Love Thine Enemy

Justice

I had only been in my cage for two days before Pasos and Milgor came back down to fetch me. As always, they warned me to be good, and I chose to listen. I wasn't starving yet, the meat from the last fight not quite worn off. I had no reason to eat either giant at that moment.

I was led to a door I had never seen before. It was wooden, not silver, and had a handle instead of levers to open it. Pasos knocked three times and the door opened from the inside to show a small girl in a dirty white dress. Her eyes grew wide with horror when she saw me, screaming as she backed up.

"Tessa! Shut up, girl, hush! Understand me? Hush!" Pasos scowled.

"B-but that's The Hood!" she whimpered, clambering atop the large wooden counter in the middle of what looked like a kitchen, though I couldn't be sure. I was too focused on the small girl. She looked tender. She looked fresh. She looked tasty.

"We know, you stupid girl," Milgor growled, yanking her off the table by her hair. "She's here on official request, and you'd do good to keep your mouth shut about this. You ain't even supposed to be down here!"

"Y-yes, sir!" she yelped, wincing in his grasp. I couldn't help but growl a little under my breath at the sound of her weakness. She needed to be eaten.

A swift kick in the side from Pasos cut off my slow prowl toward the little girl, who then screamed one last time before running up a flight of stairs in the corner. My animal instincts urged me to give chase, but Milgor commanded me to follow them.

We stopped outside another wooden door, this one much larger, and Pasos paused to look down at me with a serious face. "You are here on request by our King. We have captured a traitor to our people, and you will serve justice on the Volken king's behalf. If you so much as sniff the wrong patch of air, I will lock you up so fast you won't have time to whimper, and you'll stay there until you rot away. Got it?"

I growled at him low in my throat but sat on my haunches, our personal sign that I understood what he wanted from me. He nodded once at me and opened the doors, stepping to the side to let Milgor lead me into the room.

It turned out to be a meeting hall of some sort with chairs lining the walls and an open floor space in the middle. Kneeling on the dark gray stone was a giant of lesser stature than the guards I was used to. He was thinner, more pale in the face, and he was bleeding from several open wounds. The smell of his blood caused saliva to pool in my mouth.

A few shocked gasps went around the room once I was noticed, and the sounds caused the man in the floor to lift his bleeding head. His eyes widened in something I recognized as terror once his sights were upon me. My inner devil grinned in delight and reveled in the aroma of his fear. It was what I lived for.

"Ronan," a very large giant boomed from the biggest, plushest chair at the head of the room, "today you have been accused, tried, and found guilty by the Book of Volken. Your crime is treason of the highest sense, and a dishonorable death is the punishment for such offenses. Do you have anything to say to this sentence?"

Ronan lifted brown eyes to mine, startling me a small bit with the sadness in them, before he hung his head with a shake. "No, my lord."

"Very well," the King continued solemnly, "you will be executed by a dog of the pits, most dishonorable, in front of my assigned court. Your body will be fed as scraps to our prisoners, and your family will be stripped of their status in the Volken
Royalty. Do you understand?"

Ronan nodded. My stomach growled. Pasos looked down at me with a devilish smirk.

"Are you prepared to accept this sentence?"

"Yes," Ronan whispered, his frame trembling visibly before the eyes of Volken nobility. "I accept this. I only beg of you this one thing."

The king paused in waving Pasos and Wilgor forward and raised a brow. "And that would be?"

"My wife," he choked out, making my gums itch to be tooth deep in his throat, "she is with child."

Murmurs went up around the room again. Apparently a child was a big deal. Did they taste good?

"I beg of you, any of you, to take the child in. We have no other heirs, and my wife is sickly. She is sure to die in labor. Please, someone take the child," he begged quietly, a tear running down his cheek.

"This is absurd!" A man across the room yelled, face red. "He has betrayed us all, and we sit hear listening to his requests for favors?! I think not!"

"Agreed!" yelled another, "let the bloodline die out!"

Angry protests drowned out my growls as I lost my patience and, amongst the chaos, set my sights on my prize and pounced on him as if he were a rodent, my play thing. His bicep proved to be very juicy and tender as I clamped down and viciously shook my head back and forth until the shoulder rolled out of socket and allowed the flesh to be torn. I took the arm from the man and nestled down beside my screaming victim to indulge in my appetizer.

The room had grown almost still since everyone stopped to behold my actions.

"Please!" Ronan screamed, "please, end it! Please!" He clutched his bloody stump with a pale and sweaty face.

All eyes turned to the King for direction, but his hardened gaze stayed on Ronan as he writhed about. Tense silence made the men furrow their brows, but I was only aware of the fact that most of the meat had been cleaned off the arm and my belly wasn't quite done eating yet. I spit the bone back out and licked my chops, turning my gaze to this Ronan fellow again. His brown eyes pleaded quietly with me to attack again, end his misery, but I paused and turned my head sideways at him. Why someone would be so eager to die, I did not understand. Perhaps he was too weak to go on. The thought angered me, to see someone so pitiful.

"Hood."

My ears perked at being addressed directly by the king. I couldn't keep my tail from wagging just slightly, making Pasos roll his eyes from his corner. I had never been spoken to by anyone but the guards since I came here.

"If you don't mind," he sighed sarcastically, "would you go ahead and finish the execution?"

I did not have to be told twice. I walked up to Ronan until my nose almost touched his chin, and I growled low in my chest until it rumbled into my toes and ears. He trembled a small bit and slowly turned his head to the side, baring his tender neck meat to my bloody fangs. I opened my mouth wide and clamped my teeth around his throat but did not bite down. I could feel his pulse on my tongue, the way his breathing accelerated under my power. It was thrilling to be able to smell such thick fear off my prey.

I let him gulp one last time before I closed my jaws in a clean chop, his head dislocating from the shoulders and rolling until it came to a stop at the king's feet. I looked up at him, eyes blazing and muzzle dripping with blood, and was satisfied to see him nod his head at me in approval.

"Guards," he murmured, eyes fixated on the head before him, "take Hood back to her cell."

Pasos snapped his fingers to gain my attention, nodding for me to head back out the door. I did not want to go, but the consequences didn't seem worth it. I let my tail drop to the ground in annoyance as I sauntered over to Milgor at the waiting open door.

"Oh, and," said the king, "take this body with you. She earned a decent meal."

My ears perked and my tail wagged slightly as Pasos fought the disdain that wanted to take over his expression while he grabbed the legs of Ronan and dragged him away with us.

"I don't get paid enough for this," he murmured to Milgor as the door shut behind us and we headed back to my cell. They both watched in disgusted amusement as I steadily licked up the trail of blood that was left in the wake of the headless body, but they said nothing.

Upon our return, they threw the carcass into my cage and I willingly followed, unconcerned by the click of the key in the lock this time.

I had a man to eat.