Sabretooth Tigers

Life, Failure / Mishap

Fenneck learns about Natalya's abusive past with Pufuktin.

Fenneck heard snow crunching outside and he felt his heart leap in excitement. He was excited to see Natalya after the long winter months away from her. He went to stir the pot of potato soup he had prepared for her as a surprise. It was quite late into the night and Fenneck assumed she had been with Dimitri. He heard her gently tap the rocks outside with her dagger. "Hey!" Fenneck greeted her. "You can come in!" Fenneck called out. Natalya walked in through the pelts. She was wearing her normal hide armor and a cloak with her long beautiful hair down and messy around her face. She seemed flushed and Fenneck's heart glowed at the sight of her. Fenneck smiled up at her as she came in. "Hey. How was your winter?" he asked her gently. Natalya smiled at the basket of pastries Baegla had sent as she removed her cloak. "Good, the weather was relatively calm," she commented as she removed her gear. "I see you were with Dimitri?" he pointed out from her lateness and gentle demeanor. "You shouldn't assume things," she said teasingly, unable to hide her smile. Clearly it had gone well. Fenneck smiled. "You always seem a bit happier after you're with him and your skin tends to glow-" He stopped himself realizing how weird it might sound to compliment her post-orgasmic state. She laughed at him and smiled to herself. "Were you as lucky as I was this winter, then?" she asked. He smiled. "No. I didn't actually do much this winter," he said, shrugging. "You're so boring," she teased as she started messing with her tangled hair. "You know what isn't boring?" he asked, changing the subject. "There's an interesting rumor going around that Pufuktin has an heir," he informed her. Natalya looked at him quizzically. "Really?" she asked, surprised by this news. Fenneck continued as he stirred the pot of soup. "Yeah. Well, a bastard, of course. Supposedly he knocked up some whore," he said casually. "Can you imagine? What kind of self-respecting woman allows such a disgusting monster to bed her?" he said with disdain, thinking about how gross Pufuktin was with his greasy neck-beard. Natalya faced away from him and was quiet. "Did you hear me?" Fenneck asked, not getting a response. Suddenly she grabbed her cloak and hurriedly left the cave. "Natalya!" he called out to her but she didn't respond. "The hell?" he muttered under his breath. He grabbed his cloak and hurriedly slipped his boots on and he ran out into the cold. It had started to snow heavily and he could barely make out Natalya up ahead, stumbling on the edge of the ridge. "Nat!" he called out again. He suddenly saw her disappear over the ledge. "Nat!" he exclaimed in horror as he ran toward the ravine. He looked down and saw her crumpled body lying in the snow. It was maybe a fifteen foot drop. "Natalya!" he called out in fear before running down the pass and finally making it to her. She was crying and had blood pouring down the side of her head. "Nat!" He lifted her head out of the snow. "You're bleeding!" he said in fear as blood started to degrade the pure white snow around them. She started sobbing and he clutched her to his chest as he summoned magic to heal her head wound. The warm glow of his magic seemed to calm her and she slowly stopped crying. Fenneck tried to look into her eyes through the thickly falling snow. "Nat, are you okay? Did I say something?" he begged her. She shivered and Fenneck leaned down and picked her up in his arms. She fell limp against his chest, only just managing to keep her head up against his shoulder. He carried her up the ridge and back into the cave before carefully lowering her snow-covered body onto the ground, just inside the cave. She sat up as Fenneck removed her cloak that was now matted in ice. She looked like she was in shock. He confirmed she was wearing his ring and wasn't intentionally giving herself frostbite again. He wondered what could have caused this odd behavior. He pulled her boots off and went to remove her tunic that had ice caked on it. "May I?" he asked her hesitantly before removing her shirt. "You need to get warm," he tried to tell her. After a couple seconds, she finally looked up at him with tears in her eyes. "I..." she started, shivering from the cold and her nerves. "I... Pufuktin..." She swallowed as she tried to speak, her eyes filled with fear. "Pufuktin raped me," she said suddenly. Fenneck stopped moving. "When I was in the KAV," she continued. "He would charm me and convince me to have sex with him." Fenneck stopped what he was doing as everything around him started to fade away. He looked at Natalya and her perfect, innocent self and felt a rage like none he had ever felt start to build in him. That monster had done a lot of heinous things, but this was something else entirely. Fenneck felt as though the fire in the cave had illuminated the room and he was back in that burning longhouse with the bearded demon standing over Natalya like he had Alina and Pyotr. Fenneck wanted to kill him. He needed to break something. To hurt something. He didn't want Natalya to see him like this. He stood suddenly and grabbed his swords and his bow and ran out of the cave. He ran a few feet through the blizzard before he saw tracks. Sabretooths. Perfect. He followed the tracks quickly and swiftly and drew his bow and notched a few arrows as he moved. He heard their growls as he approached a ravine and he slid down behind a rock to look out and see what he was up against. He saw three large sabretooth tigers in the pass. The large beasts seemed to be traveling and didn't notice him in the storm. He took a deep breath and shot out from behind the rocks and landed his three arrows into one of their pelts. The beast turned and roared angrily and Fenneck shot another arrow at it's friend before dropping his bow and drawing his short swords, gracefully jumping down into the ravine and slashing at the third. He screamed in anger as he ripped the cat's skin, wishing it was Pufuktin's monstrous face. He carefully dodged one of the creatures before its friend slashed a huge gash across Fenneck's back, catching him by surprise. He cried out in pain and spun around, digging his swords into the beast in retaliation. It wasn't fair. He drew his swords out of its flank, failing to land a vital blow as one of the other cats hissed and snarled at him and he slashed its underbelly as it jumped up and bit his shoulder, throwing him to the ground. Why did it have to happen to Natalya? He rolled out of the way as one of the cats lurched at him and he got to his feet. Why did it have to be Pufuktin? He took another swipe to his chest, yelping in pain from the giant claws before he gracefully slashed back at the angry beast in fury. How dare Pufuktin touch her? He screamed and stabbed one of his swords deep into the chest of the first sabretooth and drew his sword back out, sending a shower of red blood across the snow. He remembered Pufuktin's cruelty when he had taken Alina's life in front of him with just a word and Fenneck felt his head pound from his fury. He turned and slashed at one of the cats again but the other threw its massive paw against the side of his head, causing him to stumble in pain as blood started to seep into his shiny white locks of hair and down his brow. What kind of cruel tricks did Pufuktin use on Natalya? He grunted in pain as he drove his sword into the flank of one of the remaining sabretooths, sending it to its grave. Fenneck thought about the night he had called Natalya a whore in his angry, drunken temper and felt horror flood him. The last cat growled and bit his side as it ran by, digging its giant teeth through Fenneck's gut. He cried out in pain and fell to the ground. He felt time start to slow down as his blood poured from the giant hole in his torso. He thought about Natalya and how awful he had treated her. He wished he could go back and re-do everything. He had ruined their thiramin. He had ruined Erikur's life. He had been the cause of Evelyn's death. He hadn't been there to protect his parents. He raised his swords in a last ditch effort to save his pathetic life as he watched the giant cat leap on top of him and everything went black.   Fenneck felt a warm, unusual feeling of magic as he felt himself come to. He heard Natalya's soft sobs and he opened his eyes to see her red hair splayed out against his chest. He reached out his hand weakly and caressed her head. She looked up at him and her eyes flooded with relief. He moved his hand to his chest and summoned his magic to help hers. He enjoyed the feeling of their magic working together. She had never been able to figure it out before and Fenneck smiled softly at her ability to save him. Soon his wounds closed and he sighed and dropped his head back into the red snow as his magic was drained. His wounds were closed but he was still in a lot of pain and desperately needed rest and to get out of the snowstorm. Natalya helped him to his feet and let him lean against her as they stumbled back to their home in the freezing, harsh wind. He grabbed his swords from the sabretooths and she grabbed his bow as they passed it on top of the ravine. Despite the pain Fenneck was in, he couldn't help but be grateful to feel Natalya's body pressed against his own. When they finally made it inside he dropped his weapons in the entrance before stumbling toward the ground. Natalya caught him and lowered him to the floor gently. She removed her cloak and boots before turning to Fenneck and helping him undress. She carefully removed his ripped, bloody clothes until he was left in his braise. He collapsed back onto the stone and Natalya took off her snow-caked tunic and pants until she was left in her soft, baby-blue linen underpants and undershirt. Natalya grabbed a bucket and left quickly to fill it with snow and put a heating stone in it to melt it. She sat down next to Fenneck's head and pulled him onto a towel on her lap so she could wash the blood off his face and hair. He closed his eyes and sighed with her perfect, gentle touch. She was still scared and occasionally a few of her tears would fall down into Fenneck's face. She was gentle and thorough as she wiped the blood away. She gently reached down and started washing the blood off of his chest. Fenneck saw her face look down in sadness at the giant scars he now bore. "Don't worry," he tried to assure her. "It will be very sexy... one day," he said weakly, trying to make her laugh, but she looked dismal as she continued to care for him. Fenneck felt guilt rise up in him for doing this to her. For scaring her in this way. She gently braided his wet hair and stood and walked over to his pack of clothes. He managed to pull himself to his feet and walked to her. She handed him a clean white tunic. He winced in pain as he put it on and Natalya reached up to help pull it down on his chest. Her fingers grazed his chest and studied the scars in horror once more as the tunic covered him. She slowly looked up into Fenneck's eyes and they looked at each other longingly for a moment. Fenneck wasn't sure what to say. He was feeling a lot of emotions, predominately exhaustion. She cleared her throat. "You need to rest," she told him. He nodded slowly. "You're probably right." He gave her a small smile and he started to painfully lower himself onto his bed mat. She reached out and helped him get settled against the wall of the cave and bundled him up in his blankets. He watched her intensely, trying to make eye contact with her to see what she was thinking. She stood and fixed a bowl of soup and brought it over to him and settled down next to him to help him eat. "I'm sorry," he said, feeling ashamed for the pain and fear he'd caused her. "I... That was really stupid of me." She finally looked up at him. "What were you doing?" she asked him, not trying to hide the fear and horror in her voice. "I was upset," he said as he looked down, ashamed. "I needed to... I didn't want you to see me angry..." He shook his head and sighed. He looked up at her and took her hand in his own and squeezed it. "I'm sorry for offending you," he said, looking her in the eyes. "I had no idea. I should have put it together. I just..." He felt tears start to brim his eyes. "I... I'm so sorry, Nat," he told her passionately. "For everything. I've been a complete ass." She squeezed his hand back and looked at him for a long moment before nodding. "Thank you," she said, meeting his eyes. Their foreheads gently rested against each other for a brief moment. "I want to kill him," he said softly. "I've never wanted to kill someone before... not really," he said, trying to process his anger and remembering the hate he had once harbored for her, Erikur's killer. This was different, though. He meant this. He wanted to personally stab and slice and gore and maim Pufuktin in the most painful ways imaginable. "I hate the idea of taking a life... but by gods he deserves to rot in hell." He reached his hand up and caressed her beautiful face lovingly. "Thank you for telling me," he told her. "I understand why you haven't. I wouldn't have told me either if I were you." He dropped his hand and looked down, defeated and disappointed in himself for the way he'd treated her. Natalya shook her head softly at him. "You didn't know," Natalya said. "I just..." Her face filled with pain. "I don't want you to think I'm some dirty whore." Her voice cracked and Fenneck felt guilt well up in him as she continued to speak. "And maybe I am, but... but..." He reached up and squeezed her hand. "Of course I don't think that," he told her, looking desperately into her deep green eyes. She squeezed his hand and let her forehead rest against his again. They sat like that for a long while. Closer than they had been in years. Their breath teased each other's lips and Fenneck wondered if he could kiss her. He wanted his lips to meet hers so desperately but he fought the urge. This relationship was different from Erikur and Alexei, and Fenneck worried that kissing her like he had his friends would make her uncomfortable. Besides, she had just been with Dimitri. She eventually pulled away and they shared an intimate look. He saw a glimpse of fearful desire for him cross her face before she handed him his bowl of soup and stood up to fix one for herself. Fenneck's heart sighed as she moved away from him. He watched her fix a bowl and wondered if they were really meant to be together or not. Suddenly, she turned back to him. She came over with her bowl and hesitantly settled down and got underneath the furs with him, sending Fenneck's heart into a flutter as she leaned against him like she had years ago. They ate in silence but he was grateful to have her near him again. To be forgiven for all the hurt and pain he'd caused her. He didn't rest easy, though. His mediations were plagued by Pufuktin and the memory of that night in the longhouse when he had seen him across the burning room. His cold silver eyes and his disgusting neck beard started to haunt Fenneck's mind. The sound of Alina's screams and her newborn baby's roared through the layers of his meditation, now joined with Natalya's. He wanted Pufuktin to pay. And he wanted him to pay painfully.