table © Alaine
ooc: <3
As he continued to carve into the stag, the young male got progressively covered in the thick ruby of it's blood. It was gruesome business, but necessary - If he was to do the stag justice, then he would need to use as much of it's body as possible, so that it would not have died in vain. However, after a while of stripping, the lean muscles in his arm had gotten tense and sore, and his emotions bubbled close to the surface. For a moment, he rocked back on his heels and remained crouched, arms resting on knees as curved claws dripped with blood. The crude bone dagger in his hand glistened with the stuff, and as Caillen watched it, he was aware of the slick feeling of tears welling in his sky-blue eyes and sliding down his cheeks. For all his immense size, the youth was merely a boy trapped in the body of a man. He didn't know how to deal with his emotions, and he wished, more than anything, to wake up from them as if from a bad dream.
However, crying was something that puppies did. He wasn't a puppy. With a petulant and somewhat aggrieved sniff, Caillen rubbed at his eyes with the clean back of his arm, swiping away the beads of moisture. There was hard work to be done, and sitting about blubbering wasn't going to finish it.
Once he'd sliced up the best portions of meat from the flanks and haunches, the wolfdog hybrid laid them out on some nearby rocks. Light filtered through the trees and flies, drawn by the smell, began to buzz in the air. He wasn't doing it quickly enough - Soon, the meat would be contaminated. With a sharp snarl of frustration, the manchild set about digging out the tendons of the beast. They were long and sinuous, and would be handy as ropes. However, once he'd worked his way up to the head of the animal, Caillen stopped again. It's great glassy brown eye stared into the abysmal world of death. The stag had been a formidable foe in life - A great hunter would relish that he had made such a kill. But Caillen was simply sad, sad that he had felled such a magnificent creature in his anger.
On a whim, the youth struggled to break off the antlers. They were one of the most prized pieces of the stag - Symbolic to the hunter, a trophy of his prowess. The wolfdog did not deserve them, not really; It had only been luck, fury, and size that had allowed him to kill the fleet-footed forest guardian, and he did not deceive himself by thinking otherwise. Caillen had no real fighting skills, and would have been an easy match for even a half-trained fighter.
After much effort, he managed to remove the top portion of the skull, with he antlers attached. Panting from the exertion, it was only now that Caillen experienced the peculiar sensation of being watched.
Immediately, he froze. One erect ear and one floppy ear, both an exotic mottled navy in color, flitted forward and back, scanning for the slightest sound. Sky-blue eyes, surprisingly innocent and naive looking in comparison to the body they belonged to, scanned the shadows and trees nervously.
"Who... Who's there?" Because his voice trembled slightly, the youth rose to a stand. If anything, perhaps his unlikely size would frighten off the watcher. "Show yourself! I know you are there!" Bolder, this time. His bloodied hand slipped on the bone dagger clumsily. If whoever it was wanted his kill, Caillen would not be able to put up much opposition. He was exhausted from the hunt, and from skinning and carving the carcass. The skull, topped with antlers, was held in his other hand, still steadily dripping with blood.
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