RP:I Fought The Wolf And The Wolf Won

This is a Mage's Guild RP.

Summary: It was supposed to be a nice night out for Cal and Meri... and then things got hairy.

The Arh'Nuk Fair, Xalious

Callum || The ball hadn’t been all that bad, all things considered. Cal got to look hot. Meri got to see some of her friends. There surprisingly wasn’t any shenanigans, as is wont to happen during an event in Lithrydel. Well, you know, until that guy with the weird hat happened… and then Larewen’s… Larewen-ness also happened. And Fleur had -really- hated that. So, it was decided that Fleur would not be accompanying her parents to the carnival. Too many people, too many noises, and they likely wouldn’t be able to take her on any of the rides, if they actually decided to do this thing. Cal opted to pay for a carriage today--it wasn’t something he did often, considering they both have their own horses and both are pretty content with walking. But, if they decided to partake in anything alcoholic, they wouldn’t have to worry about riding drunk on a horse. Maybe Meri was good at that sort of thing, but Cal not so much.

Callum || So they did the carriage thing and then the walking through the park thing to get to the carnival itself. Meri’s sister’s band was playing, sans Khitti. A little too loudly for Cal’s liking. He really didn’t understand this whole “rock music” thing. There’s not even any rocks used. It made no sense. He paused finally, once they were well inside the gate, eyeing everything in the immediate area before looking to Meri. “Where first?”

Meri :: The ball had indeed not been bad, at least not until the end, though Meri probably should have rethought bringing Fleur to the event. She missed the memo about the pageant, thought Fleur would be seeing daddy doing something important...it resulted in a mildly embarrassing meltdown, but these things are bound to happen with kids. The parents are kid free though, which might make this their first date night since getting back together? Meri seemed excited, that was for certain. Though she was regretting her choice of outfit for this event, Cal had called from the start as he so often does...but wearing a dress to a fair is going to prove inconvenient for Meri. At least she was wearing flats, not heels. Regardless of her outfit regrets, Meri seems excited for their kid-free-night-out. Meri snatches up Cal's hand and begins to haul him to closer to Khitti's band, because she knows how much he appreciates that rock music. "We could start with some daaancing," she is joking of course, but Meri? Dance? This was not the woman Cal signed up to be with. Naw, they don't get far, Meri changes course once she gets a reaction out of Cal...likely a roll of his eyes. "Why don't we just start by finding some food to munch on...walk around...spend our gold on things." If they felt like it they could hop on the ferris wheel perhaps, but food and shopping sounded good to Meri. Fairs had some cool finds. Interesting plants. Cool art stuff. Non-clothing items potentially worth spending coin on...or at the very least, cool to look at.

Callum || The blonde certainly had gotten her reaction out of Cal, with a smirk to accompany the eye roll once she finished pulling him along. “If food is what the lady requests, then food it shall be,” he said with a flourishing bow that was not at all serious, but was certainly an attempt to mock her formal attire. He’d take a moment to look between the various food stalls once they got to that portion of the fair, ocean-blue eyes squinted as he deliberated over it silently. “Hm. Real food first. And then sweets after.” Cal couldn’t quite deal with sugar as well as Meri’s sister could--the guy needed one of those huge sandwiches first. “Have you had your sister’s sandwiches yet? I heard about them, but… I really wasn’t going to just walk into your sister’s shop while we were not together. I wasn’t quite sure if I’d finally meet a fiery end or not.” It would’ve been amusing at least for Cal to be murdered by Khitti instead of Brand or Lionel and he could appreciate the irony. With Meri’s hand in his still, he led her towards the sandwich stall and eyed the list of ingredients, and immediately got excited, “Holy hell, Meri, she’s got soda bread here. I’ve not had that since I was in Catal!” He made quick work of his order, rattling off everything he’d want between those two delicious slices of bread: a few slices of Muenster cheese, two thick slices of mammoth meat, a couple pieces of bacon, lettuce, tomato, a few jalapenos, and some of that spicy mayo Khitti had concocted. Callum could hardly wait for that monster of a sandwich, his stomach finally telling him that he was indeed hungry. The workers in the stall were polite enough to get Meri’s order too before they went off, despite the fact that Cal was so impatient he nearly spilled gold coins all over the place. Look, it’s been a long time since he had that bread, okay? “Where did she even get that recipe from?! Brand and Lionel are clearly not the baking type.”

Meri responds to Cal's poking fun at her attire much the same way that he responded to her poking fun at his taste in music. They move on to talk about the menu at Khitti's shop and Meri smirks, "Yeah, I have tried them a time or two. I am sure you would have been able to set foot in her shop without being murdered. Besides, she's not -always- there. This is why she hires people..." Though Meri is trying to assure Cal that Khitti would have been fine toward him, her tone is not as confident as she would hope. Khitti -is- a redhead afterall. Cal has pretty much decided Meri's order for her, the blonde's nose is already alerting her to the fact that he has picked a good combination for this sandwich. There was a lot of meat in it. Mmm. Meat. "Well she definitely did not get it from Brand and Lionel," Meri proclaims once she has a sandwich of her own and is able to join Callum. "I am pretty sure neither of them would manage to feed themselves in any sort of decent fashion were it not for her." I mean, they'd still manage it. It would just be far more questionable dinner choices. "She probably got it from a book. She does love those books. Or. You know. Someone had to invent this recipe at some point. I guess some people just have a talent for it." Meri has done far too much talking and not nearly enough eating. The woman takes a large bite before declaring with a mouthful of food, in a very lady-like fashion. "I am not one of those people." Though she has improved. She does have a daughter to feed now. Except she also has a Cal to help with that area again....

Callum snickered at Meri’s agreement that Brand and Lionel would’ve probably starved had it not been for Khitti. Both of their enormous sandwiches are handed over and Cal takes a few steps away from the stall so that he’s not in the way. “No, you’re not, but it’s fine because we’ve got enough money to eat like this for the rest of our lives.” Especially if Cal kept doing things like rigging carnival games. Nom nom nom goes the Cal, but he’s only a few bites into the sandwich before a bunch of idiot kids come barrelling through the area and plowing right into him. Cal let out a yelp as he hit the ground, the sandwich went flying and landed mostly on the ground, but also on Cal. The horrid children found this amusing and let everyone in the immediate area know about it with their uncontrollable laughter. Who wouldn’t want to laugh at the nicely dressed dude getting his entire outfit destroyed by the innards of a massive sandwich? “For frak’s sake…” He was not happy about this new development, but he was doing his best not to cause a scene--anymore than the kids had already.

Meri , on the other hand, was a bit more inclined to cause a scene...Cal's ruined sandwich? Well the pieces that have hit the earth start levitating and seem to have a path straight for the children. They would be beamed in the head with dirty food if Meri gets her way. "You could always take it off." Meri says with a wiggle of her brows, trying to not let her annoyance with the undisciplined children get the better of her. It was an easy thing to have happen these days, Meri's temper getting the better of her. Those kids are pelted in the head with bits of sandwich chunks and are none to happy as a result, but Meri does not seem to care. She is going to one of those stalls (probably back to Khitti's food booth), grabbing a plate and a knife, and cutting her monster sandwich in half for her and Cal to share. "I didn't really want the entire thing anyway," Meri announces, though it's not like they were hurting for gold. If Cal wanted a sammich all to his own personal self, they could just order up a new one for him. Meri would not be offended, she's just trying to be a nice fiance!

Callum withheld a smirk as the kids were pelted with sandwich fixings, only to allow it to surface when Meri suggested he take his clothes off. “If I did that, you’d be fighting with more than just children,” he said. He does take his jacket off at least, used a bit of air magic to blow off the ingredients, and then slung it over an arm. Who knew if Cal would’ve been able to eat that entire thing on his own anyway. He was definitely grateful that she offered up half of hers, “Thanks.” He started to nom on this one as well and when he finally looked up… there was a couple of big surly-looking dudes--and one of them was in the process of shoving Meri in the shoulders from behind. “HEY! What the hell do you think you’re doing to our kids? You gotta problem with them just having fun?” Now it was Cal’s turn to get a bit irritated, “Your little brats started it. Maybe teach them to watch what the frak they’re doing when they’re running around like hellions, yeah?” The leader of the two laughed at Cal, “Oh? And what’ll you do if I don’t? Hm?” Cal shrugged, set his sandwich down carefully on the stall’s counter, before facing the two dudes again, “Oh… I don’t know…” But, Cal definitely had known, because he followed it up with throwing his jacket at dudebro number one’s face to distract him, and used a bit of that aforementioned air magic to knock him over. Dude-parent number two just kinda blinked and then went to beat the shit out of Cal, starting with an oversized fist to the face. It connected. It hurt. And now Cal was bleeding all over his nice outfit. As if the sandwich wasn’t enough.

Meri :: It is going to become painfully obvious where Fleur gets these bitey habits from, though Meri would have been quick to lose her cool as a result of someone attacking Callum even before she was a werewolf. Still. It is obvious that things are escalating a bit quicker than the norm for Meri's normally blue eyes have turned a rather wolfish shade of gold as she whips around to confront the two men. There is a low growl to her voice and she wastes no time in launching a mean right hook straight for the jaw of the man who made Callum bleed. "Excuse the hell out of you, but I did not realize having a good time included laughing at someone over ill-mannered behavior." Back when Meri was a human though, she probably would have managed to stop herself after the first punch. One is revenge enough. As a werewolf...Well Meri's not going to stop. One punch is not enough. She'll try and get in a punch with her left. And then her right again. And if he falls? In this moment she will have no issue with kicking a man when he's down. It's when the other dudebro steps in to try and help his friend that things start to get really ugly. Why no, you may not stop me from beating your friend to a pulp. This is entirely unacceptable. Rage-worthy in fact. And rage Meri will...until she is so mad that she can no longer maintain her form as is. That wolfish side of her really wants to come out and bite someone...Cue the sounds of bones cracking. Soon the dudebros will not be fighting a blonde woman in a fancy dress anymore. In fact, Meri has gone and ruined another one of her dresses, not that she has a closet full...but she does seem to have a knack for destroying the few fancy items that she does own.

Callum || Ohhh frak. Ohfrakohfrakohfrak. “Meri! It’s fine! It’s--” But things were not fine. Meri was going to town on both dudes as Cal attempted to stand up and steady himself, the blood from his nose wiped away onto his sleeve. It hadn’t taken long for her to deal with those guys--apparently when faced with a werewolf, they turned chicken real quick-like. And now Cal had to deal with a wolf-Meri. Again. And the last time hadn’t gone entirely great. Suddenly dealing with Fleur seemed like cake and Cal wished for that alternate universe where they’d brought Fleur along with them instead. People were careful around babies! “Hey!” The Catalian tried his best to get Meri’s attention before she rampaged elsewhere as if she were Godzilla wreaking havoc in Japan. “MERI!” Well, if that wasn’t going to work, he’d have to try magic… So, putting out of his mind that his woman was going to smell like wet dog, Cal summoned up an orb of water and threw it at her.

Meri :: Cal managed to get Meri's attention alright. That orb of water hit her and though it did not hurt her at all, all attention was on Cal though. For how long? Who knows, there were plenty of people screaming and trying to flee the scene, surely one of them could easily distract Meri. If not one of them, maybe some other dudebro felt like trying to play hero, stopping the werewolf from her horribly violent deeds. Maybe this would happen...but if it was going to happen then it was not happening fast enough. Meri's attention was pulled away from the two dad's that start all of this and she was charging at Callum now with jaws chomping. She did not really seem to care where she managed to bite Callum, leg, hand, or whatever other body part happened to get in her way...but she seemed pretty determined to bite down on something. At least last time Meri had managed to contain herself...and somewhere in the woman's whirlwind of a mind, the blonde is throwing a fit for the uncontrolled behavior of her wolfish self.

Callum couldn’t possibly take anymore damage to his poor precious face right now. He hadn’t had time to contemplate on what to do and in an effort to save the front of his body--it was his best side, really--he turned to let her maul his back, in much the same way Orikahn had. Might as well add to the scars. But he turned too late. There’s another spray of blood from Cal, compliments of Meri’s teeth right in the back of his left calf. A pained scream bubbled out of his throat as that fight or flight response kicked in. This time it was to fight. This time, Cal wasn’t going to hesitate on going entirely easy on the blonde in her wolf form. ‘It wasn’t supposed to be like this’ was all he could think as his uninjured leg swung around to kick Meri off of him, likely taking a chunk of his leg with her. ‘It wasn’t supposed to be this way’. Now Cal knew how Meri probably felt when Alvina attacked her. Lightning crackled in his left hand, the Catalian hesitating for a moment. The hesitation might serve to get him injured further, but he eventually let loose a bolt of lightning. It wasn’t his full power, but Cal hoped it was enough at least to knock her out. Or even get her to revert back. Or something. Anything. ‘We had everything planned out.’ The blood loss from his face and his leg was starting to bring on a bit of dizziness, the lights of the carnival doubling… tripling… twinkling like the stars that’d been magicked up for the ball.

Meri couldn't fault Callum for not holding back in trying to defend himself. She would have been angry if he did not. Heck, she tried to talk him into making sure he was armed with that wolfsbane stuff at one point just in case this very thing happened. Lightning coursed through her body, it may not have been full power but even still it was enough to render her unconscious...and in rendering her unconscious she also shifted back to the form that Callum was far more familiar in dealing with. She was a little naked though, which was just adding another layer to the scene that she had managed to create at the carnival. Even worse is that Callum was also on the verge of passing out himself from the loss of blood. This means that the both of them will potentially be unconscious in the middle of the fairgrounds. It definitely was not supposed to be like this, they did indeed have things planned out. There is some saying about the best laid plans though. Meri will have to apologize...but she clearly could not do that right at this second.

Callum || The adrenaline hadn’t quite kicked in yet, but as it was starting to, Cal forced it along by giving himself a bit of a shock as well. Not exactly to the extent as what Meri got though. It was enough to force him awake and he limped his way over to Meri once he’d retrieved his jacket. Using it to cover her up, he’d soon start yelling for help. Most had scattered once it was clear that Meri was going to go on a rampage. There were more than just mages here thankfully, and soon a dryad Cal had been selling herbs and flowers to happened upon them, having heard the Catalian’s familiar voice. The Apothecary Shop’s clerk blinked a few times as Cal collapsed on the ground next to Meri, then set to attempt to stem the loss of blood in Cal’s leg. “Holy Hind, Cal. I’ll get you home… Don’t worry.” The dryad was worried however as Meri had bit him good. As attuned to nature as she was, she could sense the lycanthrope virus coursing through his veins, but she was more worried about him bleeding out before the curse could even take effect and heal him. It was going to get better, but not if she couldn’t deal with this. “HEY!” The green-skinned Ivaera was not like most other dryads, meaning she wasn’t as shy as some, “Go call for a carriage. Make sure they bring it -into- the fairgrounds. NOW!” Leaves that grew from her hair were plucked out and placed over his wound, the tiny veins in the plant matter crept out of the leaves and sunk into Cal’s skin to cut off the tide of blood. The carriage would eventually show up, and the dryad would give directions to get both Cal and Meri into it carefully, Ivaera soon joining them. “Southern Sage. Please go quickly!” There were a lot of people Cal and Meri could hide their home in Sage from, but a dryad was not one of them.

Meri would remain unconscious even as she is first lifted into the carriage. The blonde would be out cold for the better part of the ride home, giving the dryad plenty of time to focus on trying to mend Cal's wounds. Wounds that Meri caused. When the blonde comes to, she remains fairly sedate...which is a good thing. At least it means that she is not going to wolf out. Her calm state is due to the fact that her head is aching and her limbs still feel like they are burning. Top it off with the fact that she does not really know how she got where she is...let alone where she is. But Callum was there. With a dryad. The blonde furrows her brows together as she tries to piece together what might have happened, but it's really not too hard for her to start putting two and two together. There are not many reasons she would end up in carriage without much in terms of clothing save for Cal's jacket. And Cal's clothing was definitely all bloody. Meri frowns and soon that confusion is replaced with guilt, because as Cal had noted...it was not supposed to happen like that.s