Dark, tattered paws tread lightly across the lands he now called home and yet he was so unfamiliar with them. Each scent, sight and sound was something new and brought a sense of belonging with it, a comforting feeling in which was only a small bud, but it was growing each passing second he spent within the new pack lands. Now that the pack was formed; finally together as a family, he had been moving around all day with the aim to familiarise himself with as much of the territory within the border as he could.

Although he had adjusted to solitude long ago, it unnerved him slightly to be away from Bastion as often as he had been these past few weeks. Even with the knowledge that the small one was more than capable of looking after himself, the torture marked Arbiter found himself constantly casting his mind to thoughts of the small one, images of trouble and death, where he was not around to save Bastion. Yet he forced himself away; for there was much to learn and do now that a new pack was formed, but with each step further away from the small one, he found himself constantly reminding himself that Bastion was safe, even if the he was not directly by his side.

As his mind drifted into the cloud of worry once more, he found himself emerging upon the scene of a hunt. Dead, ice cold eyes stared out and observed the scene before him, his face that of it’s usual bleak expression. The child huntress was impressive in her work and would no doubt grow up to be a force to be reckoned with if she choose such a path. Moving forward, allowing himself to move in a noisy manner in which was unnatural to him, but he did not want to frighten the child and so he hoped that she would note his presence now if she hadn’t already.

“You hunt well, young huntress” the voice was low and as dead as his eyes, the ability to express emotions had long ago been beaten out of him; leaving behind only a shell of the man he once was, a weapon to be used, a slave to his master.

Silently he awaited the other reaction to him; some cowered and ran, others responded aggressively and so there was no way of predicting how the small pup would respond to the sight of him. ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’, a human saying that he understood better than most, for whenever he met someone knew, the judged him by his appearance. Although he himself did not possess any fondness to his appearance, it was due to his build and scars that he’d been accepted into the family’s ranks, his role to scare, execute and torture those who opposed the family. To some he could be viewed as a body guard, to others a figure of death and some had even gone as far as to treat him as a slave despite his rank. How will you respond little one? Surprisingly, he hoped to gain some level of acceptance from the child, in fact he had hoped to gain acceptance for whom he was from all members, but only time could really tell how he would be viewed within the family.

As the child acted possessively over a kill, a ghost of a smile touched his lips, so slight it may have been missed; an exceptionally rare display of emotion upon his usually dead face. Judging from the way the pup was acting, she’d had a fine upbringing and as she spoke, her words lead him to believe the young one had much self confidence. You’re just a little trouble maker, aren’t you child? The thought was reinforced by her question. “Clothes” he replied, stating the obvious to wind the little one up some; all the while his voice, posture and expression remained neutral.

The scarred male had never once claimed to possess any maturity, others assumed due to his age, past and lack of self expression that he was a quite, mature, reserved kind. Maybe he was at times, but no canine was the same at every moment of their lives and he was constantly discovering new sides to himself as he interacted with different canines.

Janos allowed his cold eyes to glance back at the female, letting her cold and terrible eyes wash over him like it was nothing and perhaps it was nothing to him. He had seen eyes like that before, those terrible eyes peering out of the darkness of the hull of a ship or from the laughing gaze of his task masters as he was put to work or put under the lash. No, those eyes no longer held the power, the fear that it may for others but it didn’t mean that he wouldn’t show the pup some respect, her eyes just wouldn’t be able to be the things to intimidate her. He was giving her calm neutrality that he often picked up when around those that he didn’t know and more than once he found himself wishing that he could be there with his master. Bastion would smooth this whole thing over but that was just not the way that it went. He would have to be the one in control of his future and of the current situation. And so far he felt that he was doing a good job of things. She hadn’t attacked him nor shown any signs of much outward aggression other than verbal aggression but all young wolves did that, tried their best to speak out in the hopes of making themselves seem bigger than they were. But so it went that eventually people evened out, or well most people did anyway.

He had no right to rein her in, no right to say anything to her so it was all that the wraith of Salsola could do to simply put up with whatever she had to say to him. Suddenly the puppy started approaching him and he was hit with a sudden case of fight or flight syndrome. He didn’t much care for people approaching him unless it was his master. Not even the pack leaders were people that he wanted to so brazenly come up to him but he still didn’t retaliate and even forced his body to stay still despite wanting to tense up in the off chance that he would have to make a run for it. Females were well known for being faster than males were but he hoped that such a thing wouldn’t have to be tested out between the two of them. The pup didn’t stop at a respectable distance either. Rather, she continued to approach him, even leaning close enough so that she could sniff at his clothing. The sniffing was fine but it took all that he had to not reach out and smack her in the head in an attempt to get her away from him. Taking a slow, deep breath to calm himself, his tail gave a little twitch, the only other sign that he was getting agitated. His face still remained perfectly neutral.

The question was something that he supposed that given her age he should have expected but he hadn’t even thought that she would show her age this quickly. But then again, to someone who didn’t wear clothing it was probably quite the normal thing to wonder. ”You learn to move with them. At first you won’t be as fast as if you were naked but it provides protection from the elements,” he said, reaching down a hand to pull out one side of his jacket before letting it fall back against his scarred hide. He had pulled out the side of the jacket opposite the side where he had his mark at, the jacket making no sound as it hit against his body once more. He shifted just a little bit to look down at the pup, tilting his head briefly as if considering something before he righted his head once again. ”Have you never been in the least bit interested in clothing like this?” He asked the girl, wondering if she would rather be more of a naturalist, someone who would never put on such things as he was wearing. But he didn’t think it was a bad thing for everyone to try out at least once, wearing clothing. Sure, it wasn’t always the most comfortable and it hindered with transforming most of the time but since he stayed in this form so much, it became second nature for him to finish off looking at least mostly well rounded. Other than that there was no real reason for any of them to wear clothing. They were fully clothed everyday as it was in their thick coats that covered them as well as any type of clothing that he could think or that he had seen before. He continued to eye her warily as if he wasn’t quite sure if he could fully trust her but until she did something that he deemed stupid, she was in the clear for violence from him.

She may be a monster testing out the water, a child unknowing of her strength and if he was anyone else he would have put her in her place by now. She may have been a loyal pack member and may have had ties with the leaders but he smelled on her a ranking lower than himself, something that he would have exploited in anyone else where someone else to talk to him and act like this with him as she was. But he managed to hold his anger back, something that he had been good at after a long time of much practice. But still perhaps it would be better for her to heed all of those trying to teach her about lines and boundaries but perhaps in her he saw a life that he desperately wishes that he could have had, a life where he could be the rebellious teenager or something of that sort rather than being the male who was forced to grow up and was now the way that he was. He had been forced to grow up quickly and adapt to the new world that he had found himself in or perish. Well it was fairly obvious as to which he chose to be given that he was standing there in front of her. Still though he had wanted to do so much as a child but now was no longer able to do those things. That ship had long since sailed and he was still stuck in this adult’s body.

The only signs that he gave that he was agitated with her seemed to either go unnoticed by the female or she was completely disregarding the warning signs. But either way since she didn’t respond to him, he could only assume that she didn’t see them and so set about being sure to keep his thoughts and his emotions to himself without letting them get overboard and without him going crazy with all of these pent up things inside of him. He spoke with her and found that the more that he spoke with her and answered her questions, the more that he was able to tolerate her and her disrespect, treating him as an equal rather than someone that was ranked above her. But these questions were all honest questions and the female seemed to be genuinely interested by whatever it was that he said as if the concept of clothing really did confuse her and so long as she was being honest about this then he didn’t mind explaining it to her. Clothing was hard to explain to someone that didn’t wear them though he was coming to find out. Telling Bastion about it was bad enough but trying to defend wearing something as primitive as clothing? It was hard to do but now that he wore them he felt…well…naked without his clothing and it wasn’t really a sort of thing that he liked to feel. Plus it was so easy to show others just what kind of a good tracker or finder you were if you showed up with clothing that was found in the ruins. Clothing really was good after all.

Suddenly green eyes rose up to meet his own and a low warning growl sounded in his throat. It sounded harsh from the male but he couldn’t help it. She had overstepped herself by so brazenly looking up into his eyes, a direct act of insubordination. Hand itched to raise it against her but seeing as how he didn’t want to try to prove why he did it to the leaders if they were to ask he withheld himself, one of the harder things he had had to do today. The girl continued to ask him her questions but as she did her voice continued to get louder and he shifted a little, agitation growing within him until it was hard for him to handle it. He didn’t want to lash out at her but at the same time it seemed that it was a good idea. Up until this point he had been able to handle her but it was the way that she looked at him that made him want to smack some sense into her but he merely watched her, the cool façade never breaking despite the tumultuous feelings that were going on inside of him, threatening to rip him apart if he wasn’t sure. She began to pace around him still questioning him and he had to hold back a sigh. ”No need to raise your voice at me. I may have a tattered ear but I can still here. If you get stuck, you wiggle out of your clothing. It’s much better than if you get a trap and you’re held in by your skin. You can’t escape from that. If someone grabs your clothing then you get out of the hold. It’s the same exact thing as if you were fighting in the nude. It gets hot but just as hot as if you didn’t have anything on. Why don’t you try it if you’re so curious about it?”

He honestly didn’t mean to lash out at her as he had done but he did want to put some sort of fear into her, some sort of knowledge that she was seriously overstepping herself and that he wouldn’t have any of it. She seemed to understand quickly enough and dropped down into the proper position and he gave a nod of his head, seeming to relax some. Even if she didn’t mean it, this slight show of submissiveness, he would take it and let sleeping dogs lie. Her puppy whine didn’t faze him…nothing seemed to. However, something did stir in the pit of his stomach, something akin to longing. Before he was captured, he had had every intention of carrying on the family line of the Russos and spreading the word about their family. But with the capture and with the brokenness of the man he had lost all sense of that longing because he thought that he was going to die. Even now that he knew he was gay and he was happily in a relationship with his master, he was still very interested in finding himself a pup for them to raise. Sure, it would be difficult having to feed three mouths on his own but he would do so and he would be able to show his cherub that he loved him by taking care of him and a pup even if he had to steal it from a mother’s breast. Her words shook him out of his thoughts and he blinked at her as if he had forgotten that she was there.

Her words had an eyebrow twitching as if it wanted to raise. She couldn’t shift yet? He supposed that it made sense though, she was still young it seemed and would eventually be able to show herself for the way that she truly was. The diverted attention was soon drawn back to the nightmarish Janos and he gave a little nod of his head at her. ”I am Janos. I am sorry that I had to snap at you but there are some things that I cannot excuse. You understand right?” He asked her with a questioning sound before he looked up at the sky as if he were calculating something. Soon he would need to be on his way. The slight sound of a tail brushing against the ground once again drew the male’s half cloudy vision down to her where she was wagging her tail and seemed to be content and seemed as though she was no longer being aggressive. ”It is getting late. It would be best for you to go back to your mother now. I have a job that I must do,” he said as he shifted, standing up slowly to his full height. The scarred creature watched her, waiting for some kind of response before leaving. Even though he didn’t much care for someone who wouldn’t be respectful towards him, she was part of Salsola, the scent was thick with her so he felt a need to be sure that she was well protected.