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Vieira. The sable-furred woman knew that scent well—it had permeated her former home, hanging up with the rest of them. Eternians weren't generally prolific slave owners, but Eris had taken to it—they were her canines, ones that she could simply trade for, and no one could say anything about how she treated them. Slaves were a possession, no more alive and no more canine than the rocks beneath her feet. It didn't even cross Eris's mind that Vieira had been freed—Kaena wouldn't know such a ritualistic procedure. She didn't know the symbolism behind that piercing that was no doubt still embedded into the tawny canine's face. Almost instinctively Eris's sable hand brushed against her nose, touching the empty space where she had worn a similar piercing. One couldn't tell by looking, of course.
The small canine's scent saturated the air, and Eris paused, lifting one of her dark-colored lips. She had tired of the smaller canine quite a long time ago, and she did not think time would have changed their relationship any. But how had she survived? Lazy curiosity overtook Eris, the same sort that overtook a predator presented with an opportunity in stumbling a weak prey. Even when fully sated, a good hunter invariably at least investigated the opportunity. The sable-furred girl had not had the chance to hold herself over another canine in quite a long while, and though she was certain she looked like shit, she preened the fur of her mane and shook her head to puff it out, strolling toward the source of the scent.
“So you made it,” she said when she had drawn close enough. Eris strolled right up to the petrified canine, drawing around her in a circle, her sable-furred muzzle close to the woman's shoulders and the back of her neck as she passed around the rear of the other canine. Vieira did not deserve personal space; regardless of whether or not Eris was the woman's owner anymore, it was clear to Eris the tawny-furred canine hadn't been released. “And still wearing your pretties, too,” the hybrid said, reaching out a shadowed hand for the shiny piece of jewelry in the other canine's nose. Her own was a secret, still, and so it would remain—neither Vieira nor anyone else needed to know what had gone on in Eterne.
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