Keeping It in the Family

"One sound from you," Rao hissed threateningly, as softly as she could, "and I tear those pretty little horns right out of your skull."

It was a fairly common threat, and Casequin didn't so much as snort at her to show that he'd heard. Of course, common or not, he didn't quite trust her not to try it, so he did keep his mouth shut, at least.

They'd finally caught up with their quarry, after an additional week and a half of running. Only the thought that it all had something to do with his nameless, absent father kept Casequin from at least trying to desert his mother and escaping into a cave system, or something. As it was, he was merely frustrated about the utter lack of information Rao let slip, exhausted by having to keep up with her, and distracted to the point of obsession about who they were tracking and why. It was enough to keep him from wanting to hurt Rao. Too badly, anyway.

So now they'd finally caught up with the pair-- Rao had mentioned, quite on accident, that there were two entities they were tracking: the chaos-beast with five heads, and the chaos-beast's companion, a humanish sort, only with magic. Which meant he wasn't really human, but probably a hybrid of some sort, because everyone knew humans didn't have magic. He didn't think, anyway. But they'd caught up with them, and Casequin was more frustrated than he could articulate by the fact that he still couldn't see the quarry! He and his mother were both crammed into a small slot canyon, hidden from view and blocked from scent by a passive spell on Rao's part, and Rao was blocking the only access to the trail outside with her considerable bulk-- Fat bitch, he thought maliciously, but quite to himself-- as she watched for the quarry to pass by.

Casequin was quite temped to whine at her, but he expected she'd just club him insensible to shut him up, and then he wouldn't even have the chance to see anything.

After what seemed like a very, very long time, Rao's voice hissed into his thoughts. The demoness didn't have a strong psi gift, but she used it when she had to. Her thought-voice was slightly sibilant and certainly dark in feel-- rather appropriate, actually. :Have a paralysis spell ready, 'Quin,: she said. :I'll take the chaos-beast, you take the man. I need them both unable to fight back. Look sharp for magic from the man, be ready to block it. You're good enough for a simple mass-block, I know you are.:

Not sure whether to be proud that she'd complimented him or angry that she'd given him his marching orders without even asking him, he gave a curt little nod, which she couldn't see but seemed to pick up, anyway. :Good. On my signal, then.:

There was a pause, silence, and then finally the sound of paws on ground, and the much smaller sound of booted feet on ground. It was agony to wait, tense and crouched, listening to them get closer, closer, right in front of them, and then-- pass them? Before he could protest, Rao slapped him with her tail, and his mind filled with nothing but the shout: NOW!

If he hadn't known ahead of time what to do, the mental command had the knowledge in it. Rao sprang from the canyon, roaring, claws extended, and Casequin cast a net of magic over the smaller of the two targets the instant he could see them. For a moment, that held his attention completely, for the man was quick to react, struggling and launching a magical counter attack that almost freed him. Rao had drilled Casequin mercilessly in just such things, though, so he managed to fend off the attack and prevent further ones by ruthlessly squelching the man's magic. Or, more appropriately, the creature's magic. This close, tasting the magic and able to smell him, Casequin could sense dragon in him. Uck, disgusting. At least he was looking at him, as he stepped out into the light, like no self-respecting dragon would ever look at anything, even a demon-runt like himself. He looked like he would be perfectly happy to tear Casequin's horns off, like Rao had threatened, and then slit his throat with them. Well, that isn't going to be happening, Casequin thought smugly.

That threat neutralized, Casequin looked quickly around for his mother and the chaos beast-- and very nearly lost his spell over the man at what he saw. His mother, looking somewhat larger than life but still far too small, had bowled over a sinuous, coal-and-silver beast with far, far too many eyes, all glowing a furious red, and far, far tails, all tipped with poisonous barbs, and all lashing with rage. It had gotten back to its feet, four heads swaying, and it towered over her, at least twice her size, but she snarled at it fearlessly, standing her ground and mantling her wings. Four maws gaped and screamed challenge, but Rao echoed the scream, refracting the sound so that she sounded like a chorus. It was quite an effect, and for a moment, it made the beast pause, multiple eyes blinking and narrowing, and she took that moment to launch her own spell of paralysis over it. It toppled with a look of such shock-- on all four faces-- that Casequin nearly laughed.

Rao might have been a horrible, horrible mother... Casequin might have hated her with every fiber of his being... but in that moment, he was proud to have been brought into the world by her, by someone who could take on, and defeat, a thing like that.

Then, with a start, he realized that the "thing" was the chaos beast. His first thought was, Lying bitch, she said it had five heads!

As if four wasn't bad enough.

"You will take us to your clutch, beast," Rao was saying at the felled chaos beast, who still looked ridiculously stunned as it lay, legs still splayed as if it were trying to stand and all four heads staring at Rao. Shock was still foremost, though one of the faces looked indignant, and another was starting to look angry. Casequin wondered momentarily if they all thought separately, or if they all shared the same mind.

"Our clutch," the man repeated, sounding slightly muffled under Casequin's own magic, as the paralysis spell made it difficult for him to move his lips. "What makes you think you can give the orders? We choose who is taken as a candidate, demon, and I'm hardly inclined to take someone who makes such demands."

Even in his rather perilous predicament, the humanoid abomination still held his head high-- in a metaphorical sense, since how he held his head wasn't up to him, at the moment. He sounded haughty, even bored, a tone Casequin admired, even in the face of possible death. Rao, though, gave him a smile that made Casequin's fur bristle nervously. She'd never looked at him like that, as if he were some tender morsel to snatch up and gnaw on, or some plaything for her psychotic urges, and he never wanted her to. Despite everything Rao had put him though, she had never subjected him to anything like what her expression was hinting at, and it was enough to make him feel supremely grateful to her.

"My dear, beautiful Hedoro," she purred, a rumble underlying her words that was as full of malice as it was-- something Casequin didn't dare try to identify. "You are hardly in a position to set the stakes. But if you want a reason, other than my son's obvious worthiness--" Casequin blinked at her as this "Hedoro's" eyes flicked to him and back. Two compliments in ten minutes; she must have been slipping. "--then here is what I will do. For every refusal you give me, I will cut off one of your charming chaos-beast's heads. How does that sound?"

The mask of indifference cracked, revealing fury, and the dragon-man's lip curled slightly into a repressed snarl. Apparently, harming the chaos beast was something that made him angry.

"Let's just take her," one of the beast's heads muttered.

"Onithris can say no, and that will be it," another growled, teeth clenched by anger as much as Rao's magic.

Hedoro seemed to relax within the confines of the spell holding him. "Very well," he said. "Release us, and we will take you the clutch. But if Onithris says no, you must agree to leave-- and we will take you away, as well. The location of my stronghold is not for you or anyone else to know."

Rao huffed lightly, as if disappointed, and there was a distinct pout in her voice when she answered. It was enough to make Casequin stare at her, for he'd never heard his mother pout before. "Very well," she echoed the dragon-man abomination. "I'll take off the spells, but my dear son," she all but purred the word, which made Casequin wish he knew what was going on in her head-- on second thought, maybe not, he expected he wouldn't like it, "my dear son will keep the magical binding on you, Hedoro dear, just as a little precaution. You wouldn't want me snapping off his head, now, would you, Cheran'khan?" The strangely sweet question was aimed at the chaos beast, who was even now struggling stiffly to his feet. "He doesn't exactly have any to spare, now, does he?"

Three of four heads were unified in hatred, but the fourth looked almost speculative. Rao had the audacity to laugh, then turned to pick Hedoro up bodily, cradling him carefully in her forearms. "Come along, 'Quin," she sang with more cheer than Casequin'd ever heard in her voice. So far, nothing had gotten any clearer-- about his father or what was going on. And what is a "clutch"?

Even so, he didn't want anyone thinking his name was Quin. "It's Casequin."

"Whatever," hissed all four heads at once, and then they were gone.