Chapter Text
Of all the things Irida expected when she responded to Warden Gaeric’s frantic summons, it certainly wasn’t this. Still, she walks confidently forward and the crowd parts before their young leader. She stops a safe distance away, and regards the thing that has caused such a stir.
It must be a Zoroark. It has to be.
But it’s the strangest Zoroark she’s ever seen. It sways slightly where it stands, and blood slowly drips off its chin and the fingers of its right hand. It wears a human disguise, but a very strange one. Too tall, the eyes unnaturally pale and slightly glowing. It wears a long black and red coat in a style Irida has never seen. There’s a tear in the right sleeve and she assumes a wound in the flesh below is the source of the dripping blood.
Why is it here? Does it think if it comes to them looking like an injured human, they’ll let it in? Maybe that would work, she thinks with a shiver, if it managed to be a little more convincing. But it’s not even trying to act like a human. It sways again and stumbles forward a step. Warden Gaeric and a few others step towards it, ready for a fight, but it regains its balance after a moment. It stares at Irida, but the silver eyes seem to look right through her.
She draws herself up straight and addresses the Zoroark. “We will not allow you into the settlement. We don’t wish for a fight, either. Please leave.”
It slowly blinks, but its eyes don’t focus. It makes a noise that might be an attempt to speak, but comes out as a cracked, broken sound. It really isn’t very good at pretending to be human.
The Zoroark doesn’t move, except to continue swaying. Irida takes a step forward and draws her knife. “Leave, Zoroark. Or we will make you leave by force.”
At the sight of the weapon, the unfocused silver eyes widen and it stumbles back a step. Emboldened, Irida takes another step forward. The creature is breathing heavily, and still wearing its human disguise it manages to look afraid. She knows it’s a trick.
But it backs up another step. And another. Irida stops advancing and the creature continues its retreat slowly. It seems unwilling to move very fast. She keeps watching as it turns away and begins to trudge through the snow, back into the icy wastelands.
Once it’s finally out of sight, she releases a breath of relief. Most of the others have already gone back into the settlement, back to their usual routines, but Warden Gaeric has stayed with her while she watched the monster.
He smiles and pats her on the shoulder. “You did well, Lady Irida.”
She smiles back. “Thank you, Warden Gaeric. That was… very strange.”
As she turns to head back into the settlement, her eye catches on something. She moves forward and kneels to look at the small patch of red in the snow.
“What is it, Lady Irida?”
Her brow furrows as she touches the now frozen pool of blood. “I thought it was part of the illusion. But it looks as though that Zoroark was actually injured.”
She looks up at Gaeric and sees an alarmed look on her mentor’s face.
“Why would it come here if it was injured?” She asks.
He shakes his head slowly. “I don’t know.”
______
Something is wrong. Lady Sneasler doesn’t know what, exactly. But something. She can feel it as a growing sense of unease. She’s already checked the south side of the mountain and found nothing. Now, she’s moving toward the northern side. It’s colder up here, but she’s more than capable of handling it.
She stops suddenly and sniffs the air. She can smell blood. She follows the smell down off the mountain and into the Icelands themselves. In a small stand of trees she finds the source. It’s a human. Not one she’s ever seen before, but definitely a human.
It’s on the ground and at first she thinks it’s dead. But it raises its head to stare blankly at her. It has blood all over its face and one arm seems to be badly damaged. It tries to push itself up with its other arm, and Lady Sneasler hurries to its side to help.
Surprisingly, this doesn’t cause it to panic. Instead, it seems grateful for the help and leans against her once it's standing. Lady Sneasler looks in the direction of the Pearl Clan settlement and pulls the human that way.
But it pulls back, making a panicked noise. When it backs away from her, it isn’t able to keep itself standing and falls back into the snow. It stares at the distant rising smoke with fearful eyes.
It’s afraid of other humans? Why?
It doesn’t matter right now. If she can’t take it to the other humans, what is she supposed to do with it?
She considers the human for a long time, and it watches her right back. There’s no fear in its eyes when it looks at her. Only when it looks towards the other humans. Fine. She’s not going to let it die here, so she might as well take care of it. She steps forward and slowly, gently, wraps her long claws around its body, lifting it off the ground.
The human seems oddly unconcerned about this and when she turns away from the settlement it breathes a sigh of relief. What a strange human.
She carries it back to the other side of the mountain and all the way back to her den. Getting up the cliffs proves difficult since the human doesn’t have the strength to cling to her for very long, but they manage it. Once inside, she lays it on the soft bedding of her nest and shoves some berries towards it.
She’s not sure exactly what to do about the wounds. She knows that humans don’t heal quickly like Pokémon do. But how to actually care for the injuries, especially given the limitations of her claws, escapes her.
The human, for its part, seems to be happy about the food, and already moving a little easier in the warmth of her den. It seems to be looking for something, and making a painful sound. She thinks about what else it could need. It’s warm, it has food and-
Water. She picks the human up again and carries it to the back of the cave, where a small, frigid stream of water runs down the rocks and gathers into a pool. The water flows out the other end of the pool through a crack in the rock.
The human doesn’t hesitate to stick its hands into the water, though it hisses at the cold. Red blooms out from its right hand, but it ignores this and cups water in its hands to drink. Only after it has satisfied its thirst does it pay attention to the blood flowing slowly downstream.
After a moment of staring, it strips off its odd coat and sticks its entire right arm into the pool. Once again, it hisses at the cold, and the pool quickly fills with red. But when it pulls its arm out, it’s much cleaner and Lady Sneasler can actually see the injury to its forearm. It’s deep and looks painful, but it's not as bad as she feared. It’s still bleeding, though, which is a problem.
The human sighs and takes the hat off its head, revealing short gray hair underneath. Well, gray on the left side. The right side is stained red from the sluggishly bleeding wound that spans across it. She thinks the human is going to dunk its whole head in like it did with its arm, but instead it leans over and splashes water over the area. The pool, which had been slowly draining of blood, is once again dyed red.
After just a few minutes, the human is much cleaner. It takes the odd blue ribbon from around its neck and winds it snugly around the injury on its arm. Even as little as she knows about wound care, she understands that. The pressure will slow the bleeding. The head injury seems to vex it a little more and it appears to give up after a few moments.
The human looks back at Lady Sneasler with its strange eyes and tries to stand. Its legs collapse immediately and she catches it. She helps it make its way back to the nest area and curl up in the soft bedding. It folds its coat into a small parcel and lays its wounded head against it, holding pressure on the wound.
Clever. She’s genuinely surprised.
Once settled, the human falls asleep immediately. She studies it for a few minutes. It’s the strangest human she’s ever seen. It wears clothes that are completely unfamiliar to her, and even seems to be shaped differently. Taller than any human she’s met. An Alpha perhaps? Its eyes do seem to glow slightly, although not red.
It isn’t afraid of her. Not at all. Even the people of the Pearl Clan often sway easily from reverence to fear. But this new human seems totally at ease with her. Perhaps because it’s wounded? But then, usually wounded humans are even more afraid.
She lays down and watches the human’s deep breathing. She wishes that it would have let her take it to the other humans. They would know how to take care of it. But it’s too late for that. For now, she just hopes that it doesn’t die.
______
A week after the strange Zoroark tried to enter the settlement, Irida makes her way to the Highlands. She’s still on edge from the encounter, but there had been no further sightings of the creature.
She hopes that a visit to the Lady of the Highlands will help calm her nerves. She visits the Noble as often as she is able, since she has no Warden to care for her. Her lack of a Warden is by choice, but Irida still worries.
When she reaches Lady Sneasler’s den in the Highlands, Irida calls out to the Noble with her flute, then waits patiently for her to arrive. And waits. And waits. She’s starting to get very concerned when she finally hears the Noble’s call from the cliffs above.
Lady Sneasler descends the sheer cliff with ease and rushes toward Irida. She tries not to flinch back from the excited Pokémon, but doesn’t entirely succeed. Lady Sneasler covers her mouth with a clawed paw and laughs.
Irida bows. “My Lady, it’s good to see you well. I was beginning to get worried you weren’t going to come. Were you in the middle of something?”
The Pokémon responds with a noise that Irida doesn’t bother trying to make sense of. She’s only making conversation for lack of anything better to do. She really doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do with the Pokémon and not for the first time, she wishes that she would take a Warden.
She chats with Lady Sneasler for a few more minutes, but even as bad as she is at understanding Pokémon, she can tell that the Noble is restless. “Do you… have something else you need to be doing?” Lady Sneasler whines in response. She has no idea what that means. “If there’s something important, don’t hold yourself back on my account. We can catch up again later.”
Lady Sneasler stares at her for a few seconds, then turns and launches herself back up the cliff face. Apparently there is something else. It seems there’s no end to the strangeness lately.