#september writey prompt hours

[kiryll-antiqua]

Bark

Kiryll's ears burned when he heard about Victor for the first time. He knew Varis liked dogs, which made the tempered pugnaxes in Babil Tower make his heart hurt even moreso, but to think, a particular show dog existed and survived the whole Anima incident��and on display locally.

The requirements to get in to see him were very high, and Kiryll lacked the ability to commit time to completing them, but at the very least, he could go in to visit it.

Though no farmer's hand with animals, he was a dog lover himself. Lady Susuno had had borzoi, and it was one of Kiryll's duties to assist in keeping them well-cleaned. They had needed enough attention that Lady Susuno hired a new member of staff to do the entire job, because it had just become too much of an ordeal. His grandmother's dog was a very sweet and dense Collie named Scratcher. 

Victor was warmed to Kiryll almost immediately. He was large, and the pugnax face aesthetic was not to his taste, even with Victor being considered as having the gold standard pugnax face. He was barking and wagging his tail as Kiryll approached, and when he got within range, Victor slobbered on the upper half of his right torso, leaving Kiryll shuddering for a few moments, wiping himself off with a handkerchief.

Kiryll had never enjoyed any kind of dirt on him, ever since he was a child. Born the son of a lord, but raised as a servant, it always had perplexed him how much he hated getting dirty, while his half sister seemed to roll in it daily.

Victor's handler calmed him down and waited politely for Kiryll to approach again. "It's all right, I know he's a good dog. Aren't you?"

Kiryll knew just where a pugnax preferred to be scritched. 

–

"Do you like dogs, Warrior of Light? I have a summer home to the south, and I keep several there. Pugnaxes, that is."

"Pugnax?" Kiryll hadn't heard that word in such a long time, and didn't think he had certainly never seen one before.

"One of several types of attack dogs. Round-ish, snub-nosed, sharp teeth. Though I suppose they haven't made their way to Eorzea…I know your people do use attack dogs, but I'm unfamiliar with exactly which ones. I'll have to look them up later…"

Kiryll cleared his throat, a little nervous. "I did see to it that my lady's three borzoi were taken care of, but I typically haven't too much experience with attack dogs."

"Are borzoi not attack dogs themselves, though?"

"Only if you agitate them."

Varis was very good at diverting the core of the conversation so that there was more to talk with him about. Kiryll wasn't sure if it was a bit of attention deficit or purposeful deceit, meticulously crafted in advance to keep Kiryll ensnared. He worked a bit to find the thread. "Summer home, you say? I think I can handle meeting an attack dog."

Varis smiled at him, his crows feet catching Kiryll's eye. "You're a good person. You can probably handle all six."

–

Kiryll had indeed been able to handle all six. Said summer home was in a warm place that reminded him of Thavnair but he didn't think it was within its borders. The home was a modest cluster of homes, impeccably kept, not standing out as an Imperial edifice due to its retaining of the local architecture style, but heavily patrolled. 

It was nice to share a secluded set of evenings on a beach, alone with someone. He was a little bit angry that that someone ended up being Varis and not some kind of better paragon from Eorzea, but he was still in his feelings about Eorzea, which was part of why he decided to go meet Varis rather than ripping up the letter he got sent.

The dogs looked very fierce, and he didn't remember any of their names, but he was good to them, and they were good to him. Even the ones that seemed skittish or likely to snap seemed to warm to Kiryll as if he were royalty in a fairy story.

Now years later, he wondered what had become of that place, or if it could ever be found. Victor barked, though it came off as more of a "boof," bringing him back down to earth.

Kiryll spent so much time in his own thoughts these days. The trainer had him do a few tricks and it was almost time to let the next group of people in to see him, and he was eventually politely ushered out after loitering for too long.

Kiryll was having trouble keeping his lucidity in public, and he didn't like that at all. He hoped the move to Garlemald to help the Twins would prove useful.

He trodded back to his apartment and grabbed an old bottle of plum wine off the shelf before bed, still thinking about Varis's dogs, and all the other pugnaxes he happened to encounter afterwards. He had such terrible trouble being on the other side of their leash.

He felt like the biggest heel in existence as he had to push past the pugnaxes Zenos seemed to employ in his own defenses. Though with Zenos, Kiryll thought that maybe his defenses were actually designed by his retainers, or been mandated by Varis himself. It was almost comedic, like ordering small bodyguards for an unbelievably powerful Gladiator.

Though Victor here would only be an entertainer. His snarls seemed like the dog version of smiles, and his love language was a frightful bark, it was the only language he knew, and it also reminded him of Varis. 

There was not a single day he wasn't thinking about him, in all this time. He knew it was about time to try to let go a little bit. It had been almost two years, after all. He felt quite stupid, drowning in the dreams, the nightmares, the fanciful daydreams. He was surprised he was not tempered, himself. 

Kiryll remembered seeing tempered pugnaxes in Babil Tower, and the horror of the situation really set in - Babil Tower was not something Varis would have chosen for himself. It was a vicious punishment enacted by Fandaniel's desire to destroy, and Zenos's silent apathy to everything that surrounded him that was given to him by his family.

It was good that the war had ended. It was just gruesome and terrible that it had ended like this.

Kiryll was constantly hearing people on the streets of Ul'dah talking about it, and not just amongst the Lemures, but the merchants and the low ranking politicians, too. It had lost its charm, and with it, most of what tied his attachment to Ul'dah.

Most of his own things were in boxes, and friends had been communicated with, and a long conversation with his mother as well. This was his last week here, and he was hoping the change of venue would be better for his mind.