Ribbon.

"The least you could do," Kel'luknar muttered, taking the bowl of cold gruel that was proffered through the door of the cage, "Is serve our dinners warm."
Their young half-Sand caretaker smiled at them, revealing bright, sharp teeth, and then laughed heartily.
"Human grumpy!" he said to Sodre, expecting him to be in on the joke.
Sodre gave a half-smile and glanced nervously at Kel'luknar. The wolfe was grumpy, and had been getting more so steadily throughout the day. They hadn't talked about it, and Sodre hadn't tried to tease Lucky out of it. It was the heat. There was nothing to be done.

What the Layer had tried to do was speak with their captors, and he had achieved a marginal degree of success. He had learned, for example, that their main caretaker's name was Lucca, that their secondary caretaker was Iwwi, and that the two had come from the same place - somewhere in the South. In fact, it appeared that all of the half-Sand had come from the same place, and they all seemed to know each other well. Looking up across the caravan courtyard, Sodre caught sight of two of them bathing each other. Yes, they seemed to know each other extremely well.

The little layer had also learned that they were all headed west somewhere, which worried him deeply. There was Lout territory to the west.

Lucca reappeared with a second bowl and pushed it through the bars to Sodre, who took it with a nod of thanks. He ate quietly, casting glances over at Lucky but trying not to draw his attention. Lucca lingered by the bars after he had finished, ostensibly waiting for the recalcitrant wolfe to return his bowl. It was more likely, however, that he was waiting for the evening conversation. Lucca and Sodre had made something of a habit of it, over these past three days - the food came, the prisoners ate, and then Sodre pretended to linger over his bowl long enough to ask Lucca more questions. Tonight was no different.
"So who was it who sent you again?" Sodre tried innocently. Lucca grunted and looked over his shoulder towards the group.
"Papas."
"Papas?"
Lucca hesitated and glanced away again, then looked back at Sodre.
"Sand Papas."
Comprehension dawned.
"Ah. Your Sand fathers sent you?" he frowned. "Away? By yourselves? Why?"
Lucca straightened up a little, proudly.
"Mission. Find wolfe here, take to Lout leaders." he smiled a self-satisfied little smile, then added, meaningfully, "Very important."

The sound of an empty metal bowl being slammed against iron bars scared both of them; Sodre leapt back into the cage, and Lucca leapt away and pulled his weapon. Kel'luknar, looking broody, glared at the half-Sand.
"I'm done." he snapped, then turned his back on the two of them.
Sodre swallowed and tried to calm his racing heart. Lucky's discomfort was becoming palpable, and his behavior was becoming more violent. Sodre bit his lip. It didn't look as if they would be getting out of here anytime soon, which meant that other alternatives would have to be explored. There was only one thing to be done for the heat, and it would have to be done soon.

++++

It was when they were out on their nighttime bathing and relief break that Sodre started to begin to put things together. Iwwi and Lucca had separated them, so that Sodre had gone off with Lucca and Kel'luknar with Iwwi. When they were alone, Lucca spoke, prodding the Layer gently in the shoulder.
"So-roo quiet. No more questions?"
Sodre furrowed his brow and glanced over his shoulder.
"Not yet. Just thinking, Lucca."
The half-Sand nodded and continued to march them towards the water, the small torch he carried lighting a path in front of them. In the flicker of the lamp, Lucca looked contemplative.
"Thinking of home?" he asked, gently.
Sodre's throat tightened briefly, and he nodded.
"Yes. Thinking of home."
Lucca furrowed his brow.
"Lucca too." he said, quietly. "Thinking of mother."
Sodre felt a pang in his heart, and he remembered again how young the caravan all looked - were they anything more than children? Why would anyone send them so far from home? And on a mission, of all things?

"But!" Lucca said suddenly, brightening considerably, "We get to Lout leader and give gift - Papas happy. Louts happy. We go home to unit, mothers, food."
Sodre nodded, trying to be cheerful even though the whole scenario Lucca had described hinged on his being handed over to the #1 enemy of the Wolfes. But even as he feigned a benign disinterest in that part of the story, another part struck him as seeming awfully...curious.
"But why," Sodre asked again, "Did they send you? Why not Sand soldiers for this mission?"
Lucca hesitated, then picked a splinter nervously off of the torch.
"Don't know. Papas say only we can go to Lout man. No one else allowed." Lucca paused again, then added quietly, as if reassuring himself, "Very important."

++

It was the bathing that did it.
Well, not the bathing exactly - it was the bathtime conversation that did it.
As usual, Sodre and Lucca undressed by the water's edge and went in together, Lucca careful to keep his weapon close and an eye on his captive. They tucked the torch into the bend of a tree, and Sodre bathed just out of reach of its light, sheltering himself somewhat in the shadows and giving Lucca a bit of privacy as well. Somewhere off in the woods, Sodre heard Kel'luknar's growl and worried about it. With the wolfe getting as deep into the heat as Lucky was, perhaps it wasn't safe to leave him alone anymore.
The Layer turned to the half-Sand in the water.
"So there's going to be something happening," he began, uncertain how to explain the heat to a naïve, without frightening him or spilling Lucky's secret, "With Lucky and I."
The half-Sand listened attentively, clearly curious.
"What happening?"
Sodre sighed.
"I'm going into heat." he answered, then added, deciding to leave out the details, "Human and I have to mate...soon."
Lucca stared at Sodre for a long moment.
"You...mate him?"
Sodre wrinkled his nose and made a rather vulgar, but edifying hand gesture. To his surprise, Lucca gasped and stepped backwards.
"Him mate you?!"
Sodre nodded and shrugged, uncertain why that should elicit such shock. Lucca stared at Sodre for another minute, then smiled shyly.
"You like us." he said, quietly. Sodre couldn't quite puzzle the meaning of that one out, until Lucca suddenly stepped forward, out of the shadows and into the torchlight. "Us get mated, too."

As it turned out, half-Sand were full-breeders. Lucca stood still in the torchlight for a minute, revealing his naked androgyny to Sodre, then backed up and shyly covered himself with his hand.
Sodre wasn't sure what to say.
"All Sand are like this?" he managed eventually. "All Sand get mated?"
Lucca shook his head furiously.
"All half-Sand." he corrected.
"To who?? To Sand?" Sodre demanded.
If it were true, it would make sense - how else had their people been able to sustain their numbers so evenly for so long?
Lucca turned red.
"No! Never Sand!" he nearly shouted at Sodre, who recoiled.
"OK. OK. Sorry?" the Layer raised his hands in placation, unsure what his error had been.
Lucca shook his head and looked embarrassed at his outburst.
"Sand no need to mate." he clarified. "Sand..." he struggled to find the word for a moment. "...permanent."
Sodre swept right past the immortality issue to ask the more pressing question in his mind.
"So then how did they make you? Why did they make you??"
Lucca looked uncomfortable again; he wrung out the bathing cloth he'd carried with him, then soaked it again and ran it over one arm.
"We made with human mothers." Lucca's voice lowered, and he seemed disheartened by his own answer. "We...experiment."
Empathy plucked at Sodre's heartstrings. To know that the only place one occupied in the world was that of a tenuous and fleeting interest...an experiment...it was heartbreaking.
"So who raised you?" he asked, wanting to hear an answer that would ease his mind. "Your mothers?"
Lucca shook his head.
"Mothers dirty. Mothers human. Cannot live with dirty humans." Lucca sighed, sadly, and wrung the wet cloth out again. "See mothers sometimes." he hesitated, then added, "Not enough."

There was nothing to be said for a moment; there was only the quiet dripping sound of Lucca playing with the wet cloth in his hands. Suddenly, he shook his head and looked back up at Sodre.
"Time go back." he said, wrung out the cloth, and turned to reach for the torch. Sodre agreed; the cold water and the night air were beginning to chill him anyway. Silently, the Layer and the half-Sand both dressed, gathered their things, and went back the way they came.

+++

Left alone again in the cage, Sodre wanted to relate to Kel'luknar everything he'd just learned, but Lucky was in an even more agitated state than usual and Sodre just tried to keep quiet and out of his way. By the time the last fires were extinguished in the encampment for the night, both the Layer and the wolfe found themselves inexplicably fatigued, and so bedded down (with much grumbling from Kel'luknar) and fell quickly asleep.

It was still dark when Sodre's eyes opened. He twitched an ear, aurally exploring his surroundings. Something had woken him - what? A shift in weight, then, and a hand lying heavy across his belly startled him and made him gasp. Lucky growled a strange, anxious growl and tightened his grip to hold the Layer still. Sodre stilled immediately and tilted his neck, presenting no challenge.
"Now?" he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer, wanting to put a hand to his star and check himself but knowing that he shouldn't move. Lucky's answer came fast and sure, and Sodre's stomach flipped with the actual hearing of it.
"Yes." the wolfe mumbled, his voice rough and muffled where muzzle was pressed to the Layer's skin. "Now."

+++++