the floor with incredible ease.
The rathor's misty yellow eyes widened at the feeling, and his whole body squirmed in an effort to break the hold on his neck. His back was pushed to the wall and his claws wrapped the arm of his attacker while he swallowed the remaining gore in his throat. A voice spoke at him, trying desperately to pierce the senseless veil of euphoria he'd slipped beneath, and his eyes steadily returned their focus as his hunger ramped up drastically. It was Fayeth's eyes that he first set his gaze on, and lingered over the bloodstains on her pale skin as he traced the length of her arm to his neck.
"...You doing?" he caught the tail end of her inquiry, then blinked quickly before he shut his eyes and swallowed hard. His claws tensed around her wrist. "How many, Ark?!" She called again and jostled him against the wall.
"...I dunno," he choked back, and strained his throat to draw breath as he pulled air through his nostrils. "Not enough, am shore..." He grinned with a flash of his serrated, hyper-sharp teeth before her arm released his neck and allowed him to fall to his feet. His knees locked and straightened his form as he leaned back on the wall, and his gaze directed straight to the mangled mess of blesh and broken bone behind his progenitor before she snatched his scalie muzzle and forced his eyes to look up at hers.
"This isn't funny, Ark," she scolded. "There are people dying out there, bleeding out from wounds caused by the tyrannical Celebrant."
His misty eyes squinted uncomfortably while he looked at her, and he strained his jaw to open a tad before he flicked his forked tongue at her from his gore-splattered lips, then withdrew the darkened organ to its hiding place once more. "Am sorry," he spoke with difficulty.
With a scoff, she let him go and produced a rag before she began to wipe the fresh and dried blood from his lips and neck. "You're unbelievable," she continued her angry rant. "But I'm glad you're okay; Asmodei and I were worried sick."
"...Sorry," he returned again, and shut his eyes while she cleaned him off. "'Ow bad is i'?" he asked with his usual lowborn common.
"Don't drop your H's," she warned. "...And it's ...well, it's quite bad. The argent let the hollows loose on Savant, Lustrians, and nameless alike. They killed and wounded indiscriminately."
Arkash blinked while he watched her, then tilted his head as she finished wiping him off. "Relly? Isn' 'at good fer uz-?"
A light whap of her hand on his muzzle directed his gaze to the floor, and he squinted at the stinging pain. "Those are people out there Ark, victims of Lorien's injustice!"
His nose curled a little as he lifted his gaze to hers, and the round black pupils of his eyes narrowed a touch. "I's a weak up call," he clarified, then pushed out of the space she trapped him in with a grunt. As he pushed his way to the end of the alley and stepped over his previous meal. "Fink abou' wot i' did for me," he turned to face her and held his arms open to behold himself, for he'd been subject to execution via hollow not too long ago.
Fayeth held in silence for a moment or two but maintained her gaze on the rath while he walked back into the open street, then lowered his arms before he turned to smell the ashes.
Her words weren't without merit, he recognized. Any one of the broken bodies he saw laid out on the road could have been him in the summer gone. If it weren't for Fayeth and Asmodei both, he would have been a pile of broken meat and broken bones, just like the ex-people he stepped over as he made his way through the snowy, cobbled street.
A claw rested on his flat, growling stomach while he scanned the grounds for survivors. His refined hearing listened for the shuffle of fabric, distant heartbeats, and wailing. He scoffed then as he walked over the body of an elven man, and looked back to where he'd left Fayeth. Though she was right to criticize his morals, he'd not have been able to focus his efforts on helping people if he hadn't gorged himself a little. Yes, his feeding wasn't for selfish reasons, he convinced himself. He was just doing what was necessary to help the wasters caught in the hollow attack.
He continued walking that way, away from the Florent estate.
