Chapter Text
The lamb returns from a crusade at the break of dawn, a chorus of birdsong signaling the birth of a new day. The morning sunshine is dappling lazily through the canopy of trees and foliage, struggling to burn off the mist of an evening storm. At the base of the entrance, Narinder loomed, tall and imposing in his cloak as crimson as blood. The hood is pulled tight across his ears, blocking out the moist air. Crimson eyes stare up at the lamb, narrowed against the growing brightness of the hour.
He’s taken to waiting for her, timing her return to greet her first. The decades of hurt and distance had given way to something tender and fragile between them.
The lamb smiles, soft and oh so prettily, at the sight of him. She leaps down the cobblestone, her portal snapping shut with a hiss. “I’m back,” she bleats. Narinder hums in response as the lamb moved to grip at his cloak. She stands on the tip of her hooves to press a tiny kiss to the underside of his chin. He nuzzles her back, huffing the bitter tang of magic and the iron coating of blood on her wool. A purr rumbles, scratchy and low, at the back of his throat.
The crown on her brow watches, eye crinkling in amusement.
Narinder doesn’t ask of her travels nor does the lamb offer any reply. The heavy stacks of fresh meat, and beetroot that had fallen into the kitchen quarters had been enough of an indicator.
Grinning, the young death god pulls free from his arms. Narinder huffs, but allows for the lamb to curl her fingers with his. She drags him into the still quiet base, followers still sleeping deeply in huts and cabins.
They pause at the Nursery, the lamb smiling down at a tiny green kitten wrapped around a stuffie and the softest of pillows. She was Narinder’s niece through Leshy. Quietly, Narinder watches the lamb care for the tiny feline, pulling blankets closer, whispering a quiet hymn to herself. The kitten yawns in her slumber, flopping to her other side with a drowsy noise.
The lamb smiles.
And -
“Lamb,” Narinder rumbles, the word leaves him without thought. His ears flatten to his skull. A request, a declaration, burns behind his teeth, it twists and aches in all the unseen caverns of his ancient chest. “Oriana,” he tries, again.
It isn't the first time.
The lamb, Oriana, turns to face him. Her large eyes drift across his hunched form, the nervous twitch to his whiskers. She bleats softly in question, confusion tightening her pretty face. She steps into his arms, pressing into the steady thud of his immortal heartbeat.
He moves to entangle her in an embrace before -
the rumbling started.
The quiet intimacy of the moment is shattered by pressure, black and heavy. The magic reeks of the former old faith.
Oriana flicks her ears, annoyed. “He followed me,” she huffs, pulling away. Narinder kept a hand on her hip, blinking down at the former vessel.
“He?” he rasps, his free paw moving to wrap around a thin wrist, holding the lamb in place. Before Oriana can reply, a portal opens between them. It’s a swirling puddle of black essence thickened with blood. They stumble apart as a set of horns, much longer and curled than that of the lamb, break the surface, followed by a scream that could shatter glass.
A goat, Narinder realizes, as the newcomer turns to the lamb. He stands a head taller than her without the horns. The crown on his head, nestled in a messy coal-colored coat, turns to blink lazily in his direction. The violet eye stares, snapping into a crescent moon with a pulse of all-too familiar power, before turning back to the lamb.
“Shamura’s vessel,” Narinder murmurs as the lamb and goat knock horns in an almost playful gesture. His sibling had sent him away during his rebellion; to safety, to a dimension where The One Who Waits never ached for power.
He had seen him, years before and through the crown, tossing the ewe out of danger before slipping back to his time.
And now he was here.
“Nox,” the lamb huffs, shaking dirt from her wool from the game. “I told you I’d get you if he remembered.”
The goat mumbles something to her in reply that makes Oriana sigh. She points, giving up, to a house fixture just beyond her glowing temple. Tucked between flowerbeds and hanging branches, Shamura’s abode was a quiet sanctuary.
With another shriek that made his fur prickle, the goat gallops off. He runs through the encampment on all fours, grass and gravel flying from underneath his heavy hooves.
They watch him disappear before the lamb turns back to her own former god. She sighs heavily, tangling her fingers in the fabric of his clock. “Before you ask…” she mumbles, “I think he just wants to reconnect.”
Narinder snorts at that. He moves to cup her waist, claws sliding underneath her fleece to spread out possessively across the base of her tail. The lamb shivers at the feeling, a whimper chased from her throat.
“That,” Narinder murmurs, voice deep and husky, as he bends to kiss her, “is like saying I only desire you as a friend.”
He sweeps into her mouth, tongue sliding against her parting teeth. They part with a wet noise, and Narinder moves to cup her neck. Her pulse thuds against his thumb, up-ticking steadily as he drags his muzzle across her cheek to press a tiny peck to her eyelids. “… my sibling,” he starts, staring down at her pink face with something close to a grin, “will be heavy with filthy goat egg by the end of this visit.”
The lamb makes a face but buries her flushed features into his chest. The moments pass, a pleasurable bubble of two, before the camp begins to stir around them; a spotted dog making a mad dash for the outhouse with a yelp.
The lamb giggles.
And Narinder, he cups her face for a second time. He strokes her cheekbone, claws careful of nicking her flesh. The lamb's features flood with fresh soft pink. His affection, undoubted but mostly saved for the private confines of her cabin, always ended up turning her to jelly and bring a sweet, hot flush to her fur.
He smirks down at the dazed lamb, long canine glinting in the morning light. He feels warm. He feels -
Happy.
And the words come easily.
“Do you wish to try for an egg?”