Well, staring down was relative, because the beast’s ears came up to his chest and the lithe but solid body still reached hip height. Silver fur glinted in the moonlight, its six red eyes on a long snout unblinking as it stared back, and Kizros forgot everything he was supposed to do when faced with one of these beasts.
It wasn’t the claws—dull—or the teeth—only sharp enough to do damage if it had hours to gnaw on your skin—that he had to worry about with this creature.
It was the fluffy tail. Whip-fast, ignitable fluffy tail. Fire-so-hot-it-sliced fluffy tail.
And it was currently in Ragnar’s living room.
Kizros watched the atteapir’s tail sweep lazily behind it, no flickers of flame yet. With neither of them reacting, he at least managed to breathe out a silent sigh of relief that this was only a kit. Which he then remembered wasn’t actually a relief because the youngest didn’t have control over their fire.
“Hey!” came a voice deeper inside the home, and Kizros wasn’t sure how much more relief and panic swings his heart could take now that he knew Ragnar wasn’t dead by atteapir fire. “Sit.”
Kizros bent his knees.
“Not you, Kizros,” Ragnar huffed, half-leaned out of the kitchen.
Kizros watched as the atteapir lowered its hind legs,curling its tail at a calm pace until it was sitting patiently at his feet.
“Wow,” he hummed, chuckling as the creature blinked all six of its eyes at different intervals. “You really are the best tamer if you got an atteapir to follow directions before it’s fully grown.”
“She’ll remain that size.”
Kizros choked on a breath, wondering how the typically six-foot-tall beast could be… at best four feet tall and full grown.
“I brought her up to meet you,” Ragnar continued, waving Kizros toward the kitchen. “Since you’re taking her home.”
There weremanyarguments on Kizros’s tongue about taking a living flame into his home of very flammable plants who would not appreciate being turned into crisps, but he also trusted his friend.
Maybe slightly less now.
He kept an eye on the atteapir as he stepped into the house, closing the door behind him. On his way past the couch, he scratched Moar behind the ears, the human-world dog wagging its tail but respecting Kizros’s preference for not being tackled.
Kizros sat at one of the table’s two chairs, watching Ragnar at the stovetop as he fiddled with the teakettle. The gray demon’s linen shirt was slightly wrinkled, untucked at the belt, but even under the loose fabric, Kiz could tell his friend was tense. Well, tenser than normal. His movements were less smooth—not clumsy, per se, butdisjointed as if he kept forgetting what he was doing. And his thick tail kept throwing him off balance, swinging one way when Ragnar attempted to go the other.
The atteapir joined him, sitting by the counter watching the room instead of either of them and occasionally flicking her ear against Ragnar when he got too close.
“You’re quiet,” Ragnar called over his shoulder. “Is, uh, is something going on between you and your human?”
“What? No, everything’s fine,” Kizros blurted, leaning back in an attempt to appear casual. “Why would something be going on?”
The atteapir made a little chirrup noise then huffed through her nose.
“Shush,” Kizros said to the beast.
“She senses your distress,” Ragnar pointed out.
Kizros wanted to point out that the atteapir had chosen to sit next to Ragnar, not him, but he also didn’t want to lose the open invite to visit his friend. He was pretty sure he was the only one allowed in Ragnar’s home besides the animals.
“I’m not distressed,” Kizros argued, ignoring the atteapir’s second huff. But then Ragnar turned with the tea tray, unamused, and Kizros groaned. He slumped, pressing his forehead into the table as he muttered, “I’m a horrible demon.”
Ragnar didn’t say anything, only set the tray on the table away from Kizros’s horns and pulled out his own chair. This time, when the atteapir joined them, she wiggled her gianthead and ears between the table and into Kiz’s lap, nuzzling as deep as she could.
“I’m the worst, Ragnar,” Kizros mumbled into the table. “I took advantage of the human program, and now I’m suffering the consequences of my actions. Why in the blazes did I say yes to taking one back with me?”
There was a shuffling from Ragnar’s side of the table before he said, “I was under the impression things were going well with the human.”
“They are.”
Another shuffle. “But you regret taking one in.”
