Lily Flower

Misc: Predation

Something pinched Dark Choco's cheek.

"Uhh?" He sat up, shaking his disorientation away. A crow was sitting on his lap. He did a double take at the tame bird, unsure of where exactly it had come from. The crow cawed at him, flapping its wings.

The prince tried to drive it away, but the bird only took to air for a scant few seconds before returning to their former position. The dog at his bedpost was awake and alert now, barking at the strange animal that had invaded her space. The crow cawed again, flapping over to the exit. The prince squinted at it. Did the bird want him to follow it? He decided that there was no harm in going along.

Dark Choco and Truffle followed the crow to the edge of the floating city, where they were met with a cookie in a dark cloak and one missing arm. The crow, its job done, settled on her shoulder. He recognized her as the guardian of the village below.

Black Raisin addressed him. "Dark warrior, you are the closest to Pure Vanilla out of everyone, right? I had seen you carry him around when he was weak."

"Yes, I am," he confirmed.

"The one with the hounds, he had stolen him away in the middle of the night. My crows bore witness." She pointed in the distance. "I didn't trail him past the wastes, but he had been traveling that way."

"The cake tower," Dark Choco observed.

The guardian gave him a slight shrug. "I thought that you should know. Bring my healer back whole, okay? I owe that man."

"I will." He paused. "Wait, how did you get up here?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Red Velvet didn't consider himself loyal to the Dark Enchantress, and he hadn't for a long time. It wasn't hard to figure out that she only kept him around because of what he could do for her. Nevertheless, he stayed, because who else would support his dream of cakehounds being able to live without being driven away or killed by cookies? It was a bearable tradeoff, or at least that was what he preached to himself.

Yet, more and more, he was questioning whether he wanted to fight for her, wanted his hounds to die on behalf of her battles. Old memories whom he thought he had made peace with resurged in an avalanche, intent on drowning him beneath their frothing waves.

Love.

The Dark Enchantress loved Pure Vanilla.

She had not affirmed his position, his cause, even when he had thrown the healer onto the painted red target. Red Velvet could claim that he didn't expect anything that bad to occur, but such were frail assurances. Pure Vanilla, despite being a powerful and once exalted cookie, had healed his hounds without complaint. He alleviated the pain that came with his unbalanced arms. He defended Truffle's right to live, even while believing that Red Velvet would argue against it. Was he supposed to view him as an enemy? He had a difficult time coming to terms with that. If he wasn't an enemy, then he was a...friend. One that Red Velvet had betrayed.

"Let go, you're only pushing everything back!" Pure Vanilla cried.

The healer struggled against his grasp. He was weak from his injuries and his magic had been bound, but he continued to try and break from his hold. Why would he strain himself so hard? For what? All that awaited him in the castle was pain and horror, and Red Velvet wanted to keep him away from his mother. He needed to rectify this somehow.

Unable to physically dislodge the hybrid, the healer turned to speaking instead. He started asking him why he was doing this, dissecting his psychological state and what could have forced him to such drastic measures. Red Velvet was becoming quite frustrated with the healer and the situation in general, but he refused to ever yell or hit him. To cope, he tried to ignore his abductee and think louder.