Her Beasts

Abandoned

The next day, Caspian headed off to market with Ember. There were simply too many things to carry for one person to go to market. Due to this, Ember carefully flew the beauty products to market while Caspian carried the games and clothes.

Meanwhile, Basil took Iris to the fields. Iris was pleasantly surprised by just how good of shape the fields were in. Despite the heavy rains previously, the fields were still going strong thanks to the deeper paths for water to pass through. Ember had also been keeping the worst of the weeds at bay.

Iris and Basil only had to remove a handful of weeds here and there and check the vicinity for animal tracks. Iris noted that the plants were now looking pretty good and about half way through their growth cycle just as the system said they should be. This made Iris quite happy as she was looking forward to having plants to eat, store, and sell.

After tending to the fields, Basil carried Iris back towards their home. Sadly, since it was still early rainy season, there would not be much forageables available to collect like there would be in another month or so. Still, Basil allowed Iris to stop as they collected some chickweed and miner's lettuce. Basil knew Iris liked to eat plants and was happy to provide what he could for her.

When they got back to the tribe, they were greeted by Ivy and her mates. Ivy was pissed to not have been included in the few females to have been given a gift the previous night. Since Iris had sent two of her mates off to market and only had a witch doctor left, Ivy felt Iris would be vulnerable. It would be the perfect chance to teach Iris a lesson for not respecting Ivy's position as the tribal leader's daughter and tribe beauty.

Basil looked at Ivy and her mates and placed Iris on the ground, pushing her behind him as he took a protective stance. Iris was worried about the number of mates Ivy had. Thirty versus one was too many for Basil to take alone, even if he was stronger than the others.

Iris shouted out at Ivy

"What do you want now?"

Ivy sneered at Iris as she stood amongst her mates. Ivy wanted to get in Iris's face, but was weary of doing so after the last time. Thus, Ivy just shouted back in an ugly voice

"How dare you gift those half orcs something and forget to give something to the tribe beauty? As tribe beauty, I have priority when it comes to all resources."

Ivy flipped her hair behind her back as she said the last bit, reminding Iris of cliche mean girls from the modern world. Iris couldn't help but chuckle as she responded

"I wasn't aware you were what passed as beauty around here. Besides, we aren't friends, I don't owe you anything!"

Ivy let out a shrill screech like a banshee as her mates descended upon them. Iris pulled out two bone knives from her bag and stood in a stance to prepare to use them as if she were an assassin or rogue with daggers in an RPG.

It was a good thing that Iris was prepared too. While Basil did his best to protect Iris and certainly drew in the attention of the stronger mates, two of the weaker non-awakened males got past him. Iris grimaced as she slashed the knives out at the males, slicing into on of their forearms.

Iris had taken self defense classes in the modern world, but most of that was basics. Using ones fists, a pocket knife, keys, or mace to protect oneself long enough to run away. This meant that Iris wasn't prepared to fight two large males who were stronger than her to the death.

Thus, Iris stuck one of her knives into the males legs before shoving them as hard as possible into the other causing them to stumble into each other and fall backwards. Iris then took into the forest and ran for her life.

Iris knew that beastmen had a good sense of smell and she could only run straight towards the river before swimming down river a bit. Then she took off running further into the forest and scrambled up a tree. Iris hoped this would be enough to throw them off her trail.

Iris felt immense guilt over abandoning Basil, but she wasn't sure what else she could do. Besides, Iris knew that it would be far easier to kill her than Basil and that her death would equal the death of all her mates. Iris could not put all those she loved in danger for a useless attempt to help a single one of her mates.

Luckily for Basil, Ember soon arrived at the scene. Ember didn't plan to help Caspian sell things and had returned to the tribe as soon as he had arrived at the city. Ember was confused at first by the bloody scene in front of him. When he saw Ivy, Ember's blood began to boil and he no longer cared who it was that she was attacking.

Ember began to attack Ivy's mates indiscriminately as fire raged around him and he tore chunks of flesh from bodies. It wasn't until Ember pulled a bloody and barely still standing Basil from the fray that Ember began to worry. Ember incapacitated the rest of Ivy's mates before roaring at Ivy

"Where is she?!?! Where the fuck is she you wretched worthless bitch!!!!"

Basil tugged on Ember's skirt as he collapsed to his knees. When Basil pointed to the forest, Ember immediately took off in a desperate search for Iris. Basil barely pushed himself back up to his knees as he made his way back to their home. Basil didn't want Iris to see him like this and was desperate to clean his wounds and treat them to he would look better than he actually was.

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