RP:Learning to Butcher

Various Track

Orikahn is in the snow, arm deep in a fresh carcass. Blue blood is splattered all up his arms and down his front, and there are a variety of sickening, squelching sounds as he cuts and tugs, carefully gutting and cleaning a recently felled frostmare. The midnight blue horse is slit open right up its middle, and a large pile of organs already sit beside it, staining the snow a brilliant cerulean in a wide, slushy swath around. With quiet grunts of concentration and exertion the cat works at the edge of the treeline. His expression is stern and his eyes are intent. Out beyond, hundreds of feet off, a few frostmares still prance and pace in their agitation, not daring to approach, but perhaps not willing to leave either.

As was usual for Aira she was not traveling on the ground but rather through the trees, gracefully hopping from branch to branch as she moved quickly and silently. She looked different, no quiver of arrows was slung on her back, no bow rested across her body. The more time she spent in Frostmaw the lighter her hair seemed to get, her platinum locks appearing nearly white. An agitated expression worked itself into her features--she needed a new bow. The itch to hunt was insatiable so much so that her hands almost seemed to twitch with desire. The past week Aira had still gone out to the woods, even without her weapons, just to get out of the tavern. She had been silently watching Orikahn work on gutting the animal, her nose scrunched up slightly. Her back was up against the trunk of the tree and her long legs were stretched out across the bough and hands folded neatly in her lap. It was a long time before she even said anything but the runaway eventually called out, "That looks gross."

Orikahn is just pulling the beast's limp jaws open to cut out the tongue when he hears a familiar voice, and he glances behind himself to spot the elf. Kahn's face still bears his scratches, scabby now, but wounds don't seem to bother him. Quite the contrary, his eyes light up in pleased recognition as he spots Aira, and with unusual cheer, he beckons her closer. "You'll change your tune when we're roasting him. Here, help me hoist him up." His hands may be covered in gore and goo, but that doesn't stop him from rooting around though his own belongings and procuring a rope to begin wrapping it around the frostmare's rear legs.

Aira lifted her pale brow as Kahn beckoned her down from her perch in the tree to assist him. Shooting was all well and good, even the blood Aira could deal with. But she'd never had the, pleasure?, of gutting a kill. The runaway noted the scabbed wounds on the feline's head, her own injuries fairing much better than their last meeting. Her shoulder (which was hidden from view and still bandaged) was healing up nicely and the burns along her throat and ear seemed to be dwindling, those leaving no lasting marks on her otherwise smooth flesh. Heaving a deep sigh, Aira sat up more fully, and swung her legs over the side of the bough. Without giving it another thought, the elf slid from the branch, freefalling, and landed below in a crouch before standing straight once more. It was a fairly far fall, yet it didn't seem to phase Aira in the slightest. Snow crunched under her booted feet as she made her way towards the prime hunter and waited for further instructions, skirting around the organs of the fallen beast.

Orikahn tugs the bindings on the horse's legs, making sure the rope will hold before taking one end of the rope and tossing it over to Aira. "Loop that over a branch for me, would you? We're going to string this stallion up and drain him." Gripping the rope near the horse's legs, he begins tugging the carcass over toward the base of the trees, grunting and groaning with exertion before the big blue body breaks free of the snow and ice to begin noisily sliding over the frozen ground. "You're late," the cat jokingly chides her. "But I'll still try and cue you in. You ever butchered an animal before?" By his tone, Aira suspects he can already tell she hasn't. "Goes with being a hunter, you know."

Aira scrunched up her nose in disgust as she caught the rope which was covered in all sorts of goop. Still, the does as she's told, walking towards the nearest tree and slinging the rope over the lowest branch that would still hoist the beast into the air. She managed to get it on the second try. She turned to face Orikahn when he addressed her about being late. She could tell by his tone that he already knew the answer but she gave it anyway. "In my old home I not allowed to hold bow. You think they bade me butcher big beasties before (ha!)?" Aira made a noise somewhere between a snort and a scoff. "Not exactly on list of things to do to be proper wife in Rynvale."

Orikahn eventually gets the frostmare to the base of the tree, leaving a wide, blue trail of gore behind it. "If I'd known you were coming, grnf, I would, hmmfph, have started it bleeding before I gutted it. I didn't think I'd have help getting it off the ground." Indeed, the sizeable pile of organs still laying in a steaming pile in the snow would have added considerable weight to the already daunting stallion. "And now we pull." Kahn takes the rope and waits for Aira to grab on behind him. Assuming she does (if Aira doesn't, Kahn will do it himself and she'll just earn herself an annoyed look) the hunters hoist the heavy horse's hind hooves high, until the unfortunate ungulate is upside-down and slowly swinging side to side, suspended and steadily seeping cerulean to splatter and stain the snows sapphire. "There," Kahn nods and looks to Aira, gruffly grunting with a gesture that she give the grisly cat some slack. Taking the taut tether's terminus, he ties it to a tree trunk.

"Coming?" Aira asked, trying to hide the smirk that was pulling at the corner of her lips but failing miserably. "I was in tree whole time, watching you work." She explained all this as she grabbed onto the rope behind the feline and began to pull. She was pretty sure that finding out she had been lounging away as he worked -would- grant her an annoyed look. With that satisfied grin still on her face she handed over the slack of rope that he gestured for so that the prime hunter could then tie it to the trunk of the tree. Copper eyes trailed on the beast, head tilted to the side slightly as she watched the cerulean blood begin to drain and stain the snow.

Orikahn sits back on his haunches and plucks the rope, listening to it twang before he nods in satisfaction. "I should have guessed as much, well then," he pulls out his dagger, a simple bone dirk to temporarily replace his shattered flint blade, and kneels beneath the dripping animal to cut out the tongue like he'd begin to do, apparently not minding the gore. This would probably explain why he comes to town splattered in the stuff half the time. "Got it," he takes the tongue, then goes back to the pile of organs, sifting through them. "I usually keep the liver, and the heart," the cat picks out the pieces as he names them, setting them on the snow, then he looks over his shoulder to Aira. "You're doing pretty well, by the look of you." The cat takes a bite of raw liver, noisily ripping off a piece to choke it down without hardly chewing. "I thought you'd be down for longer than that, the way that hound had gotten ahold of you."

Aira winced her eyes closed as Orikahn removed his dagger and swiftly moved to separate the tongue from the mouth of the beast before wandering over to the pile of organs once more. The runaway opted to follow him, even lofting a brow when he mentioned keeping the liver and heart. When he looked back and spoke of her injuries she was about to respond when he took a bite out of the raw liver, Aira visibly gagged and turned her face from him. "Don't sound so disappointed," she teased. "I more upset about not having bow than anything else. The others?" A slender hand came up to indicate her shoulder and face, "Small flesh wounds." Not really, but the high elf normally shrugged off her injuries as no big deal. Aira crossed her arms over her chest before sitting down next to Kahn, making sure her face was still turned away so she didn't have to see him eating.

Orikahn sees Aira gag, and his immediate reaction is to check the liver in his hand. Did it have cysts on it or something? He couldn't taste any, and he can't see or smell any either. Probably best not to worry about it. He takes another bite and continues rooting through the entrails, picking out choice bits and setting them to the side. "Impressed," he talks through the mouthful, "not disappointed. Crack shot, good climber, fast healer: you're sounding more and more like a born hunter by the day. Oh! That's a good one," Kahn pulls out a lumpy, squiggly looking organ of some kind and tosses it onto a clean patch of snow at Aira's feet where it lands with a limp splat. "Good juju. Good juju. So we'll get you another bow. This time, I'll teach you to make one."

Aira smiled gently despite herself at Kahn's praise. Between that and the glowing report he had given to Hildegarde after the fire, she was beginning to think he might actually like her company and not just tolerate it. Aira kept her face sheltered from having to watch the hunter dog the the organs, audibly giving a girlish squeal as her flings a particularly disgusting looking organ at her feet. The elf quickly crawls backwards, her face a pale shade of green, as if the offending innard might attack. "N-no thank you!" She exclaimed, slightly embarrassed by her little outburst. She perked up, however, when he mentioned her not only getting a new bow but learning to craft one herself. "I like that very much."

Orikahn startles at Aira's squeal, as it was certainly not the reaction he'd expected, and he is further taken aback when she refuses the offer. "You're joking!" Plainly, she isn't. Ah well, the more for Orikahn. He reaches a long arm over and plucks the squiggly, jiggly little innard up and slurps it down with obvious relish. "That kill can drain a bit more, then we can drag it back to the lodge and quarter it for smoking. In the meanwhile, let's try and pick out a good branch for that bow of yours." The cat pulls out his granite-headed hatchet and tosses it like a tomahawk to stick in the snow beside Aira. "You seem acquainted with trees. Go chop me off a bough with some good heartwood in it." Much like his old, shattered flint knife was more like a shortsword, this tomahawk is more akin to a battleaxe in Aira's hands, and it could very well be that Orikahn intends this as a test of strength and not merely an educational exercise.

Aira's copper eyes seemed to flare at Kahn's disbelief at her turning down the organ. She merely gave him a "you've got to be kidding me?" type of look; however, when he plucked it up and slurped it down like a delicacy, Aira's hand slapped over her mouth as she gagged once more. After several gulps of frigid air the runaway seemed composed once more. That metallic gaze trailed on the tomahawk as Kahn took it in hand and threw it her way. Like everything else with the hunter, from his sheer size to his weapons, Aira (who was rather tall for her kind) was dwarfed. She breathed out a deep sigh before standing, wiping snow from her leggings. At his order to go cut a branch she merely jutted out her hip, placing a hand in the crook of her waist. She wore an annoyed expression on her face as she narrowed her almond shaped eyes at the feline. "How about 'please'?" She would stand there for a few moments waiting for the peasantry. If it came she would start on her merry way, if not she would scoff and start mumbling in elvish under her breath -before- starting on her annoyed way. Before she even grasped the tomahawk she knew it would be weighted, made the feel even heavier thanks to her healing shoulder injury. Still, Aira wasn't one to turn down a challenge, especially one posed by Kahn. With a grunt she hoisted it from the snow, wincing slightly, before moving into the tree line. Upon finding a suitable tree she gazed up into the boughs and tapped her foot. How was she to climb -and- carry the axe at the same time? Several minutes pass by before an idea struck her. Despite the cold, she unclasped the cloak at her throat letting it flutter to the ground, her bandaged shoulder now clearly visible. She took the tomahawk in the hand of her uninjured arm and took a mighty swing into the tree. She would then use the leverage of the handle to pull herself up. As she found footing on a knot on the trunk she would pull the tomahawk out, reach up with a swing, and pull herself up again. It was long work, but it was the only solution she could come up with. By the time she reached her intended bough, she was wiping the sweat from her brow, her chest heaving with deep breaths. Aira would scoot out onto the bough and begin to hack away at her branch. Her arm ached badly but there was work still to be done. After several swings the branch went tumbling down into the snow, soon followed by the tomahawk, and lastly, Aira herself, who landed in her signature crouch. The high elf was also most likely singing "I'll Make A Man Out of You" during this whole ordeal.