Chapter 19
Estella left a while ago and hadn't returned yet so Thomas was beginning to worry about her. For now he thought that it was best to walk around the village to look for her. Annie was still bound to the cart and he couldn't leave her alone so he pulled her behind him while on his little quest. He had told Estella not to leave his side so he was a bit annoyed with her.
When Thomas finally found her she was acting stealthy while peeking into a window. "Why didn't you stay with me like..." Before Thomas could finish his sentence, Estella turned around and shushed him before pointing indoors.
Estella talked to Thomas in a quiet voice. "There's a puppy sleeping in there. See it curled up on that bed?" The place that Estella was pointing it was too dark to see well since his eyes hadn't adjusted yet. He could see something dark on top of a lighter surface; the dark thing must be the puppy that she was talking about. "It's so cute, can we keep it?"
Whispering to Estella, Thomas gave her his answer. "That's not a good idea. Animals are very protective of their young. We shouldn't even be here right now. Come on, let's go before its parents notice us."
Estella kept holding on to him and begging with sparkling eyes. Her sparkling eyes turned to shock and when Thomas tried to turn around to see what she was looking at it was too late. "!" A black thing had collided with him so hard that Estella lost grip on him and he got knocked off his feet. When hitting the ground he hit his head and something was..h.i.tting him heavily in the face several times--striking his left eye, cheekbone, and lip. Estella quickly moved to help Thomas but by then his lip was split and he'd probably have a black eye.
Once Estella had it subdued and he was able to open his eyes, Thomas saw what it was. It was a black dog or at least it looked a bit like a black dog when you saw its floppy dog ears on top of its head. There were some major differences between this thing and a regular dog, however. It had a shorter mouth, its nose stuck out a bit, and the inside of its face was without fur. Even its body didn't really resemble a normal dog as its upper limbs were
"RAAAAH" The dog-person yelled out before kicking back towards Estella's s.h.i.+n, knocking her off-balance. It then bit her hand to get her to let go before charging at Thomas again. Thomas was ready for it this time and rolled back before it could collide with him again, grabbing the dog-person's clothes and using his leg to kick against its leg to send it flying.
The dog-person was able to counter the throw by grabbing on to Thomas's hair, ripping some out when they went flying. This caused a lot of pain to Thomas but he couldn't afford to let it get on top of him and start hitting him again. Thomas continued to roll backwards, landing on his feet and spinning around to face the dog-person. The dog-person was still rolling over on to its back when Thomas had tackled him, grabbed his arm, and then pulled it back; crossing its arm behind its back and applying pressure upwards to keep it from escaping.
The dog-person was trying to break free but Estella had arrived and helped Thomas pin it on the ground. Thomas's upper-lip was bleeding into his mouth and it felt uncomfortable so he spit out the blood. "Eth.e.l.la, do you know what thith thing ith?" His swollen lip caused him to form a temporary lisp.
Estella was trying not to laugh at the way he was talking while giving him an answer. "Obviously it's a puppy! This one isn't as cute as the one inside and it's a bit violent but can we keep it? I promise that I'll feed it and train it not to be so violent!"
"A puppy!? When have you ever seen a puppy that can wear clothes!?" When Thomas and Estella were arguing the door to the house that the other "puppy" was in opened up and another black blur appeared.
"Get off my brother!" Thomas expected to get another beating so he raised his left arm in front of his face--his right arm still being used to pin down the first dog-person--so that he could defend himself. Hits rained down on his arm and the top of his head but he was barely feeling them. This smaller dog-person was much weaker and even if he didn't defend it was doubtful that they'd do any actual damage unless they aimed for his eyes.
Thomas grabbed the little one's arm to stop it from hitting him and asked it something. "You know how to speak our language? Why did your brother attack us?" Thomas expected the little one to answer but it was the first dog-person--the boy--that answered him.
"Unhand my little sister! Even if you capture us now our parents won't let you get away with this!" There were tears in his eyes as he tried his best to glare at Thomas, unable to turn his head all the way around to actually glare at his target.
Thomas let go of the little girl and tried to rea.s.sure the boy. "I'm not trying to capture you. This idiot right here might want to take you away but I won't let her. You have my promise." Thomas was pointing towards Estella and received a glare from another set of eyes but he decided not to acknowledge them. "This has been a misunderstanding. My name's Gren and this is Estella. We're just travelers that came here to fill up on some water. We didn't even know that anybody was here. If I let go of you will you still try to attack me?"
The boy shook his head and seemed to be a bit calmer now even though his tail was pointing up. "Okay, I'm letting you go now." Thomas got off of the boy and backed away while bringing Estella with him. "Do you mind if we talk a little?" The boy ignored Thomas and grabbed his sister, making sure that she was okay. Seeing that the boy wasn't going to answer him for now, Thomas turned to Estella. She had caused him to be harmed so he decided to punish her a little bit.
Grabbing her cheeks, Thomas squeezed and pulled them apart for a short while before letting them go. Her small yells of pain didn't go unnoticed but were ignored. "I told you not to leave my side! What was with you trying to take those kids?"
"But they're puppies! Father said that if they wore the collar then they were puppies! I didn't do anything wrong!" Estella pointed towards the necks of the two kids and, sure enough, there were collars on them. They weren't so easy to spot in the middle of the fight since the collars were the same black color as their fur. Thomas felt that he had seen those before; in Gren's memories there was someone that had tried to put one of those on him but before he could succeed there were some hunters that injured the guy with an arrow and caused the villain to run away. The hunters came back with news later on that the man was later caught by the soldiers when he tried getting his wounds healed and that he was sentenced for kidnapping and illegal slave trading. Those were slave collars.