And that is how it went. It was just the usual, guns, swords, the occasional magic user and explosion, kind of like every other Friday night when I think about it… Except… it wasn’t.
                This time something was different, normally after all that I would just go back inside the bar and order some honeyed ale, but this time there was no bar in sight, no civilization and no town guard waiting to get his teeth sunk in for trying to arrest me.
                That felt nice… I didn’t want anyone else in there right now, I was happy that it was just me and him.

                He was sound asleep, I was still worried he might have lied to me, that he didn’t stop the bleeding and that he was just going to die, but I could still hear his heart beating calmly as I carried him through the woods, so I believe he was telling the truth.
                If this were just a teen I meet in the street I’d be worried, but somehow I knew this wasn’t his first time getting shot, and he probably knew his limits very well… And knowing that still left a bitter taste in my mouth.
                However I didn’t want to think of that now…

                That silence was so filled with wonder, the night sky was beautiful, every dot of light shone brighter than before as if they were placed there by Bahamuth himself just for me to gaze at. The breeze was gentle and still warm from the heat of summer, the wind was running through my hair and body guiding us to somewhere we could rest.
                I walked for a good hour just taking everything in, I was a free man again, the despair of meeting my father had been postponed indefinitely… And it was all thanks to that tiny thing in my arms.
                I paddled across a creek and took refuge inside the trees on the other side, I knew that to be covered enough that not even a man’o war could spot us from the sky… So, I laid Vernon on  a nearby log and started to setup.

                I managed to gather a few things of his, certainly not enough to provide us with any sort of shelter or food, so I had to provide… I’m no professional hunter, but I got a good hearing, by sinking my head bellow the water it became easy to find a few unfortunate fishes that thought this was a good place to rest.
                There was the awkward moment, like always when hunting, when I had to wait and see if they could speak… But these were just feral and not smart enough to do that, so I had no quarrel turning them into dinner.
                Somewhere along the time I was running back and forth splashing water everywhere, I realized just how nice it felt, how there was just the right amount of cold to be refreshing, and seeing as there was no one else there but us I decided to take a skinny dip to clean off.
                I had never felt that relaxed before, there was just something about the night air that felt great to bathe in… Not just that of course… I had just been locked up for weeks now, I was grimy and smelling horrible, not to mention the wounds that still stung as the water made contact with them.
                But even in spite of the pain, it just felt great to finally lay back again… My sore wrists floated around the shallow water, my tail swayed with current back and forth. I closed my eyes just for a moment and breathed in that sweet wild air.
                This was freedom… And I had found a new place in my heart for appreciating it.

                After taking a few minutes to relax and clean I felt much better, my scales were shiny and I was cheery, practically prancing around.
                I gathered some firewood, placed it in a pile in the middle of camp, and then came the hard part… I quickly realized I never started a fire before.
                At first, I remembered you can just bang rocks, but none of the rocks I found had any sparkle to them so I quickly dropped that plan. Then I tried spinning sticks on top of one another, but as fast I could do it, they’d smell burnt and weird but just wouldn’t ignite.
                I immediately regretted not paying attention to one of my tutors, but in my defense, his classes always felt like the least useful ones for a guy in my… Line of work… And being alone with him in the woods made me distracted.
                Dad would surely have killed him if he found out what I was actually doing with the people he paid to teach me.

                I eventually gave up on the sticks and stones. “Az… Azer… Azur? C’mon… it sounded like my name! THINK!!” I rambled trying to remember the exact words needed to trigger the spell… But even if I did remember, it’s not like it would have worked for me.
                Realizing there was nothing I could do, I just sat there, in the dark, with raw fish on one side and a sleeping redmane on the other… This would have bothered me any other day, but not today.

                I’m not sure how much time had passed… Not having a watch kind of does that to you… I just laid back inside the creek, settled on some rocks, and enjoyed the night air while i waited.
                I was in no rush.

                After a while, I started to hear his little heart beat increasing and his body getting restless, so I moved out of the water and sat close by to him. He shifted back and forth as if his body was heavy, he was still a bit out of it so it took him a while to focus on me… Once he finally did, I lifted my hand and smiled at him. “Yo!”

                “Azreth?” He asked confusingly and started to get up, but stopped abruptly due to his wounds… “*Ugh*”

                “Easy there tough guy…” I tried to help him up.

                “What are you doing here… Did I not free you? Where are the guards?” His eyes wandered around, still unfocused.

                “We got captured again… I’m sorry.” I chuckled to myself as I tried to lighten the mod.

                “WHAT!?” He cried out in shock, and once again tried to get up in a hurry wincing back down onto my grip.

                And nowadays I know my joke may have a dick move. “Yeesh Vernon! Take a hint… We are in the middle of the forest and it’s all dark!”

                “I…” He looked around still trying to situate himself, then he looked me and smiled an awkward smile back… I expected him to be happy and proud of his accomplishment as I would be in his place, but instead he just wiggled away from me and cowered again. “… We’re fine? No one else is chasing us?”

                It was disheartening, seeing him behave like that was like a spear being jammed right into my guts. “We’re fine… No need to back away, I took out the guards… But don’t worry about them too, they are fine as well…” I reached out my hands who were still bruised by the chains and turned them around in front of him. “See? I’m free…”

                He looked at me… Top to bottom… His eyes felt kind, I could feel he was proud and happy, he even dared to tremble a smile, but it felt less like joy and more like he was in pain. “Good… I’m glad…”
                However, that didn’t last… his eyes then started hanging low, first discretely, then again, then again and I noticed his expression aggravating on every look… I heard his heart beat go from calm to a loud thumping in my ears, his ears lowered and his eyes widened. “Azreth…”

                “What?” I for one fault my generally laxed state… I got up and started looking around trying to find out why he was so blushy… It never occurred to me the reason was dangling right in front of his face. “What?!” I Asked again impatiently.

                He covered his face and started blushing harder and harder. “You’re… Not… Pants!”

                It didn’t take a genius to put two and two together, I looked down and suddenly all that talk about the night air making me feel different made a lot more sense… Still, in my head he was guy too, there was no reason for him to be ashamed on that leve. “Really? You got a problem with this?”

                He buried his face in his hands as if trying to hide in there. “Please, I’m… I’m… Just… Cover yourself!” He said in a small and shy voice.

                “Fine… Give me a second…” It occurred to me I never had that problem before, most of the guys, in the castle or not, were pretty much okay with me occasionally being naked, but this is the first time someone just flat out called me on it… It made me embarrassed.
                “There… Done!” He opened his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief… Which mildly ticked me off… “You’ve never seen a sheath before?! Seriously?!” For reasons that were yet unclear to me, his disproval was sort of an offense.

                “I’m… I’m…” He started blurring out again, and that is how I noticed how easily he gets startled.

                “There you go again… I’m not gonna bite you! You can just say what’s on your mind!” I tried to make him feel at ease, but I was so livid it was hard to convince him of it… Just like in the cart.
                This time however we had a different scenario… I wasn’t bound anymore… And that changed everything for me.

                I approached him and he started to back away, I could tell how scared he was from the way he looked at me to how fast his heart was pounding through his chest… As I got closer, he closed his eyes and cowered as if expecting an attack of some sort, once again my heart ached seeing him like that specially when I intended nothing bad.
                I hugged him… Reeled him even though he struggled and tried to get loose, I pressed myself on him and relaxed. I said nothing, thought of nothing, I just held him tight and felt his warm fur brushing softly against my scales.
                He reeled back, it was like he was trying to get away, I knew just from his heartbeat that he was not used to this... Strangely, seeing him agitated triggered something on me, it made me calm and focused. “Let me have this…” I said softly. “… I know you’re scared, but please… Let me be kind to you, or at least, let me try.”
                He was shivering like the lost puppy he is, his heart raced faster and faster the tighter I held… He was truly terrified of a gesture so gentle, I wasn’t even hurting him, I wasn’t even doing anything wrong… I remember thinking to myself, how could anyone live so afraid of everything all the time?
                “There… There…” I rubbed his hair and pressed him harder on my chest. Little by little his frightful twitches began to subside, his heartrate slowed, lower and lower… It felt like somehow his heart synched up to mine, we were beating together and as I relaxed so too did he. “There… How’s that?” I pulled back and took a good look at him still keeping my hands around him.
                He was speechless, but not out of fear… I think he genuinely did not know what to say in this situation… He just looked at me with those sad puppy eyes of his and nodded silently. “Good, don’t be so alarmed now, it’s just you and me here.”
                “I want you to relax and take it easy for a while, you’ve been through a lot… Can you do that for me?” I pleaded.

                He nodded once again, blushing at all the attention. “I’ll Try…” His voice was almost a whisper.

                “Great…” I knew however that the hug and proximity were starting to get to him, his breathing was getting anxious and his body agitated, so I let him go.
                He looked around now, trying to spot things in the darkness, he noticed his backpack was torn and he seemed grumpy … He really can’t hide an emotion to save his skin. “In the fight…” I said before he even asked. “… it must have got hit by a stray bullet.”
                Still looking pouty he looked inside, counting his meds… “I got all the ones I could find, but most of them scattered in the explosion.
                His eyes widened at my explanation. “A lot happened when you passed out… Don’t blame me for it, they were the ones with the explosive rounds.”

                The wolf shook his head from side to side, kind of like telling himself not to ask… Instead, he came up with a different subject. “Were you thinking they can still spot us?” He motioned towards the unlit fireplace.

                And my shame began creeping up again, I guessed the subject would arrive just not this soon. “I…” And I proceeded to scratch my head nervously as I didn’t want to admit to anything.

                As innocent as he might be, even he caught on to that. “You couldn’t light the fire!” He smiled sarcastically.

                “IT’S HARD! DON’T JUDGE ME!” I lashed out.

                “Really, just use some magic, I’m sure you know some…” And he got straight to where I didn’t want him to go.

                “Shut up about it, will ya?“ Once again I was out of things to say, my head felt like it had a dozen knifes stabbing it and scratched it with both hands.

                I know it’s hypocritical of me to tell him to relax then freak out over such a stupid thing… But it’s one of those subjects that I’ve been teased over and over in my life and I felt stupid just thinking about it.
                He pondered a bit, he was not witty enough to pick on it immediately but eventually it came. “Azreth… Do you not know any magic?” I groaned angrily as an answer. “But… All of you nobles know, it’s like the half-breed ‘thing’, you guys are better than us at everything and natural magic users!”

                Needless to say I was annoyed. “You got It already… Can we drop the subject?”

                He retracted again and tried to apologize. “I’m s-.”

                “Don’t!” I warned him.

                “I…” He took some time to collect himself and then. “Did you never have a private tutor? Or go to an arcane academy?”

                “I did, both actually.”

                “So you just… Can’t channel magic? At all?” He turned his head inquisitively… It was cute, I could recognize that even in my state at the time.

                “No matter how hard I try, magic just doesn’t come to me… Not all half-breeds are magic users just so you’re aware, we just have a better knack for it, well… not all of us as I stand to prove.” But it was especially bad for me, as I was not exactly a half-breed, was I?
                “So I learned how to fight, became stronger and faster… But that doesn’t do much good in this world either, so I trained myself to be more resilient, to reject magic so it wouldn’t affect me. After a while it worked, but it made the few tricks I could pull off even harder, eventually I just stopped trying. Why bother with flicking my finger to make a lighter when my peers are casting thunderstorms and huge flaming geysers.”

                “I see…” He empathized, and smiled a rather bittersweet smile. “I guess were both screw ups in that department.”

               “But you can use magic!” I quickly pointed out… Not knowing what I just said.