The Wolf in the Ice (Arya)

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

700 Years Ago
Palanhi




The once sacred halls of the Sanctuary of the Rei'Dulf had been laid to waste. Destruction had descended on House Luthgarde, and in their waning days it was crippling. Slaughtered like cattle, the already dwindling numbers of a once proud Loveloxx Greater House had been wiped away from the surface of Palanhi. The world that had been their last hope. The great fortress was pillaged and burning, overrun and overtaken. The once wondrous halls were in shambles, busts of so many Lupines come and gone, tapestries smoldering, priceless treasures looted from the vaults by such greedy hands. Even the Great Library, with its' magnificent ocean vista was not spared, each book set aflame to burn into nothingness.



* * *

Over the rocky outcropping lining the shoreline, a man ran for his life. His body strained against his wounds, his mind willing his muscles to continue to churn him forward. He slid down a small embankment, boots hitting the sand before taking him forward once more. Behind him he could hear the sounds of his pursuers close behind, their anooba hounds clamoring for his blood. They howled in the mad desire to catch him, but their handlers held them back still, simply allowing themselves to be pulled along after their quarry.

Dietre san Luthgarde had held the line until the rest of his brethren in the Rei'Dulf had fallen, at last choosing to flee. The other; Jokhari... Anden... Yanto... Kassius... all of the Rei'Dulf had fallen except for him, and clutching his vibroblade in one hand, the other holding tight to the black-bound tome of the Luthgarde family tree, he had fled. He had to protect the memory of his House at all cost.

He stumbled, but was quick to his feet once more, sliding down a gradual slope before his footfalls splashed into the shallows of high tide. A new sound set his heart to beating faster, and the priest risked a look back over his shoulder in time to see two speederbikes closing the distance with frightening speed. The Weequay riders held vibropikes, both weapons coming around.

A calculated duck that sent him rolling along the ground, yet allowed his to dodge the incoming strikes. His robes soaked up the water he careened through, and scrambling back to his feet, the Lupine thundered on. Another look behind him; another speederbike. This time the rider held a netgun, and he only had time to inwardly curse before he felt his entire body taken up in course fibre. He fell once more, though with no ability to control his descent, and Dietre san Luthgarde crashed into the water, sliding for only a short distance before coming to a stop.

The last thing he could remember was looking up to the noonday sun, warm and inviting on his skin.

And then the butt of a carbine took him from the waking world.








Present Day
Tammuz-An


There were many things that a Hutt clan could boast of, but Clan Varsijj had maintained over many hundreds of years the distinction of having in their possession a Lupine. They held him on display for decades upon decades, his pained features frozen in time. In those years so soon after their invasion of Palanhi, and their sacking of the Lupine citadel, Clan Varsijj had chosen only one real trophy to bring back to Tammuz-An. A Lupine. They had no interest in the pitiful few that were left, choosing only one out of the dwindling lot before settling on the priest. His comrades had fought bravely, but in the end had fallen one by one. Until only he was left, having fled with nothing but a book and a sword.

But, as all things, the knowledge that Clan Varsijj held within their halls a Lupine frozen in carbonite fell to the wayside until finally, it became a legend in its' own right. The slab containing the priest had been eventually shut away in a secret room, forgotten over time as word of mouth transformed into tall tales told in bars throughout Hutt space and even beyond. But there was no truth, surely, to the stories, and most laughed at the storytellers, chuckling to themselves at the absurdity of it all. After all, to those that even knew about the Lupine race, they were merely bogeymen; stories told to younglings to make them stay in bed at night.

Eventually Clan Varsijj fell away, overtaken by another more powerful clan that abandoned the old fortress and left it to ruin. Once-lively halls were now silent. There were no more merrymakers or rousing gatherings of any and all degenerate folk. No music, no yelling, no drunken demands or cackling lackeys.

All that could be found now was silence and decay.

And the last priest of House Luthgarde.

[Arya Ravenwing]

LAST WEEK
Gamorr




"Well, I take it back, now," Arya said ruefully, scraping her boots on a scraggly bush that was growing in the middle of the 'landing pad' in the 'spaceport' as the CLL-6 (not even the more current Eight series!) lifter droid slowly emptied the hold. "There is a shittier place than Arcan IV."

"And we had to come herrre," said her co-pilot, Jaas. "Jugssmuck Sstatjion?"

"I don't pick where the work is, okay." She gave up on scraping, and sighed. "Anyway, this job put us in the black. This close to Hutt space I'm sure we can find another load to take either in or out." Arya looked around the sparse settlement, her hands on her hips. "Not that there's one here. Not many exports from Gamorr and if I see one morrt worm on my ship I'm going to have to decontaminate the entire thing." She shuddered.

Jaas held out his datapad to her, and she peered at it. "We'rre closse to the Tammuz ssectorr."

"Why does that sound familiar?" Arya frowned, taking the 'pad and selecting the sector on the map. It enlarged, showing the various systems. "Tammuz-an..." Her eyes brightened. "I have a terrible idea."

"Whjy am jI not surrrprrjissed?" The big Cizerack shook his head. "Hopefulljy jit jinvolvess gettjing pajid."







Present Day
Tammuz-an


"Rrrumorrss half-rrrememberrred frrrom yourrr jinssane motherrr'ss jourrnalss, whjich jyou don't even have anjymorrre. Do jI have that rrrjight?" Jaas looked to the side as his large frame blocked her from view of any passerbys. There weren't any - the old Hutt palace was off the beaten path even if it had once been central to the planet - but one could never be too safe.

Arya chewed her lower lip as she sliced the electronic lock on the fortress. Abandoned or not, it was still sealed up tight. "It sounds bad when you put it like that."

"Lookjing forrr adventurrre has neverr bjit uss jin the assss beforrre, jI'm ssurrre jit'll be fjine."

"Ah ha!" she crowed, the human-sized door inset within the huge double doors of the fortress cracking open as the lock finally released. "C'mon Jaas, it could be fun."

"Fun," said Jaas dubiously, handing Twopio a light and pushing the droid forward. "Surre."

"Hey, there could be abandoned treasure inside, anyway," said Arya, walking inside behind the blue droid, flicking on her own light. The tight beam swept through the large and musty antechamber, dust particles making the light seem almost solid. "Or maybe there's actually records of some of the last Lupines in here. Which are priceless." She turned around, walking backward and shining the light on Jaas' chest. "Shut the door behind you."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The sprawling fortress that had belonged to Clan Varsijj was as a tomb. A mausoleum of memories and revelry. Darkened, cavernous hallways, walls draped with cobwebs, dust layering everything around. It was deathly silent within, echos of nothing reverberating to and fro. If one listened hard enough, perhaps they could hear the whisperings of ghosts, but even the ghosts spoke little. As if they treasured their peace, they remained quiet and unmoving. Eery stillness had come over every inch of Clan Varsijj's old home.

The main dais room, surrounded by raised platforms, was unused and empty. Carvings on the walls and the once grand sitting beds of the Hutts had begun to succumb to age and nature, weathered and in some places unreadable. Tattered remnants of a once beautiful rug lay in strips along the floor. What had been such vibrant and bright colors was now faded. It was not grey and colorless, but it was easy to see that the years had had their way. The intricate pattered were now but a shadow of their former self. But, beneath the rug, etched into the metal tiled floor, was a circle. Following the outward side of the circle's edge was a string of Huttese that seemed to have no end or beginning.

Garbled words even to those who could understand the Hutt script.


Tread over those who live in two forms
Sweep away our enemies like the greatest of storms
Mastery is manifest in the ice we walk on
Yellow eyes shut away to never see the dawn
We control the monster now


To the Hutts of old, those words held pride, but as other younger generations came along, the reverence had vanished. The circle with the writing had been long ago covered with brightly colored rugs and matts, even pillows for those shapely bodies of the dancers brought in to entertain.

But, time passes and leaders com and go, and the Hutts are certainly not immune to such things.

Clan Varsijj was no more, their fortress a crumbling and desolate shadow of what it had once been.

[Twopio]

"I am not sure what use I will be in here," said Twopio, his oculars gleaming gold in the darkness as he tottered forward. The light in his hand was unsteady as he turned from side to side. "Oh dear!" He had walked under an arch and was caught in a web of some kind!

"I need you to read this shit," said Captain Ravenwing, hurrying over and pulling the dusty cobwebs off of his blue carapace. "Gross." The Captain shook her hands to get the webs off, and gave Twopio a little push. "We'll start in the main audience chamber and work our way out from there."

"If you're sure, Captain." The droid continued forward, leading the way to the audience chamber. He had downloaded a map of the fortress from some historical records, though it did not include that passageway there, or all these cobwebs which were sure to contain some truly monstrous arachnids. "I am quite certain that anything valuable was packed up and taken with Clan Varsijj when they were driven out, tens of years ago..." his vox trailed off as he paused at a fork in the passage.

"And I am not as certain," said the Captain, irritated. "Jaas, when I said watch our six I didn't mean from quite so far back."

Twopio didn't listen to what First Mate Jaas was saying, studying the paths in front of him and finally choosing one. "This way, I think. Oh dear." He continued on into the dusty darkness.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

There was no breeze, no draft from the outside world. Instead, only stillness and quiet. The long-gone inhabitants had left a few things behind, but not much. Whatever life was left was only that of the non-sentient kind, perpetually existing in the dark and feeding upon the poor rodents that managed to find their way inside.

But, there were signs that others had come and gone. Graffiti could be found in some places, along with nooks and corners stuffed with shredded bedding. There were even a few bones scattered about, skulls staring up at the new arrivals with empty sockets, jaws open as if to noiselessly call out for a spare credit or a stim.

But beyond that, the fortress was as silent as death itself.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"That place jiss prrobabljy currssed." He distinctly remembered telling Arya when they flew over the old Hutt fortress prior to landing. Between the moss overgrowth retaking the land and the crumbling of the round rooftop and battlements, the keep looked like it should have fallen to dust centuries ago and somehow stayed upright through sheer oblivion to the laws of physics. If it wasn't cursed than it would surely fall down on their heads.

The inside of the fortress had not fared better. Nature was creeping in around the edges; breaking cracks in the walls and coiling it's green fingers into the moist crevices. The climate of the planet had created a very humid atmosphere inside this mostly closed structure. Here and there they found signs of life. Animals tracks and nests. Small rodents, he concluded, and his stomach growled it's agreement. A quick snack wouldn't hurt anyone, he told himself. And it will settle my nerves...

"Jaas, when I said watch our six I didn't mean from quite so far back."

"Comjing!" He called back over his shoulder, turning away from the rodent tracks he was eyeballing and heading back toward the rest of the tour group. The flashlight attached to his blaster rifle lead the way. He was way too paranoid about booby traps to keep his eyes on anything other than the floor, where holovids had taught him trip wires and pressure plates were sure to be located. His makeshift metal pendant to Traanjirra had been pulled out of his shirt like a shield against the dark, and was clinking against the top button with every few steps.

[Arya Ravenwing]

The droid kept shuffling forward into the darkness, his light illuminating the way, but Arya stopped for a moment to let her own light pause on a dusty skull. Rodian, from the look of it. The whole place smelled like... dust and moldy cloth. There was a faint undercurrent of death there, too, but it was not fresh. A rodent scurried into the skull, making it move, and Arya jumped and then rolled her eyes at herself. "Jaas," she called, turning around and nearly putting her eye out on his shirt buttons. "Kraast! Don't sneak up on me in here!"

Arya stomped down the wide passage after Twopio. "Don't get lost, Bluebell."

[Twopio]

"Lost? Why ever would I - " the D-2PO droid turned around in a circle, seeing Captain Ravenwing's light much further back than it had been. They were just sending him up here as bait to be eaten by whatever horrid monsters lurked in the old palace! Twopio put his hands on his hips with jerky movements, approximating human body language as best he could. "I am a protocol droid, not an explorer. I am doing my best."

Captain Ravenwing jogged up to his side and he prepared to give her another piece of his electronic mind when she pushed past him. "You found it, great."

Twopio turned around, indignant, and realized he was standing at the entrance to the great hall of the Varsijj clan. "Well I merely -"

"Shine that light over here?" The Captain was tugging on some ancient tapestries, which gave way in a giant plume of dirt and germs. Twopio hesitantly raised his light, only to find that First Mate Jaas was already shining his on the Captain. She was struggling with the heavy fabrics, finally throwing them on the stone floor so she could examine the walls. Filthy. Twopio moved toward the center of the room to find a place to sit as he was no longer needed. He was going to need a long oil bath after this!

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Dust seemed to explode into the air with noiseless flourishes, clouding all around them. Frescoes cut into the stone walls, once hidden behind the thick tapestries, were once more shown for all to see. Pictures of the Hutts and their lackey armies, depictions of planets and other spacial anomalies spread throughout the rambling images that told an unknown story. Carvings of great beasts, trodden upon by the feet of those in the Hutt's employ. Heads placed upon pikes, Gamorreans dancing about a funeral pyre stacked with human and vornskr remains alike.

Each scene that the visitors' lumen torches fell upon showed varying degrees of atrocities and conquest; all in the name of amassing more riches.

The story ran the length around the audience chamber, detailing a campaign of brutal enslavement and death, and the collecting of treasures that had been pillaged and stolen.

At the end, behind the clan head's raised platform, a single etching was shown.

A man frozen in carbonite.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya whistled in awe. "This is incredible." She pulled her microcamera from her jacket pocket and started taking pictures of the exposed walls. She shared a smug smile with herself at the thought of someday telling s'Ilancy about this place. The woman had such a hard-on for history she'd probably climax just looking at the murals. It took a few minutes, pulling down the rest of the moldy tapestries to expose the stone walls, and Arya slowly walked around the perimeter, taking as many pictures as she needed to to capture it all.

It wasn't in pristine condition, but most of it was still clear enough to figure out. The violent images were in poor taste for a room people probably ate in, but Hutts were disgusting and that was a fact. "Never heard of Hutts being so...genocidal. In business ventures, sure, but this...this is something else. Twopio!" Arya looked over her shoulder for the droid, who was shuffling around the center of the room, being useless. "Come here and translate for me."

[Twopio]

There wasn't anywhere to sit in the middle of the room, just a tattered rug that had once been a fine example of mid-Republic Era Twi'leki weaving. A shame to see it torn up like this. Twopio shuffled his feet to move it to the side while Captain Ravenwing took holos of the walls. There was something written underneath...

"Twopio! Come here and translate for me."

He looked up from the Huttese script, and made his way toward the Lupine. "On my way, Captain."

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

First he was falling behind and now he was too close. Typical Captain Ravenwing. She was never happy with anything. Jaas felt bad for any men in her life; which as her first officer and co-pilot he knew there weren't any. But if there was, he would feel bad for them. Pleasing that woman must require books, tools, and Saanjarra's blessing. Ai'kosa!

Following closely behind Arya, keeping an eye, and his flashlight, moving down side corridors, the floor, and ceiling, looking for anything potentially dangerous. The grand chamber was just that. Grand. It was the kind of lavish decadence that he felt right at home with as a Cizerack. He was sure he had seen this same setup back on Carshoulis. Probably in the home of a Meorrrei.

"You find something, Cap?" He asked as he followed her up against the walls, using his flashlight to illuminate the way.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya sneezed, and then sneezed again, giving her whole body a shake as Jaas and Twopio joined her at the head of the room. "Maybe," she said, to answer her partner. "This creepy mural looks like it's depicting," sneeze, "the killing of a lot of my kind. Lupines." She pointed back at the bonfire of human and vonskyr corpses.

"What does this say," she asked the droid, stifling another sneeze. Maybe stirring up so much dust hadn't been a great idea. Arya jabbed her finger at the heavy Huttese script chiseled into the wall under the image of a man stuck inside a rock. Carbonite, perhaps.

She sat down on the raised dias behind them, the one where the Vasijj clan leader would have reclined upon to hold court in this room. "Is it a trophy of some kind? Statue?"

[Twopio]

Twopio examined the wall, metallic fingers gently touching the carvings. "It says 'The man is ours,' here, then beneath it: 'the beast is ours.'" He straightened up, turning his head toward First Mate Jaas. "Why, this reminds me of some late Republic era Gran poetry. The repetition is -"

"Twopio."

"Yes, Captain?"

"Is there more? There's a lot of markings there." She hopped up from the platform and walked over, pointing out additional text. "And this below that seems to be all scratched out."

"Hmm, yes, quite right Captain. The remaining ledgible line reads 'His treasures are ours.'"

Captain Ravenwing's eyes lit up. "Treasure! Now that's more like it. Where is it?"

"I am not quite sure, though there seems to be some more writing in the center of the room," said the droid, gesturing stiffly.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Treasure.

That made his ears perk up and sent his tail swishing through the stale air. With a toothy grin on his face he looked around the room with a new focus on detail. Looking for anything that might hint at the location of this treasure. He didn't want to get his hopes up too high. Their adventures had a tendency of sending them home battered and empty handed. A real payout for a change would help them perform some much needed maintenance on the Raven. Not to mention they would be able to buy fresh food, supplies, and a personality for Twopio.

"Then get down therre and rread jit, Blue. jIf we fjind ssome trreassurre we won't have to trrade jyou jin forr food."

[Arya Ravenwing]

Twopio didn't say anything as he trundled along behind his more agile companions, and Arya reached the center of the room first. She crouched on the floor, pulling away the ruined carpet from the metal tiles to reveal an inscribed circle with more of the angular Huttese script written around it. "Well, she said finally, "It certainly looks important. What do you think, Toop?"

The blue droid was standing back a bit, letting his glowing oculars take in the whole of the inscription. "I am locating the beginning of the verse, Mistress Arya. Apologies - Captain. As it is written in a circular fashion and completely lacking in any punctuation (most Huttese dialects make use of only exclamation marks and queries, as I'm sure you know), I will have to make a judgment call on where the writing actually starts. Do not worry, my programming enables me to make such a choice with confidence. I'm sure the translation I give you will be accurate."

Arya hid a grin at Twopio's slip up, and nodded seriously. "When you're ready." She spent a minute surveying the room from this central location. It did seem like the room was set up with this as a focal point - perhaps where the Hutts would bring down judgment on their enemies, with the mural causing the unfortunate's knees to quake with fear while they stood on this circle which proclaimed... something ominous, no doubt.

"Ah, I have it now, Captain. 'Tread over those who live in two forms / Sweep away our enemies like the greatest of storms / Mastery is manifest in the ice we walk on / Yellow eyes shut away to never see the dawn / We control the monster now.' The rhyme and meter are a better fit in Huttese, of course, and I took a liberty in the translation to preserve the intent behind the - oh, what are you doing?"

Arya was jumping up and down in the center of the circle. "Just checking how solid this is. I know how Hutts enjoy their trapdoors."

"Trap...doors?" Twopio started stepping further back, but bumped into Jaas. "Oh dear. I do not think that is safe, Captain."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The metal tiles creaked, but refused to give way. It was obvious however, that the ground below them was not solid.

The etched circle in the center of the audience chamber was certainly the main draw, but other script, in front of each platform could also be seen now that the tattered rug remnants had been removed. Small depictions of now-scratched-out symbols lost to oblivion. Square patterns stitched themselves across the room's expanse in a surprisingly tasteful pattern.

And still the floor groaned lightly with each landing of feet. The groaning grew in volume, as with every jump it seemed to shake itself loose from the moorings that held it in place

And then, the center of the circle shifted down. Not greatly, rather only the slightest of downward movements.

An unseen shower of dust and debris could be heard falling through some invisible room below.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

The plate shifted, unless his eyes deceived him. As much fun as it was to watch the Cap jump up and down, especially considering her choice of loose clothing for the jungle atmosphere, there was a point where you had to stop gawking and get back to work. Nudging Twopio out of the way with the barrel of his blaster, he stepped forward on to the plate, adding his considerably larger bulk to the equation. "Morre wejight, perrhapss?" He asked as he coordinated his hops with those of Arya. It took a few false starts, a few giggles, and then finally they were jumping together.

[Twopio]

More than happy to stand aside, Twopio watched in disbelief as the Captain and First Mate started jumping up and down on the unstable flooring. "I do not think this is wise." His audio receptors picked up more groaning from the shifting floor, and Jaas chuckled as his big spacer boots slammed down again. "Oh dear! I can't watch!"

Arms flailing to show his distress, Twopio tottered away from the unfolding disaster toward the head of the room. The dias was at a good height, so he carefully sat down on the dusty stone while Captain Arya grabbed Jaas' arm when she got off rhythm with his jumps. They paused their madness, coordinating for a moment, and then both leapt back into the air. Twopio groaned, trying to hide his face, and caught sight of something. "Mistres-Captain. If you could stop for a moment -"

"Don't be a pussy, Bluebell," called Arya to him, jumping once again. "It's getting lower!"

"I do not think it is a physical possibility for me to ..." Twopio stopped, reprocessed. "I think I have found a -" First Mate Jaas laughed as the Captain momentarily lost her balance. Were they really still jumping? Incredible. Humanoids! Twopio didn't think he'd ever truly understand them, despite all his programming.

He gave up trying to explain things, as the Captain favored action over words, so, he reasoned, this was just him attempting to speak her language. Twopio put his metal hand on the lever he'd found on the dias, where the ruling Hutt would have sat, and pulled.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Ok just one more time," Arya said, "We need to find a aaaAAAHH!" The floor was significantly lower when she hit the ground again, and she stumbled, taking a knee for safety as much as anything else while she tried to gather her wits. "What the krasst?!" The circle was moving downward, and a cloud of dust was rising around her and Jaas as the platform moved for the first time in a hundred years. Or a thousand. Or maybe twenty.

She stood cautiously, noting there was no railing as they descended into darkness, and her head and shoulders still cleared the lip of the hole. "I told you that would work," she said to Jaas, thumping him on the back as he crouched and shone his light into the chamber they were slowly dropping into.

Twopio walked over. "Captain, I - Wait for me!" Only the top of Arya's head was showing now, and she stuck a hand out in a wave.

"Stay put, Toop, I don't think there's a way for you to - Look out Jaas!" The droid got too close to the edge, his frantic footwork sending him over in a flail of blue limbs and 'oh dear!'s, right on top of the big Cizerack.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The circular lift slowly descended, ages-old metal gears grinding into motion after so long being unused. Creaks and groans sounded from the mechanisms that now transported the passengers downward into inky darkness, dust particles filtering around them in the shaft of light from above. Below, a faint scurrying could be heard before it dissipated.

And the only sound to be heard was the zwip of a protocol droid tipping over the open edge, falling through the air to unceremoniously crash atop a hulking Cizerack...

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

The pad finally began to drop. Success! Crouching down, Jaas shouldered his blaster rifle and prepared for a potential ambush or traps. Eventually the pad dropped low enough to reveal the room underneath. Dust swirled in the air, turning bright white in the light he shone on to it, making it hard to see anything. A sound from overhead caused him to look up just in time to see the golden eyes of Twopio coming straight at him.

Dropping his rifle, he caught the droid. The weight threw him to the ground amid a flurry of swears that would have made an elderly Cizerack matron blush just a little. It took every ounce of patience and restraint he had to not just throw the droid off the lift and into the dust filled darkness. Instead he waited until the lift stopped at the bottom and then rolled the heavy droid off his chest.

Grumbling loudly he got the droid, and himself, back on their feet. Then came a vigorous rubbing of everything that hurt while starring daggers at the clumsy droid. "Do that agjian and jI'll turrn jyou jinto a tea kettle."

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya ignored the other two, once it seemed Jaas would be fine, shining her light at the floor. The lift had brought them to the center of another circle, and the darkness was heavy. She looked up - Twopio had dropped his light right at the lip of the circle, leaving a shaft of illumination stabbing across the hole. Dust swirled through the beam, and all around them, and she wrinkled her nose as she tried to resist the urge to sneeze.

The metallic tiles of the floor around the lift were thick with dust, but they appeared to be different colors, rather than the uniform grey of the floor above. She hesitated... then walked off of the lift into the chamber, letting her light play over their surroundings.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Unlike above, this room was much more of an antechamber. Ceramic tiles that had once been richly painted with bright hues had now faded and cracked, some even crumbled into dust. The smattering of detritus that still fell from the activation of the pedestal lift tinked into the inky black, leaving behind the faintest of echos. Whatever pitiful remnant that light was cast upon showed so many years of disuse, left to be forgotten to time. The walls of the antechamber were filled with aged portraits of Hutts in faded gilded frames, their luster covered by dust. Old glowpanels that had long ago lost their power were mounted beneath each frame, no light to ever shine from their bulbs again.

A carved archway was the only exit, leading into a corridor that held alcoves carved into the wall, and in each one was a mangled bust of varied vornskrs. It was easy to see that chisels had been taken to the once great pieces of art, until jagged scars crossed over much of the sculptured surfaces. Perhaps it was a passing insult to those that Clan Varsijj had conquered? Either way, the once beautiful busts were now marred almost beyond recognition.

At the end of the corridor, another room opened up.

However this room was bare of any trappings save what age brought with it.

And on the far wall, shrouded in darkness, a slab of carbonite hung in eerie silence.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Taking a step off the platform and on to the floor sent dust swirling like a snowstorm around his feet. His eyes peered through the dust and darkness at the Hutt decadence. Great big pieces of art, and he could not even make out the full picture through the damage. Only the briefest of colors and shapes. A shame. He was sure these were once incredible pieces of art. Perhaps even incredible valuable. He would have loved to find something intact to take back and sell. Vapid dreams of riches shattered in a moment.

"Mjight be able to get ssomethjing forr the frramess... Um..." He trailed off as his light caught the statues. Damaged beyond recognition. Their animal shapes were still recognizable. Their poses fierce. Predatory. Beyond them a room. Empty except for a stone slab. He swore to his Goddess under his breath and stayed where he stood, his light shining the way he was afraid to take.

[Twopio]

He was positive that he'd dented his leg, but he couldn't get a good look at it in the shifting light. And a tea kettle? Well! He could think of a few choice Cizeri insults to use on the First Mate, but... it was not in his programming to do such a thing. Why, even thinking about it was a sign that he was not well. "Oh dear." Twopio moved off of the lift, following Captain Arya closely to stay near her light, and looked around the chamber. "These portraits, even in this condition, could be priceless to the right collector. You don't see early Republic era painting like this anywhere, not to mention that these are Hutt empire portraits. Even rarer."

The droid tottered up to the paintings, his golden oculars taking them in. "They are dirty, but could be cleaned up."

"Good to know," said the Captain, her voice further away than Twopio felt was necessary. Was she trying to lose him in this underground chamber? She was standing in front of the statues, her face solemn. Feeling some sort of kinship with the creatures portrayed, the droid surmised, though the Captain did not speak of her non-human heritage much. The droid turned and looked back at First Mate Jaas, who was standing near the lift, his tail twitching with anxiety.

Well, someone had to go with the captain! He walked down the passage toward her, between the ruined busts. "I do apologize for falling on Master Jaas, it was quite unintended."

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Hmm?" Arya turned toward the blue droid, and laughed. "It was worth it for the look on his face." She looked past Twopio to where Jaas was standing, guarding their way out. Or holding back because of his religious belief in hell and the burning fires of the goddess Traanjirra, and this dark place of death was triggering him. The snarling statues were defaced and ruined, but not so much that you couldn't tell what they were. What they had been.

Which was the purpose, after all. A place to gloat over one's monstrous accomplishments. Arya traced the lips and teeth of one of the vornskr busts, and let her arm fall to her side as Twopio made his way past her into the smaller chamber that held the slab of carbonite on the wall. "Make sure you don't touch that," she called after the droid.

"Touch it? Of course not, Captain," he said. "I merely wished to see if there were anymore writings in here. Oh -!" His blue metal foot caught on a bit of upraised tile, and he tripped. Arya darted forward and grabbed the droid's flailing arms, stopping him before he fell into the carbonite.

They both stood in silence for a moment, staring at the control panel he'd nearly bumped, and then Arya carefully set the droid back on his feet. "Watch it, Bluebell."

There was only one red light illuminated on the slab. That there was even one was surprising.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The stillness was almost deafening in its own right, lending a silent, heavy weight to all around.

The face in carbonite was twisted in pain and agony, exposed fingers hooked like claws in an effort to scratch their way free. Stopped in what had to be a mid-Change, each finger seemed larger than it should've been, knuckles bulging as the tendons had been stopped in their transformation. It was a man, that much was evident. A man frozen in time. A shift halted so cruelly. It was a singular look that struck to the core of any soul that ventured to look upon it.

The light that now danced across the slab illuminated a man in torment. A man tortured.

[Twopio]

The droid's golden oculars stared unblinking at the Captain as she stood in front of the carbonite slab. D-2PO had never seem such a look on her face before - granted he had been in her service for only a short time, but Captain Arya had displayed quite an array of expressions, at least forty-one separate grimaces, frowns, and smiles, many of which could be taken to mean more than one thing. This look, however, was different than all of them. He filed it away under [[pensive:Captain Arya]], for future reference.

She reached out to the encased figure, her human hands touching the monstrous ones in carbonite, and Twopio adjusted his interpretation of her face. [[lonely/sad:Captain Arya]] He turned his head to view the Hutts' trophy better. Horrific! He managed to stop his processors from creating a cry of terror at the sight of the twisted body of the humanoid, remaining silent as the Captain walked around to the other side of the slab. Lupines were in his database. He even knew their language, though he had never had occasion to use it. Captain Arya, as far as he knew, did not know the language, or much of her heritage.

He was not versed in protocol subroutines for any Lupine cultural customs. Apparently neither was the Captain.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Help me get him down," Arya said, her words clipped as she quested along the side of the slab with her fingers. There had to be a release, or something, here, to bring the carbonite statue down from where it was displayed. Twopio moved to the other side, peering as best he could at where the carbonite met the wall.

She found something, and pressed it, then pressed it again. The man was no doubt dead - he couldn't possibly be alive after all these years, could he? - but she would be damned if he was going to spend one more moment on the wall of some godsdammed Hutt trophy room.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Silence was the only answer to Arya Ravenwing's button pushing. Silence and the eerie stillness of a body frozen in time.

Until...

A click sounded after one particularly forceful jab, followed by a deep, low thrum that seemed to sound from the innermost depths of the carbonite slab. It resonated with a strange sense of urgency, as though it had waited so long to be set free, and now that salvation was imminent, it could wait no longer. The thrum melted into a dull throbbing as the rest of the lights on the slab's side panel blinked to life. they flashed in quick sequence, and the lightbar beside the keypad slowly began to glow.

The carbonite itself remained where it was on the wall, but there was a moment of hesitation, as if time stopped and clung to a man frozen in time and existence. Seconds later the throb leveled back into a hum, and the prison of Dietre san Luthgarde began to melt. The carbonite over his features and the rest of his exposed body seemed to lighten to a pale grey before pink hues became visible. Pink shifted to molten red as carbonite flakes began to shed from flesh in crumbled, destroyed bits to leave nothing but skin.

His fingers moved first, tendons and joints trying to finish the Change that had begun, but so long frozen, the transformation went no further than the moment it had been so brutally stopped. And then his lungs reacted, drawing in a gasping first breath as the rest of his body curled forward and ultimately down. His entire being folding into itself, and the Lupine pitched forward from his coffin to the dusty floor below.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Shiiiiiiit," exhaled Arya, running her hands through her short hair and grabbing it tight as the carbonite block began to melt. "Jaas! Do you have the med kit?!" She looked back at him, and shouted, "The med kit?!"

The man crumpled onto the ground, naked as the day he was born, and she crouched beside him while Twopio waved his arms about in distress. "Don't try to move," she said, sitting on the dirty ground and holding his head in her lap as he drew in a second, improbable breath. "You are safe." Her mind awash with possibilities, and wonder, and fear... Arya inhaled his scent. Tainted by the cold odor of the carbonite and yet so, so very familiar. Not unlike that of Sarin Von Metzger, but stronger, much stronger.

There was the very real possibility that this Lupine might take his first breaths in hundreds of years, and then die from shock. His body was already beginning to tremble from the cold, but they were a strong species, and ...he couldn't die. She wouldn't let him.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"jI don't thjink that'ss a good jidea!" Jaas called from his place outside of the trophy room with the block of carbonite. The captain ignored his concerns, naturally, and continued what she was doing. Jaas fidgetted in place, torn between a survivor instinct that told him to get in there and put a stop to whatever hell they were about to unleash and his unwavering believe in something that transcended the physical. This place felt bad, and he wanted no part in it. We worshiped a Goddess of fire and hell, but that did not mean that he wanted to be in this dark place. Only the dead deserve the dark.

With a large sigh he stomped into the next room, just in time for a body to fall out of the block. "Thank jyou, for hearrjing mjy concerrnss." He said, his voice betraying his annoyance at this situation. Reaching around his body he slipped off the medkit he always kept on hand. Their adventures tended to end with them getting in serious trouble and/or injured, so now he took medical supplies with him everywhere. Even if it was just a trip down the hall to the 'fresher. You never know with the almost cursed luck of Captain Ravenwing.

Pulling the velcro top open, he began rummaging through the contents of the kit. Just because he had the medkit didn't mean he was a doctor by any stretch of the imagination. Half of these things he had no idea what they did or were for, but he imagined that the adhesive strips with cloth in the middle were useful for something. Locating the bioscanner he pulled it free and turned it on. Running over the length of the man scanned him. It was primitive compared to what a medbay could detect, but it enough to pull up fluctuating biosigns, but nothing outside of acceptable perimeters.

An emergency blanket was torn open and unfolded a gazillion times to transform it from the size of a playing card to an actual blanket. It was thrown over the body. "Does it hurt?" Doctor Ageerrodarr asked he poked the man with a finger while his other hand blindly dug for a medical stimulant.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

A ringing in his ears grew sharply before falling away into a background buzz, and soon enough that too dissipated. There was a sound. Sounds. Voices? A metal tok to the side, and the shuffling of cloth on a floor. His head was moved, hands on either side of his face. His body... his fingers curled into his palms as the rest of him shook in uncontrolled trembles. His bones felt like brittle ice, his blood like frozen spears as it began to course to life in his veins. Another violent shiver, more voices, and a thin blanket was put over him in some vain attempt to stave off the cold. His metabolism, so long dormant like the rest of him, was slow to take hold, but ever so slowly his skin began to warm. Teeth chattered. His teeth.

And then his eyes flew open, a piercing tawny hue that stared directly at the one over him. And yet, there was nothing. Only the black. It was all around, swallowing him whole and birthing a knot of panic in his gut.

"K-k-kheh ai'o un-n... Jes-j-jeska ahg-hga'n-n-na s-sar... " His voice was nothing but a bare, rasping whisper, and another moment passed before his head strained against the hold, wild eyes mad in desperation.

Why could he not see??! And another much more concerning worry descended over him as he pulled in a stilted breath through his nose.

"Nothing.

No scent, no color. There was simply nothing.

"As-s-sa'kh-kha l-leh a-ahga'n-na s-su k-kh-khe't-tr-reh... "

[Twopio]

Captain Arya was... petting? the formerly carbon-frozen man's hair, and she looked expectantly at the droid, who jerked upright. "Oh! He says..." Unused subroutines spun up, the translation coming a half second later than he was used to. "I see nothing' and 'I smell nothing.'"

"Tell him it is a side effect of the freezing process," said the captain, her hands still on the man as he strained to move. "Twopio!"

"Oh, yes, of course, it is just... not..." the protocol droid's voice trailed off, and then his tinny voice repeated her words in the Lupine dialect. Mistress Arya was acting quite strangely today.

[Arya Ravenwing]

He was trying to move, which was probably a good sign, but without his senses he would only injure himself. Arya kept her hands on him lightly, after smoothing his hair she moved one hand to his shoulder, trying to come across as a friend. "Tell him he has been in suspended animation for... a long time. I don't know how long, to be honest."

The droid translated, his words strange to her ears. Her mother had sometimes rambled in a similar language - perhaps the same one. She had never taught it to Arya, speaking only Basic and then falling into insanity so deep that Arya had spent a lot of time away from home, feeling guilty the whole time. "Shhhh," she murmured as Jaas administered something into the man's arm, making him flinch, his golden eyes straining for sight.

There was a song her mother had used to hum when she had been very small and scared of the dark, a song her husband, Arya's father, had taught her. "Tell him he is among friends," said Arya, and hesitantly she hummed a few bars, and then gave up, feeling foolish. Jaas stared at her, and she shrugged, scowling.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

A woman's voice, and he felt fingers - her fingers - trying to hold his head still. They passed over the ritual scars on his head, received upon his entry into the Rei'dulf of House Luthgarde. It was the burden that those of the Council bore; to have their flesh marred beyond that of their Brand. And yet, it was an honorific. It was a title in and of itself.

His body heat continued to rise, as his internal chemistry began to right the so many wrongs.

A sound, beyond the mechanical words spoken in reply to him; he did not know what hibernation sickness was. All that he knew was that he had been brought to this palace of the Hutts, tortured, then... then... then the darkness.

And now, he was still in the inky black well of nothingness.

But, there was something that he did know. It was a soft sound that stilled him until his only movements were the shaking of his body and the chittering of his teeth. It was a gentle tune. An old melody. Something that stirred a multitude of old memories. Haunting yet comforting in its' familiarity.

A few seconds of silence passed, and despite his condition, his deep voice picked up slowly where she had left off. The scratchiness in his voice was still very much there, the notes sometimes halting as he sucked in lung-fulls of air, but Dietre could never forget that old song. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BV9Z7LWspSk)

A cough, but even that did not deter him, and his quiet, gravelly voice seemed to fill the stillness all around them.

[Twopio]

Twopio had done the best he could with the translation, but there simply weren't words in Bast'yr to convey the concept of suspended animation. Hibernation, sickness - as separate ideas of course there were words, but he worried that he was not doing his job and getting the idea across.

As the song ended, the droid hesitantly said, in Bast'yr, "You have been unconscious for many years. The Hutts... put you in stone. We have released you. The lack of your senses is because of being in the stone."

"What did you say?" demanded Mistress Arya, the spell created by the song destroyed by the droid's voice.

"I merely attempted to explain his predicament to him," Twopio replied, miffed. He looked around the chamber. "It is unfortunate that the treasures you were seeking are not here. The statuary could still be worth something, I suppose..."

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Crumbling Hutt fortress? Check. Weird guy frozen in carbonite? Check. Two complete strangers humming a song to each other. Check. Yep. This was shaping up perfectly into a typical adventure for the Starship Wing of the Raven. It was only missing an army of Stormtroopers or Mandalorians kicking down the door with blasters firing. A quick glance over shoulder was required just to make sure that very thing wasn't sneaking up behind them.

Shaking his head he pulled out the handbook from the medkit and began leafing through the pages. "Therre jissn't anjythjing jin herre forr frreezerr burrn. He sshould go to hosspjital."

[Arya Ravenwing]

"He can't go to the hospital," hissed Arya, as Twopio helpfully translated their entire dialogue. "Lupines are a myth, his biology would only confuse the doctors, and I wouldn't put it past the Empire to have some sort of keyword search running should any of our kind suddenly appear on the radar. No, he stays with us."

"Sstajys?!"

"Yes," she said emphatically. "Help me get him up."

"But hjiss health..." Jaas fished about for a reason to say no, but he helped pull the man to his feet while Arya tucked the silvery blanket around him to preserve his privacy.

"He will heal," she said. "Let's get him to the ship. We can come back for more later."

"More?!" blurted Twopio, interrupting his own translation. "More people in carbonite?!"

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The running dialog of tinny Bast'yr at least kept his still-groggy mind in this sudden here and now that he'd been thrust into, and Dietre felt numb as he was lifted to his feet. Still the world around him was dark, and the olfactory landscape that he had once known so well was utterly blank. Not a trace of color. It was all a void, save for the alien tongues and the droning, metallic voice that seemed intent on translating. Or what he guessed was translating.

And then the translation stopped, as the voice shifted once again into that bizarre speech that he could make nothing of. But, something stuck out so thoroughly that he couldn't help but blurt out the incredulous words as he was half-carried along.

"S-s-seh ar'kha'an-n-neh?"

A myth?

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"He'ss not a Lupjine. He'ss a popssjicle, and bjy the look of 'jim, one that'ss been left out jin the ssun."

Lending his strength he slid an arm under the thawed man's shoulders with one of his large arms and grabbed the med kit with his other. His blaster rifle was forced to hang by it's strap from his shoulder. Occasionally poking him in the ribs to remind him how unarmed he was at the moment. That's what the world thought, but he had a weak humanoid under his arm that he could throw like a wet mattress at any would be attackers. It would at least buy him time to get his blaster back in hand.

Half dragging the two Lupines beside him, Jaas made a bee line for the lift. He barely waited for the droid to climb aboard before he pulled on the incredibly more obvious lever on this floor. The lift went grinding skyward. Jaas knew he should have been looking up for danger, but instead he was watching those paintings slip out of sight. With their luck they'd get ambushed by Nightsisters riding Rancors on their way to the ship and never make it back for the goods.

[Twopio]

"Oh, do slow down," said Twopio, flailing a bit as the lift started to rise. Captain Arya grabbed his arm with a free hand to steady him. "Our guest said, 'a myth?' and I believe he has some confusion as to what is happening."

The lift shook and groaned distressingly as it reached the top, and Captain Arya helped the man to sit for a moment on one of the raised platforms. "Tell him that it has been many, many years since the Lupine species was great. We are a forgotten people, only a handful remain who can say they were descended from one of the Houses." She paused while the droid translated into the strange language. "I am from the house Ravenwing, and the last Loveloxx who can still complete the Change - as far as I know. Until a few years ago I thought I was the only one of my kind in the universe."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

His legs weak, Dietre welcomed the chance to lower his body down to sit on the nearest platform. One hand clutched at the edges of the blanket he wore as the other kept a hold of the woman's wrist; a strange sense of grounding in his sudden rebirth.

The Droid fell into a normal speaking pattern once more, translating. Despite his body trying to cope with the effects of being in frozen, the Lupine couldn't help the slight frown that began to form. She claimed to be of his Bloodline and yet spoke not a word of the Dev'eni Bas'te'k?

He shook his head, not exactly processing the previous words that had been previously spoken.

"Osa'ehsa kheh'kha'ri ka eh an'amar'ia Ravenwing," He croaked out.

Speak words that make sense, Ravenwing.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Krasst, I don't know if I can," she said. "Don't transla- okay, well, never mind," Arya sighed, as Twopio never stopped talking in the other language. He halted at last, looking at her expectantly. "I am the last," she said finally. "As far as I know, I am the only Loveloxx Lupine left. They were conquered, or killed, or simply couldn't reproduce anymore. Or if they could, they could not Change. It's a lot of dren, I know, probably too much to take in. And that's all I know of my heritage," she said lamely, embarrassed.

"We should get you to my ship," she said abruptly, taking a hold of his wrist as he held onto hers. "Get some food and drink into you." Arya pulled gently on his arm, at a loss as to what to do with this man from the past.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

The conversation was very interesting, but Jaas could not help but feel like he was invading a private moment between the two of them. There was plenty of new information being exchanged. Jaas had never prodded Arya about her heritage, origin, or the nature of her shapeshifting. She didn't dig to deep into his own past or beliefs, and he kept things professional between them as much as he could. There were plenty of skeletons in his own closet, and he imagined that she had just as much, or you know, maybe a lot more considering her tendency to run headlong into trouble.

"Let'ss get 'jim back up." He said before ducking his massive shoulders underneath the man's arm and helping him back up to his feet. The difference in size made it a bit difficult to act as a crutch for the popsicle man. In truth, it'd be easier to just pick him up and throw him over his shoulder, but at the cost of his dignity and maybe breaking a rib. He was as gentle as he could be, but his patience was running thin. This was beginning to feel like another worthless creature to join their little crew. Twopio was a pain in the ass enough as it was. At least the droid didn't eat.

"One foot afterr the otherr..." He mumbled, aware that the man probably didn't understand a lick of basic. He didn't know what else to say.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

In silence Dietre obeyed, unable to really do otherwise as his body focused its' energies inward to combat the... what was it? sleeping sickness? Cold sickness? The way the droid had explained it made no sense, and supported by two beings intent on taking him away from his prison, the Lupine wasn't exactly in an arguing mood. He'd save that for later. Maybe. His thoughts and awareness were still playing catch-up, and as they passed by another of the platforms circling the audience chamber, his body rebelled, and he bucked back against the hold on him. Memories flooded back like wild, torrential waves, and Dietre threw his head back, unseeing tawny eyes searching his personal blackness for the thing that had been so dear, so important. So vital.

"Ahga'na! Su a'maro'kha! Kheh so o'ka oa'lu a'maro'kha!"

No! The book! I must have the book!"

[Twopio]

Twopio processed the words, and then translated in his tinny voice, "No, the book, I must have the book!" He viewed the formerly frozen man, and added, "He seems to be in quite a bit of distress, I suggest you say something to calm him."

"Why don't you say something to calm him?" growled Captain Arya, trying to hold onto the man who was blindly trying to get away.

"I am a translator," said Twopio, straightening up. "I do not know what it is you would want to say to hi-"

"Just shut up," she said as she stumbled away from First Mate Jaas and their captive. Rescued individual?

The droid tried to keep clear of the man's flailings, but as he blindly reached out he grabbed Twopio's head and pulled him close. "Oh no! Save me, save me!"

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Shut up and translate!" yelled Arya, nursing a bruised shin from the platform she'd fallen against. "Tell him we'll find his dammed book if he'll just calm the frell down!"

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

One of his hands had found purchase on the droid's head, pulling the unfortunate automaton in close even as he roughly jerked himself from the hold of the larger unseen man. On unsteady feet, with one hand clutching the thin sheet around him and the other gripping the droid, Dietre brought the metal head in close, nearly nose to nose. His features twisted into a snarl, his body heaving with exertion in his still-weakened state.

"Kheh... ke'sa a'maro'kha," he rumbled out, a distinct growl lacing each word.

I need the book.

In disgust, the Lupine released the droid, brusquely shoving him away while blindly turning towards Ravenwing's voice. Slightly hunched, his breathing deep as his chest rose and fell.

"Sakha'r te ona'ana."

Find it.

[Twopio]

Twopio did his best to translate while in a headlock, and then stumbled into First Mate Jaas, and cried, "Oh dear! Just do what he says!" He'd nearly gotten his head torn off, and who knows what this madman was going to do next!

Captain Ravenwing narrowed her eyes, a look Twopio was familiar with. She was about to dig her heels in and be stubborn and this strange man was not going to like it. The droid shuffled further away, putting Jaas between himself and the two Lupines. He would still translate, of course. Just from a safe distance.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Jaas only held on for a moment and then let the popsicle wrench himself free. He had no intention on getting hurt because the guy they just unfroze was having a moment. Instead he crossed his arms across his chest and snort laughed a bit at the sight of that confounded droid freaking out as the man grappled with it. If it wasn't so readily apparent that this was important to Arya, he would have given up on this fiasco awhile ago. Arya wasn't paying him enough to deal with some random guy suffering from Carbonite Madness.

"Doess he even know wherre hjiss book jiss? jIt'ss not ljike we ssaw anjy bookss whjile we werre down therre."

[Arya Ravenwing]

"We'll look for it when we look for it," Arya retorted, her shoulders hunching as she glared at the man. His slouch could have been just a sign of hibernation weakness, but her Beast read his body language as hackles raised, and she couldn't back down. "Or we can leave you here to look for it."

She hadn't felt such a strong reaction when she had met s'Ilancy, until now the only other true Lupine she'd encountered. Von Metzger, with his hereditary connection to a Loveloxx Great House, had seemed familiar to her when they'd met, though it was not a strong connection like she felt with this man. Instincts she'd never felt before were trying to tell her to submit to him, he was the Alpha here, but instead she raised her own hackles even more and grabbed his neck. "I'm going to my ship," she growled.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Her hold on his neck made him flinch ever so slightly, as the physical contact had not been expected. Unseeing eyes moved in her direction, as his head turned and angled to the side. One hand came up to place a firm hold to her wrist, and though his lips didn't pull back in an obvious snarl, there was a slight twist to them. Frustration, impatience. Even desperation. Each flitted across his features as his body continued to teeter on two very unsure legs. His breathing seemed to slow then, as the exertion took its' toll on his still-healing body.

"Kha'leh."

Please.

Again he pulled in a breath, hoping that he might be able to scent something... anything. But, there was nothing. Well, mostly nothing. Scant traces of color pulsed ever-so-vaguely in the blackness of his mind's eye, and Dietre strained to catch full sight of them. They danced away, unattainable.

[Twopio]

Subroutines spooled up and probability paths were mapped. The entire situation was spiraling out of control, as the captain had the stranger by the neck - a very dominant display for those of canine heritage!

Someone should do something! Twopio looked at First Mate Jaas, who was taking a decidedly 'hands off' approach to the situation. The stranger outweighed Captain Arya by at least twenty-six kilos; it was probably only his extreme disorientation from his long period of hibernation that was keeping the captain from being thrown to the ground.

The entire situation was impolite. The droid made a noise like he was clearing his throat, and said in Bast'yr, "I do apologize for the Captain, she is extremely stubborn and does not like being told what to do. I am sure she will be happy to look for your book, after we have checked you out in the ship's medical bay. I am certain she does not wish to offend you!" Captain Arya's hand squeezed a little tighter on the stranger's neck as he grabbed her wrist, and Twopio hurried on. "We should introduce ourselves! I am D-2PO, human-cyborg relations. I am fluent in over six million forms of communications. My companions are Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr, and Captain Arya Ravenwing of the freighter Wing of the Raven. What might your name be?"

Captain Arya glared at Twopio. "What the hells was all that?"

"Introductions," the droid replied primly, remaining safely behind First Mate Jaas. She blinked, looked at her grip on the man's neck, and released him as if she was surprised to find him there.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Dietre was in no way able to resist, or even put up more of a fight than he already had to the invisible hold on his neck. His grip on her wrist remained, but there was no real strength to the grip. Still, he held on despite it all. Stubborn determination fueled him now. But, the droid's words seemed to soothe him, if only a small bit, and he let out a long breath.

"Kheh su Dietre san Luthgarde," he started slowly, in a low voice.

"Ss'eh ara'kor Rei'dulf ama hGo'ser Luthgarde."

I am Dietre san Luthgarde. The last Rei'dulf of House Luthgarde.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

The whole situation was getting out of hand. Now the two of them were grappling with each other. Jaas laughed a bit, to himself, at the sight of the male trying to get his way. Wrong answer, bub. Jaas was even bigger than this guy, and he wouldn't mess with Arya in a million years. She was feisty, strong, and not afraid to fight dirty. He was in for a world of hurt if he wanted to throw down with the Captain. And in the odd chance that he managed to overpower Arya, than he had the massive Cizerack gladiator to deal with.

The guy looked like a drowned cat. All weak and floppy. It was half a conversation, with Arya dumping down his throat, while he continued to mutter nonsense. Twopio was translating, but it was not the same. Everyone was not on the same page. Confusion was ruling this encounter. They were getting nowhere quickly.

"Let'ss get hjim to the sshjip beforre he djiess on uss."

[Arya Ravenwing]

"You missed a word," Arya told the droid. "What does 'Rei'dulf' mean?"

"In this context it is a proper title," the droid huffed, "Rei'dulf translates to holy councilman or advisor."

"Well," she said. "Dietre? We're going to the ship. I advise that you don't put up a fight." She stalked out of the main chamber, Jaas hesitantly gathering up the last of House Luthgarde and following her.

Twenty minutes (and two more arguments) later the man was wearing a pair of Jaas' sweatpants and a tacky orange and red tie dyed t-shirt from a Carshoulis Pride parade that she'd dragged him to a few months ago. Arya pulled a plate out of the auto-cook, put the dewback steak in front of him on the table, and then slid into the other side of the booth while Twopio stood just behind him like some sort of lame metal guardian angel. "Eat," she said. "You need your strength."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Dietre thumbed the shirt he now wore, more perplexed at the morass of vibrant colors that seemed to fill his vision than whatever food had been set before him. Like a splash of red and orange, looking down yielded a hazy splash of color. His features screwed up into a look of confusion for only a moment though, before descending into a mild touch of disgust.

"Sa'ano kheh... a'hgana," he grunted distastefully, and without ceremony the Lupine pulled the shirt back off. The pants could stay, but the shirt was simply too much. He made no move to fold it, rather simply dropping it in a pile on the table next to the plate she had given him.

"Oni'akha eteh kheh khu'so su ano tu'ahga."

I cannot wear such a thing.

Completely ignoring the food, Dietre angled his head up, unsure now of what had been set before him. The faintest traces of a scent tickled at his senses; something vaguely familiar.

[Twopio]

"I guess your sight is coming back," quipped Captain Arya, and she pushed a glass of water closer to the holy councilor of House Luthguarde until it touched his fingertips. "If you tell me what's so important about this frelling book, I can go back and look for it while you rest."

Twopio paused for a handful of nano-seconds while he ran the translation through his mechanical brain. "Your sight is coming back. Good! We shall speak of the book, and I will return to look for it while you rest and heal."

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Jaas was grumbling in his room. The scramble through his drawers to find his least favorite articles of clothing had left his things a bit of a mess. All so he could lend them to the frelling wise man of House douchthguarde. The search had produced his lazy day sweatpants, the ones with the rip in the knee, and that horrible Carshoulis Pride T-shirt, from that time that Arya had dragged him to that parade; insistent that he should want to indulge in his own culture. It ended up being a super racist shit show with non-Cizeracks parading around with painted on trips and fake tails. While meowing and batting each other.

It was like a goddamn Fluffies Convention.

A place for everything and everything in it's place. The room was restored to it's former half-destroyed nature and Jaas permitted himself to join the others in the kitchenette. The wise guy was being all snubby and inconsiderate. Again. They already had one worthless lifeform on board, although synthetic. They really didn't need another. He kept his tongue in his mouth and poured some caf into the mug that Arya bought him. The one with the cat ears and whiskers on it. Racist.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The sound of footsteps reached his ears, and rather than immediately answer the question posed, Dietre tilted his head to the side, allowing himself a moment to savor the sense of being able to hear once more. His body felt ravaged and held back, his mind slowly returning from that desolate place of nothingness and cold loneliness. His throat still felt raw, though thankfully the chills had passed. His motions now were his own, and while his senses of sight and smell were slow to return, they were coming back. It was wonderful and concerning all at the same time, as he found himself unsure if his would-be saviors planned on placing him back inside the prison of ice. The long sleep. The death without dying.

And so he listened now, to soak up each heavy footfall that met his ears as though it was the sweetest of intoxicants.

And even if he could neither see nor smell to the same capacity that he could hear, there was no mistaking that the one who had just entered was a sturdy body. Was it another Lupine? The woman professed to be from House Ravenwing. What brand did the other carry? The book was suddenly forgotten for a brief moment in time as the mystery tugged at him.

"Soka'sokano tu se a'ameh khos'khe'sa ro'teneh?"

What House does the large one belong to?

[Arya Ravenwing]

She snorted a laugh before Twopio finished translating. "No, Jaas isn't Lupine. He's a Cizerack." Arya looked at Jaas, who appeared thoroughly nonplussed at the idea that he might have been mistaken for another species, and laughed again.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"Damn rrjight." Jaas said disdainfully under his breath, his words lost in the roar of her laughter. Lupine? Oh fuck no. He would sooner allow Saanjarra to hurl him into the sun.

"You should ask him if he does any tricks. I think I have some treats around here." He pushed off the side of the counter and popped open the cooler. Reaching inside his hand went right for the little plastic case in the door, right next to the milk. The case of frozen Sajoi was shaken, the little frozen furballs rattling around like one teases a pet with it's favorite treat. Laughing to himself he popped the case and tossed one of the little morsels into his mouth. The crunching of frozen flesh filled the air. Like crushing ice cubes but... meatier.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

"Jaas... Ssizerak... "

The words sounded alien to his tongue as he spoke them, and with a frown Dietre leaned back in the somewhat 'cushioned' seat.

The sound of something rattling about caught his attentions, and angling his head toward it, blinked furiously at the vision his eyes refused to focus upon. Everything was a muddling of color and movement; infuriating him to the point that a disgruntled hurff sounded through flaring nostrils.

But, it wasn't long before the bare scent of cooked meat drew him back to the plate in front of him. He stared down at what he hoped was food.

"Vas te da'ahga."

What is this.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Dewback," she said. "Meat. You eat it. Or, not." Arya tapped her boot on the deck as Twopio translated with what seemed increasing slowness. "I figured you'd be hungry after a few hundred years on ice." Arya glared at Jaas as he crunched his frozen treats with his mouth open, and he stared back unapologetically.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"Heavjiljy processssed. Pumped full of vjitamjinss. Arrtjifjicjialljy flavorred. Everjythjing a grrowjing Lupjine needss." He laughed as he popped another treat in his mouth. Out here in the void of space, among the dregs of society, it was really hard to get your hands on fresh meat. It was easier to stock on this factory garbage. At least it has 40% of his daily nutritional value.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Whatever a dewback was, he kept his eyes on Arya as she spoke, and the droid translated.

"Doo... bekk."

Harsh consonants broke the word into two halves, but he at least made the effort to try and match the words from her to the words from the droid. It was an exercise in grasping at ketto roots, frankly. A thoughtful scowl, and he sent his eyes down to where the smell was coming from. His hand ventured closer to the plate, feeling along its' contours and then along the still-warm edges of the meet. His offhand came up then, to clumsily take the meat in both hands. He brought it up to his nose, cautiously testing the smell before taking a small bite.

It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad, either. Before he'd even swallowed Dietre went in for another mouthful, this time much larger.

"Iska kheh'tu," he mumbled between mouthfuls.

It will do.

[Twopio]

Miss- ...Captain Arya impassively watched the thawed Lupine as he chewed, but there was a flicker of something else behind her eyes. If Twopio didn't know better, he would call it curiosity. He was a protocol droid, after all, and well versed in the body language cues of many species. Not Lupine, per say, but certainly other caninid species. Captain Arya had spent her whole life away from Lupine society, so her mannerisms were familiar, if diverse in their roots. From what he had observed from Master Dietre, the Lupines seemed to take many body language cues from the human species, which made a certain amount of sense, as they were, after all, an evolutionary mash-up between -

Twopio's optics had dimmed, but came back on fully as his processors focused on what was in front of him. Memory replayed the last minute of Captain Arya's sarcasm in a scant second, and he quickly translated it into much more polite Bast'yr. "I am glad you like it. Is your sight returning already?"

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

"As'keh eh'to e tu'khareh."

The sight comes slowly.

Again, spoken through mouthfuls as he chewed hungrily. How long had he been imprisoned? How long had he been shut away in the cold sleep? For only a moment he let his mind try to parse the question, but in this moment, Dietre was fully focused on the food that'd been provided, and he devoured it with almost reckless abandon.

"Sa'ako meris'tasa e sa khari'ek."

Colors and shapes, moving about.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Licking his lips Jaas put the container of frozen rodents back in the cooler. Closing the door he leaned his back against it, his arms crossed over his chest, eyes focused on the new pathetic lifeform they had taken on board. It was like watching a child mature from blind infancy into a functioning adult in the span of a day. He was getting there, but for now he was still a burden. Twopoi was enough of a dead weight that Jaas was not happy about having a second one on board. Lupine or not this smelled of something that was going to bite them in the ass eventually.

"Eatss ljike a Cjizerrack. jI bet he would love a feedjing pjit."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Dietre paused in the middle of a bite, both hands still grasping the meat. Eyes rolled to the side, to catch sight of the cat man in his peripheral vision. A moment of puzzled staring, and the Lupine shifted his gaze back to the Ravenwing woman.

"Sa'aneh a'sa su ke'na?"

What did he say?

[Arya Ravenwing]

"He said that you would enjoy Cizerack eating customs," said Arya. She raised an eyebrow as Twopio translated from behind their guest, and leaned back against the booth. "So, what does your book look like?"

A proximity alarm beeped from up at the cockpit, and she motioned to Jaas to check it out. Was probably an animal - there weren't any local sentients in the area. Not that she knew of, at least.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Taking her cue he dismissed himself from the common room and headed up to the front of the ship; ducking through hatchways until he reached the cockpit. Dropping heavily into his co-pilot seat he gave his chest a scratch while he lazily looked the control panel over. Yep. That was definitely the proximity alarm. There was no doubts about that. Switching the scanners to broad he let it sweep for a few seconds while he excavated his nostril of blockage; no small task when you are sporting sharp nails on every fingertip. The scan came back. It was picking up a ship. Zeroing in on it revealed nothing spectacular. Looked like a garbage crawler.

"Lookss ljike sscavengerrss." He said after activating the cockpit comm to pipe his voice through the ship and into the common room. "Thejy'rre jusst ssjittjing out therre ljike crreepss." The ship was at some distance, having just set down. They wouldn't even know the Raven was here until they powered up the engines, or saw them with their own eyes. He doubted a run down junker like that was going to have anything approaching even a standard sensor suite. Jaas had insisted on installing a decent on in the Raven after all their close run ins with various galactic powers.

"Do jyou want to fjirre up the engjiness and get out of herre, Captajin?"

[Twopio]

Twopio quite helpfully translated the entire exchange for Dietre, while the man continued to gnaw on the dewback steak. It felt good to be needed.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Chewing, Dietre continued to stare across the table at the hazy blur of the Ravenwing woman. His eyes narrowed as he continuously tried to focus on her, to see the sharp images that he knew were there. He wanted to see her features, to see her face. And - most importantly - he wanted to see her Brand. He wanted to know for certain that her words were true. Vying for his immediate attentions though were his hunger, and the need to reclaim the Tome. The book of ancestry that was the backbone of House Luthgarde. He had been charged with its' safety and bound to it. His duty and honor would never allow him to leave such a thing behind.

He swallowed, hesitating before taking another bite as he listened to the exchange.

"A'maro'kha... Ahna'vo seh mar'esakeh. Das ar ohga'neh etar'o."

The book... it is sacred. Don't leave it.

The words were spoken as much to the woman as they were to the large felinoid, and Dietre couldn't help the frustration that twisted his features.

"No'akha le'ss'amo, kas'kes'a tari'ss'a. Sota etar'o Da'ano'a Luthgarde."

It is hide. Black. It is the House of Luthgarde.

[Arya Ravenwing]

There was no reason for scavengers to be out at the old Hutt palace. The place had been picked clean decades ago... "They must have seen our repulsors when we landed, and got curious." Arya pushed up to her feet. "Stay in the cockpit and monitor them. If anyone comes out of that ship I want to know." She paused. "Please?"

She focused on Dietre san Luthgarde, who was following her movements with his eyes much easier than she'd thought he would be. "I'm going back in to look for the book. You stay here with Jaas." Arya was checking the power cell on her blaster as she spoke, holstering it on her thigh. She'd be in and out before those scum suckers out there even found the entrance to the palace.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The droid had not even finished translating the Ravenwing woman's words before Dietre was clamoring up to his feet, legs still shaky as he stood.

"A'hga'na... "

No...

Nearly blind, the Lupine stumbled angrily forward a few steps to the blurred form of Arya was.

"Kheh asa'to'a ehr'ano."

I'm going with you.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Like the seven hells you are," she said, not budging as he lurched into her personal space. "You can barely see. Stay here."

Arya turned away, shrugging her jacket on, and stalked down to the ramp, pressing the button to extend it and open the airlock. Without looking she could tell that their new passenger was right behind her. She sighed. "Oh fine, come on if you like. If you slow me down, you're getting left behind. And you," she said to the droid, who had clunked up after them, "are staying with First Mate Jaas. You're too slow, and we can't afford to leave you here."

The smuggler swept through the airlock as soon as it opened, descending down the ramp with her head on a swivel.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

He stayed close behind, his gait uneven as he followed doggedly. Lips peeled back over his teeth as he concentrated, and Dietre felt his bare feet fall on a myriad of small shapes. Crumbled duracrete, weed shoots, bits of dried wood. None of it seemed to slow him down as he kept on, intent on holding the Tome in his hands once more. The knowledge that he'd been in the cold sleep for so many hundreds of years caused a gnawing worry to eat at the edges of his awareness however, as there was truly no way to know whether the book had been preserved. Or if the Hutts had had it destroyed. He sorely hoped that the latter was not what had happened, but it was still a possibility. One that seemed to create a strange tightness in his chest. Was it desperation? Perhaps.

"Kha'so tu tari'ek Ravenwing, ira'soko so'eh meh'gani. Sa a'su Da'ano'a en a'to."

You behave enough like a Ravenwing, always gruff and angry. You carry your House traits well.

He knew that without the translator droid there was no way for her to understand, but there was also the underlying need to simply talk. To form words. To speak out and be heard. Before the cold sleep he had been relegated to angry cries and rage-filled curses. His entire existence during his captivity - before the sleep - had been as such. There was no rest, no peace. Only pain and suffering and being chained up like some trophy beast. He had devolved, but now he was returned to something far more normal. It was a chance to live without binders and stuncuffs. One hand went up to his neck, broad fingers passing over the scars left by the spiked collar that had been clamped around his neck. That it was gone now only meant that his captors had seen fit to freeze him without anything that would distract from his status as an ornament.

A blessing in disguise, he supposed.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya heard him say 'Ravenwing' and she rolled her eyes and slowed down until he caught up. She grabbed his hand and he resisted for a moment until she placed it firmly against her elbow. "Stick close. I know you don't understand me, but just... try not to trip on anything." Her eyes tracked down to his bare feet, and she sighed. Nothing to be done about it now.

They entered the palace, and she took him back into the throne room, the dias and murals staring them down. "I figure it's likely to be down there," Arya gestured at the hole in the center of the room, "Where you were."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

A grunt was her only answer as he cast his eyes about, still barely seeing his surroundings. She was speaking, but there was no understanding on his part. Until they had stopped at the mouth of the hole. Even to him it was plainly obvious what she intended.

Dietre scowled, blinking furiously in some useless attempt to make his vision return. It of course did not.

"Ano ka'ss ta'ho ra'eh'a."

If we must.

A deep breath that eased some of the tension in his chest. The horrid notions from before still picked away at his thoughts, but he did his best to ignore them.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"Fly the ship, Jaas. Deal with the scavengerrs, Jaas. Take carre of Twopio, Jaas." He muttered in his best imitation of Arya's voice and basic accent. His fingers carefully pressed buttons on the command console as he did his best to keep an eye on the scavengers. Being alone with Twopio just made him want to ditch the droid in the forest somewhere so that he could finally be free of that annoying bucket of bolts. "But he's valuable, Jaas. He can help, Jaas. Therre's less worrk forr us to do with him, Jaas. Bullsshjit."

Getting up from the cockpit he walked back through the ship, pausing only to give Twopio a silent glare before continuing his journey back to his bunk to grab his blaster rifle. Chances were far too high that these scavengers were here by coincidence, and with his shitty luck they were probably Imperial Stormtroopers in disguise with Imperial Knights riding rancors in the wings somewhere. That was only if they weren't also Mandalorians, magic lizard people, and a living star all rolled into one being. It was easier to expect the worst and be wonderfully disappointed.

"Sstajy herre, orr ji'll usse jyou ass bajit." He said, jabbing a finger in Twopio's direction before headed down the boarding ramp to the outside. The ship was parked next to an old crumbling and ruined out building. Probably a servant's quarters or privy. It was the same height as the ship but did not do much to block it from sight. With a loud sigh he began climbing up the vines that threatened to consume the entire structure until he reached the top. Armed with his blaster rifle and electrobinoculars, he had a better vantage point should anything go down. He would hate to be stuck inside the ship if the shit got real.

Plus this was more fun.

[Twopio]

"Well I never," said Twopio, watching the ramp close back up after Jaas exited. "I'll just stay here then. Protect the ship from pirates and marauders on my own!" His ocular lights dimmed momentarily as he looked down at his blue hued feet, and then the droid straightened up and walked to the cockpit. He could at least monitor the sensors and alert the Captain should anything untoward start happening.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"I'll take thaaaaat as a yes," Arya drawled, walking up to the edge of the hole and looking down. "Not sure why the lift went down. I'm sure we left it up." The smuggler looked around, but the scuffle they'd had right after emerging from the basement had stirred up the dust enough that she couldn't tell if there had been any new footprints. She walked over to the central dias, after making sure Dietre wasn't going to fall into the hole, and pulled on the lever Twopio had found.

The lift slowly ground upward, but stopped about a foot from the floor. "It'll have to do," Arya muttered, hopping down and reaching back up to help the recently thawed man join her. The lantern she had set on the circular lift at her feet cast some intriguing shadows on Dietre's bare chest and arms, but she kept her face carefully schooled to neutral as he joined her. "At least you're not naked anymore," she said conversationally. "Not that I minded."

The stone slab they were standing on was already starting to drift downward; the mechanism was very old and showing it's age now that the intruders had forced it back into action. Arya peered down, and the craned her neck upward at the dimly lit opening they were leaving behind. "Just about twenty feet. Not too bad. Book soon. Booook," she said slowly and deliberately at her silent companion.

She cracked a couple of glowsticks, the industrial strength yellow light quickly overpowering her lantern, and handed one to Dietre as they reached the bottom. "Stay with me, or you're being left behind." Arya smiled.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Booook?

It was a strange word that met his ears, and he sounded the word out with harsh consonants as he felt something pushed into his hand. It made a bright point in his fuzzy vision, but there was enough to be understood that it was a source of light.

"Boookah... "

It sounded so strange to say, this word.

And as they stepped off the platform, Dietre did his best to mimic with his hands an open tome. It was slightly tricky since one hand still held the glowstick, but he managed none-the-less. Tawny eyes looked at the Ravenwing woman without seeing her in any amount of clarity. She was there, he knew. But her face was a blurred sight that gave no indication of her features.

"A'maro'kha... ?"

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Yeah, sure," she said. "A maro kah. Book." Arya dropped a glowstick by the platform, and indicated the way she wanted to walk with another held in her hand. "I'm guessing it's this way. You were on that side," she pointed behind him, "but there was no book there." She started walking, sticking the glowstick into her belt at her back and raising her lantern.

The disfigured busts that lined the chamber were just as intriguing and disturbing as they had been the first time she'd seen them, earlier in the day. Arya almost said something flippant to Dietre about them, but it felt wrong, even if he wouldn't understand her. He had probably known the people the statues represented, or some of them, anyway. She looked over her shoulder at him, following along behind her like a lost puppy.

Except even recovering from being frozen in carbonite he was starting to move with grace, like panther. Then he stumbled, and she snorted. "Come on, old guy. You wanted to come." Arya waited for him to catch up at the entrance to another chamber, shining her lantern. "You don't happen to know what your book, your... a maro kah... smells like, do you?" She tapped her nose and gave an exaggerated sniff.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

She lifted a hand... he thought at least... to tap something on her face. Or at least tap the hazy blur that looked like her face. But, the meaning was clear enough. Scent.

His free hand lifted then, to slide a finger along his own nose before reaching out, fingers wide as they sought out her own.

"On'sora," one finger brushed her left nostril before pulling back to his own once more. It tapped against the bridge of his nose.

"On'sora."

How to describe the scent of the Tome? It was age and history. It was like some amalgamation of Lupine tradition wrapped in that wonderfully earthy tone of leather.

He frowned, then reached out to grab her arm. It was a gentle hold though, and his thumb and forefinger carefully rolled her skin.

"Ru'ek."

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Getting as comfortable as one could lying down on the stony ruins of an ancient tower, Jaas continued grumbling as his fingers flipped the variable scope on his blaster rifle into place. Sighting through the scope he was able to just make out the gleam of the scavenger vessel. There were too many trees, hills, and ruins between him and them to make out exactly what it was. It was not large, he guessed. It's size was perfect for shuttling a few men from place to place with enough cargo space left over for whatever they came across. It further established his thoughts that these were nothing but scavengers.

Until he saw them.

They wore black leather coat over black armor, their faces obscured by white plastoid masks. Each mask was similar but altered in some minor way. A mark here, a horn there; cracks and scars of battles. They moved like wraiths, their legs hidden by their long coats, and in their arms they carried weapons of all sorts. Blaster rifles and pistols, vibroblades and scatterguns. One by one they emerged from beyond the treeline and around boulders, trunks, and rubble. They moved with a purpose, all together like a pack, headed directly for him and the Raven.

"Uhh, Arrjya?" He choked out the words unaware of how dry his mouth had suddenly gotten. One hand steadied his rifle and the other held the comm unit. "jIf you can hearr me down therre, we have nasstjy lookjing companjy up herre. jYou mjight want to hurrrrjy jit up down therre."

Setting down the comm unit he took the rifle in both hands and tried to settle further into the ruin even as the blaster nestled deeper into his shoulder. He took aim on the closest spook, right on his creepy mask, and began to squeeze the trigger before a thought bubbled to the surface and made him think better of his target choice. Switching it up, he aimed at the one carrying what appeared by far to be the longest ranger weapon of the pack; a blaster rifle not too different from the one in his hands. Lining up the shot he paused only to say a soft prayer to his dark goddess and then squeezed the trigger tightly. The blaster kicked into his heavy body and from it's barrel raced a crimson bolt of energy that sailed through the air and cleaved through the spook's face; cutting his mask in half and blowing a hole through his cheek and out the back of his head. He went down. Hard.

Smiling toothily he leaned into the blaster and began firing in ernest. Short bursts that cleaved through the field, scoring tree trunks and earth as much as it did the advancing spooks. They went diving for cover under the onslaught, and without the necessary firepower anymore, they could only try to fire back on the unholy Cizerack while their squadron with melee weapons crept along the sides. Jaas fired at all of them, taking turns whenever one popped it's head out. He wasn't landing on kill shots but they were pinned down where they stood.

Hopefully Arya would return before they managed to crawl to the ship.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Her eyes crossed a little as she followed his finger toward her face, and she watched warily as he took her arm, gently pinching her skin. "Ruek? Skin?" Arya frowned. "Leather?" She looked around, and then a burst of static came from her commlink.

"Jaas?" She plucked it from her belt, holding it up.

"Arrjya... hearr me ...lookjing...down therre." The interference from being underground was too high - most likely the Hutts had purposefully constructed these chambers to block any electronic signals.

Arya gave her commlink a shake. "Bad signal, Jaas. We're still looking, give us a minute big guy." She replaced the commlink on her belt, and dimmed the lantern that was resting by her boots. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them they gleamed amber, reflecting what little light there was.

She tipped her head from side to side, popping her neck, and opened up her senses - holding on to her human form while using the vornskr's senses was a little like holding in a sneeze, except nothing at all like it. Dietre loomed large in front of her, and she resisted the urge to sniff all over his neck, turning away and looking down the passage.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

He stared at her, lips in a thin line as he watched her send a look down a passageway. A moment later Dietre tested the air. Her scent seemed to fill his nostrils, competing with the age-old mustiness of what had been his tomb. He frowned. But, he spoke nothing, instead letting mostly-unseeing eyes follow the direction she'd turned.

Everything was muddled darkness, and his brow knit in frustration as focus stubbornly refused to present itself. An impatient snort, mostly out of annoyance.

"Kheh a'hga'na ana kasu," he grumbled.

I don't know where to go.

It was an admission that he had wished to not make, but the words were out now, and he could not take them back. His breathing grew in pace, fueled by resentful anger at having such a lock of knowledge of... well, of anything. He felt helpless, and in that moment the Lupine took two steps, his long gait sending him past Arya.

"Kheh ta'asu ka tu so'ameh... a'hga'na Temu'ss'ehn."

I'll not be useless... I'm no self-sacrificed soul.

Another angrily snorted huff through his nostrils, and Dietre sent an arm out to lay a palm against the cool stone. Even as he'd shoved his way past her, he could smell her. Hers was a scent that he found to be infuriatingly distracting.

[Arya Ravenwing]

She growled between gritted teeth as Dietre pushed past her, the Vornskr not liking the idea of an Alpha suddenly appearing in her life. Or at least, a male that imagined he was an Alpha. It was the same reaction she'd had when she'd met Loklorien s'Ilancy - Arya had always been a pack of One.

It didn't help that everything he said sounded like garbled nonsense, and reminded her of her crazy mother's ramblings. "You're going to fall into a hole or something." Arya walked after him, the glow from the lightstick he still held bright in her vision, nostrils flaring as she picked apart the odors of the ancient chambers, searching for anything other than rot and mold. There was something...metallic? up ahead.

[Twopio]

The way the two ships were positioned meant that the newcomers were walking through the jungle toward the aft of the Wing of the Raven. Twopio was perched on the copilot's seat in the cockpit, watching them approach through a viewscreen. One fell over, a bolt of red lancing through him/her/it and the droid waved his arms in a panic. "First Mate Jaas do you think that unprovoked violence is the answer to this? They most likely did not know we are here!"

More blaster fire erupted from the top of one of the crumbling security towers, pinning down the unfortunate souls who'd had the misfortune to run afoul of the Cizerack's bad temper. "...Perhaps they just wish to converse with us!"

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

* * *

Her words sounded like silly gibberish, and Dietre made a face as he blindly pushed onward. Whatever she spoke of was lost on him, and rather than bother with looking back to the sound of her voice, the Lupine kept his head forward. His nostrils flared as he scented the air around them.

It smelled old and worn. Like anceint dust and rock. There was a coolness that was refreshing, though only to a point. It was a stale cold that seeped into the body as much as it provided relief from the heat that his skin was slowly radiating, his metabolism working to fix his senses and return them completely after being dormant for so long.

The corridor they were moving through opened up into a small antechamber, and beyond yawned a larger audience chamber. This one was much more subdued than the one above; as though it was meant for private clan meetings. A single dais sat in the middle, a hulking skeleton resting atop its' worn surface. Each bone shone pale white in the light of the glowsticks, skeletal arms having fallen to the stone floor when the tissues and tendons connecting them to the rest of the body had fully rotted away.

The massive skull lay on its' side, large eye sockets empty yet staring at the two intruders.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"What? Arrjya?"

Shaking and yelling into the comm had no effect. She never replied again and he wasn't too sure what she said when she had. It was all garbled. Immediately following the signal went out completely. She was too deep in the complex. He had no time to fiddle with the device as return fire sizzled through the air above his head and blackened the very stone that protected him. To make matters worse Twopio's shrill voice transmitted through the comm with crystal clear clarity.

"Be mjy guesst." he replied between bursts from his rifle. "Come out herre and talk ssome ssensse jinto them."

Through some trick of fate, or luck, one of the skull faced scavengers chose to peek when he should have ducked, and a shot that was meant to pin him instead put the unfriendly reminder to stay put right through his throat. Even as he fell into the grassy knoll one of the other scavengers rose from his hiding place and charged the tower. Jaas leaned into his rifle and aimed downward, firing along the way, but missing with every shot as panic began to set in. The vibrobladed scavenger disappeared from view beneath the lip of the tower.

"Twopjio, can jyou ssee thjiss gujy?!"

[Twopio]

"I do not know if it is a male," replied Twopio, bending stiffly toward the viewscreen. "Oh dear! Master Jaas, he is going to climb your tower!"

"Sshjit!"

The droid reached to adjust the rear camera, but it was just out of reach. It was, additionally, mounted to the aft laser cannon placement, which he only realized a few minutes later. Half-standing, Twopio got his metal fingers around the camera controls, moving the view to more properly see the pirate who was looking for a way into the tower Master Jaas was occupying.

He lost his balance a bit, internal servos whirring to compensate, and he put his blue hand down on the console to steady himself. The pirate exploded as red plasma lanced into him. The droid started, standing up straight. "Master Jaas, we are under additional attack! Something large is firing on your tower!"

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Looks like we found the last ruler of Clan Varsijj - at least on Tammuz-an." Arya brushed past the half-blind Dietre, holding up her lantern by the large Hutt skull. She'd never seen a Hutt skeleton before, but that is what this undeniably was.

Arya placed the lantern on the dias, and then turned toward the rest of the room. "Guess I'll search the edges," she said, gesturing. When there was no response from the other Lupine her eyes flashed golden and she stalked off toward the walls.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

His head angled up, his muddled sense of smell doing its' best to make up for the much worse sense of sight he was experiencing. Even with the illumination provided by the glowsticks, there was not much that he could make out with any amount of certainty. Half-guesses and hopeful ventures. None of it was clear. But the blurr of something in the center of the room was enough to pull in his attention, and Dietre slowly stepped forward. He lifted a hand, trying to help his failing eyes by casting more light on the amalgamation of hazy colors and shapes he was now looking at. It did little good, and the closer he came the more infuriated he found himself becoming. To be unable to see...

He gave a snort, fully invested in discovering what the form in the center of the room was. He tested the air, glad at least that his nose seemed to be working on a level above his eyes. The air was stale, and there was a peculiar scent that he detected.

Stopping at the edge of the dais, the Lupine placed a hand flat upon the stone and leaned forward. The glowstick was set down as he stretched ou his fingers, running them over the large skull; over the ridges of the eye sockets, down the side, across where the lower jaw had once been connected. He knew this shape.

His teeth bared, Dietre maintained a still silence. His wandering hand pulled back as each finger curled inward until a white-knuckled fist formed. And with an angry snarl, the Loveloxx drove his strike through the skull's forehead.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Creeping back to the edge of the tower, Jaas was trying to get an angle on the climber. It was proving difficult with the pop shots coming from between the trees. It was require him to put himself in a dangerous position of being attacked both by the climber and the goons on the ground. Their aim had been largely inaccurate and far from hitting him, so he decided to take the risk and stick his head over the edge. He did it very quickly, shoving his head out over the edge while he laid prone. His eyes had barely enough time to recognize the climber, to look him in the empty eye sockets of his mask, before he was gone; vaporized.

Jerking his head back, Jaas let out the scream of a wounded animal as he tried to rub the blood from his eyes and face. It was warm. Hot even. The bottom of his shirt was pulled up to wipe clean his eyes and then his face, and then a fit of spitting commenced to clear his mouth. Normally blood was an exciting flavor in Cizerack cuisine. In this case, it had the opposite effect.

"Goddamn jit Pjio! jYou blew hjim all overr mjy face!" He screamed into the comm once he found it again, and then went silent because he was feeling a little woozy and didn't trust himself not to throw up. Shaking the feeling he crawled back to the edge of the tower, which was now speckled with blood vapor. Taking a knee he looked through his rifle scope again, but only caught sight of butts as the scavengers ran back toward their ship; the few of them that were still alive. The ship powered up and launched shakily skyward; clipping several treetops on the way before disappearing into the wild blue yonder. Jaas watched in bewilderment.

"Uhh, Twopjio. Grrab the sshovel and get out herre. You have a messss to clean up."

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya turned at the noise, and watched Dietre punch the Hutt skull into submission. When it didn't appear he was going to stop until it was a pile of dust, she kept walking the perimeter of the chamber. There was no book.

There was a control panel, however. Her fingers brushed over it - the same color as the stone it was embedded in, it was incredibly difficult to see. Arya brought her glowrod close, experimentally pushing in a few buttons. They illuminated briefly, highlighting the Huttese symbols, and a red light blinked. She looked around, listening. There was no other reaction.

And then, a clunk nearby, followed by a rasping noise. Dietre was no longer attacking the remains of the dead Hutt, having gotten whatever that was out of his system, and they both heard something enter the room with them.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The skull bore the brunt of centuries of pent-up rage and righteous anger. Now cracked and fragmented, the last remains of the Hutt lay in scattered pieces. Chest heaving with exertion, Dietre allowed a growl to rumble up, but in the wake of his outburst, it was a tired, almost sickly sound that was still at odds with his healing body.

Shoulders hunched, the Lupine took a few steps back as his emotions began to return to their seething, roiling masses just beneath the surface. His head angled to the side as he scented the air for the Ravenwing woman, but a new sound reached his ears. A moment later another smell crept in; something old and metallic, musty with age and the putrid stench of old, never-changed lubricating fluids. It was a particular smell that filled the air around him, and Dietre cast his still mostly-blind gaze to either side. A brush of light skidded through his field of vision... was it the Ravenwing and her light stick?

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

He stood on his perch for several moments, even after Twopio made his way out of the ship just in case there was anything still alive down there. The bumbling droid was about as good as bait can get. When nothing stirred he made his way to the ground. His footfalls crushed leaves and snapped twigs noisily as his massive frame made it's way to the closest intact scavenger. The figure was shrouded in dark cloth and lying on it's chest. Reaching down he grabbed the goon's shoulder and rolled him over. His mask was haunting, with it's featureless white surface; although now marred with blood and dirt. There was something familiar about it, but he could not place his claw on it.

The other bodies were gathered, each mask was identical to the last. The faces underneath varied, but he was hardly concerned with who these corpses used to be. Rather, he was more occupied with what they had on them. Weapons, ammunition, and other trinkets were pulled from pockets and limp hands. There was a curious lack of identification among them. No ID Chit, personal commlink, or even a license to operate a speeder. It was like they were ghosts; faceless phantoms. Very strange. More strange that they attacked on foot instead of destroying them from the air. That could only mean they wanted the ship, or the crew. Slavers, perhaps.

"Doessn't matterr now, doess jit? jYou'rre dead. Thankss forr the sstuff." He said with a grin as he scooped up his pile of loot. "Djig a hole, Twopjio. Keep an ejye out. jI need a sshowerr."

[Twopio]

The blue droid drew itself up to its full height, shovel still in hand, and said stiffly, "I do not dig, Master Jaas."

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya held still, one hand hovering over the control panel and the other clutching a lightstick, until she heard the clunk of a metallic foot and a mechanical whirring sound. A red light blinked into existence at the far side of the room, closer to Dietre and the ruined skull. Her instincts kicked in and she yelled "Duck!" and threw herself onto the dusty floor as orange blaster fire began to spatter over her head. She tossed the light as far from her as she could, and started to crawl toward the other Lupine, pulling her blaster out as she went.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

The blaster fire was like a brilliant orange burst of light that flooded his vision. It was muddled and fuzzy, but the brightness was more than apparent as his eyes screwed shut in unexpected pain. His entire body collapsed downward as he dropped to a low crouch, head going from left to right in frantic motions. Even behind his eyelids the stars stil shone bright, and he bared his teeth in anger at the feeling of such helplessness. What sort of existence was this?! To be hobbled in such a fashion infuriated him, but the Lupine pushed onward. His ears ticked back, trying to pick apart the sounds that now flooded his auditory senses.

A mechanical clunk of something metal hitting old stone, a whir of gears and servos... the sound of something lightly scraping along leather. There was a shuffling that he could detect, and hoping that it was the woman, Dietre shifted his body so that he could better hear.

The disorientation was still constant though, and coupled with the driving need to find the Book, he furrowed his brow in frustration.

[Arya Ravenwing]

It didn't take long to military crawl to Dietre. She willed him to stay quiet as the assassin droid clunked out of it's hidden alcove and began to systematically clear the room. Since they had both hit the deck, it appeared that the droid wasn't sure where they were, but that would soon change.

Arya twisted her body around on the dusty floor, abdomen contracting as she sat halfway up to scan the semi-dark room, blaster at the ready. She caught sight of the droid, and dropped back down again, lying flat on her back and breathing with an open mouth to try to lessen the noise. The blaster probably wasn't going to be enough. Arya pulled her railgun out of it's holster and held it against her chest, leaving the blaster on the ground.

Thunk.
Thunk.
Thunk.

Just a few more steps and they'd be in plain sight of the assassin droid's optics. Arya licked her lips, tasting the ancient dust from the cavern, and sat up, railgun bucking in her grasp as she unloaded on the machine.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"jYou want to be ljike that, fjine. jI'll djig and jyou can drrag the bodjiess overr herre. And jI sswearr to mjy goddessss jif jyou tell me jyou can't drrag bodjiess ejitherr than jI wjill djig an extrra hole forr jyou."

Setting down his loot carefully he straightened his back, back an attempt to wipe some of the blood off his face, and then seized the shovel from the blue droid. Turning the shovel over it stabbed it into the ground, where it went blorp as it barely penetrated into the moist clay infested earth.

"Oh grreat... Ssometjimess jI mjissss Kessssel."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

His hands stretched out, and Dietre felt his fingers come into contact with a familiar shape. A blaster.

Even as the roar of another firearm pounded into his ears, he bucked upward. The blaster had been snatched up, and the Lupine reared back. He had no exact sense of direction, other than where the sounds of clanking metal on stone were coming from, and with a roar he unleashed a volley of fire upon the direction of that sound. It was a strange, stifling cacophony - the heavy, sharp bark of the gun that the woman had, the much more high-pitched snap of the blaster he held - it all coalesced on one single point...

... the point of auditory contact. Of metal upon stone. He could smell the anger and surprise coming from the woman, and hoped to assuage that feeling with his own efforts in conjunction with her actions.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya rolled to the side as the droid returned fire, splattering the ground where she had been with its blasters. Taking a breath, she focused on the battered chestplate of the droid as Dietre lit it up with her blaster.

CRACK

The railgun barked noisily in her hand, a neat hole appearing in the droid's armor plating. For a moment nothing happened. Then the back of the droid exploded outward, fire billowing out and then disappearing in a cloud of smoke from evaporated fluids.

The assassin droid toppled forward, and Arya got to her feet. "Must have hit the coolant system. You okay?"

She looked toward Dietre, still holding her blaster in his hand.

[Twopio]

Twopio turned and trudged toward the bodies, choosing to avoid further antagonizing Master Jaas. He bent stiffly, hooking his hand through a belt, and began dragging the first body back to the sweaty Cizerack, who was swearing mightily as he dug quite inefficiently. Unfortunately, of course, Twopio did not have the correct configuration for digging, except perhaps on a beach to help one build a...

sand castle

two boys eagerly scooped up the sand as Twopio loosened it with a plastic toy shovel, laughing and planning the battlements of their castle, on the beach where two moons were visible in the bright blue sky

Twopio's oculars refocused as Master Jaas snapped his fingers in front of them. "Oh dear, I seem to have ..."

The protocol droid looked down, dropped the body by the deep hole (indicating he had been 'out of it' for some time), and turned to retrieve another one.

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

"jI don't ssajy thjiss verrjy often, Twopjio, but good job."

The droid had been unexpectedly quiet while holding the first body near the digging site. It was a rare gift. The ground was not great for digging, and he hit a few roots here and there making it much worse. A sonarpick like the ones he used back on Kessel would have been of greater use in this situation. Even if it blasted dirt everywhere. It would be less back breaking in the end. No sooner had he finished the hole than Twopio dumped the body into it. Covering the body up proved far easier, as the nearby pile was easily knocked over the top.

It was hardly the first burial he had arranged. It was not uncommon for prisoners to fall over dead in the mines of Kessel, and neither the other prisoners of the guards ever really cared. Jaas was usually the only one to take the poor souls at the end of the work day and dig them their own holes right there in the mine. It was the right thing to do. Same for these unnerving creatures that had attacked them. In life they were enemies, but in death they deserved a burial just as much as anyone else. He liked to believe that when he died that someone would take the time to bury him, so that his goddess would know where to look for him.

First hole done. Now for the second one. Shit. The next guy is taller than the first.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

* * *

The sharp bark of whatever it was that the Ravenwing woman had... it snarled out once, and then there was silence followed by a crash of destroyed metal that held a note of finality in its' landing upon the stone ground.

He could still only see shapes and blurs of colors, and while things were getting sharper into focus as time ticked by, it was still anyone's guess as to what had just happened.

Either way, the immediate threat was no longer, that much he could tell. His nose picked up the sent of something... burnt. A flashpoint powder that'd been primed and scored to expel a projectile. Or was it what he wanted to smell? There was certainly an acrid aroma that filled the air now, which could just as easily be coming from what he'd suspected was a droid.

Perhaps he would understand more as time went on.

A huffed breath, and Dietre let out a light hrff as he levered himself up. Moving back to the pile of bones on the dais, the Lupine slowly went to work shoving each brittle pile to the side.

He could barely pick out the scent of that familiar old a'kha'ru leather tome, hidden within the rest of the swirling olfactory mess that surrounded him now. But, it was there, and as his shoulders bunched in effort, he found his determination growing stronger with each rough shove of crumbling bone.

[Arya Ravenwing]

The other Lupine completely ignored her, returning to his bizarre search. But then, he can't understand me anyway.

Arya sighed, walking over to Dietre and observing what he was doing. "Looks like you know where to look."

She reached out to help push Hutt bones out of the way, accidentally brushing his hands as she did so. Arya tried to copy what he was doing, not sure if they were just desecrating a body or actually trying to clear the dias.

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Her touch was somewhat unexpected, and for a brief moment he paused. He blinked still somewhat blind eyes, then swiftly returned to pushing the crumbling bones to the side. Soon, all that was left on the center of the dais was powdery white dust. His fingers searched the rough-hewn stone, feeling the chiseled scratches and etched lines.

A grunt, and Dietre huffed out an impatient breath from flaring nostrils.

He could still smell it! It was stronger now, though still intertwined with the stench of burnt metal, bone, and firepowder.

His fingers swept over the surface before coming to a final stop, and baring his teeth, he gave a push. A click, a whine of ancient gears, and the dais gave a slight rumble as a compartment began to groan open. Even before it had finished, he thrust a hand inside, searching and feeling for what had to be held within.

And there it was.

Wrapped in threadbare linen, the smooth leather tome with the embossed House Brand on the front cover. He pulled it out, his motions suddenly slow and reverent.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Well, we've located a really old book, just as promised." Arya knew he couldn't understand her, but that didn't stop her from talking.

"We should go." She tugged gently on his shirt, indicating the direction. "I don't like being out of contact with Jaas for this long."

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

Her pull was met with obedience as he stumbled up to stand, clutching the book to his chest.

"Or'u atate'k," he grumbled.

The scents of firepowder still lingered, as well as that of metal and age. But, he had the book now. That was all that mattered.

"Inakheh ata tu akhav'oeh."

His tone was low, close to grumbling and yet, there was nothing but relief that flooded his voice.

"... uwld... bow-ock."

[Arya Ravenwing]

Despite her hurry, Arya was fascinated by his reverence toward the musty tome. Her hand went to the front of her shirt, where her father’s medallion would have been had she been wearing it. She felt a sudden and deep pang of loss. How much of her past could have been explained in the pages of her mother’s journal?

Even without it, she led you here.

The journey out was swifter than the one in. Dietre managed to follow her closely even with both of his hands on the book. And when they reached the main floor she was able to contact Jaas.

”Lost comms underground,” she said, staying alert as she led them through the ruins. “Any trouble out there?”

[Jaassuuvi Ageerrodarr]

Dirt was smoothed over the top of the second body, and a few stones were placed in an aesthetically pleasing pattern so that it might draw the eye of whatever deity they served. No soul should have to wander this desolate place. Burying the bodies was putting his mind at ease. There was something deeply unsettling with their now lifeless white masks; resembling empty-eyed skulls. It caused a chill down his spine. He could not shake the feeling that killing these wraiths had left some kind of curse upon his soul. The sooner they were buried the sooner he would recover from this malaise.

He started on the next hole, which was for the goon that Twopio had mulched. A much smaller hole was needed what parts they had managed to find. That was when his comm crackled back to life, and he swore it was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard. Goddess be praised.

"Uh, yeah. A bjit of trrouble. Ssome rrajiderrss sshowed up. Sshootjin fjirrsst, quesstjionss neverr. Theyj'rre dead. Rreal sspookjy lookjing gujyss. We sshould leave ssoonerr than laterr beforre morre sshow up. Oh, and Twopjio jis okajy. How'd thjingss go down therre?"

[Dietre san Luthgarde]

He trailed behind the Ravenwing woman, thoughts on the return of the aged book and his eyes still trying to make sense of the still-blurry world around him. The darkness was still broken up by brushes of muted color and murky flashes of light, and with a grunt he reached out with his free hand to rest it unceremoniously atop Ravenwing's shoulder.

"Danri'ahgo sa khet'ri kha," he mumbled.


Still too dark.

[Arya Ravenwing]

Arya managed to only flinch a little when Dietre’s hand came down on her shoulder. “Oh, you know, woke up a really old assassin droid, desecrated a Hutt tomb, found a really old book.

“Same old same old.” She was walking while talking, the other Lupine following, his hand still on her shoulder. “We’re coming out. Get the ship ready to go.”

Out in the sunlight Arya looked sideways at the tome Dietre was cradling. No doubt all written in the language of her people ...their people. Someday she would read it herself.

The Wing of the Raven​ was idling when they reached it, and she stomped loudly up the ramp. “Let’s get out of here before we get arrested for grave robbing.”