Sorin's lips twisted into a frown as the girl proved to be pretty much useless. Damn. Oh well, they would just travel to that city, anyway, and if it wasn't the correct one, eh, it might not even matter if they had luck there first. Their mark was in Arca, but if they struck gold elsewhere first, even if it was a smaller bounty, well, beggars certainly could not be choosers.
"I see. Well, that's not a problem, thank you," Sorin murmured, then shrugged away his disappointment and looked her over more closely. So she was useless information-wise, she didn't look like a mage and was thus useless there, but as he focused more on her, looks-wise she wasn't half bad at all and he was sure he could find some uses for her as far as other things went. And she appeared to be alone and rather dim-witted. What else were dim-witted women good for?
He sighed and walked past Sharlee to stand closer to the fire, turning his back to it so he could watch the other two and warm up. He rubbed his gloved hands together, trying to work out the iciness. If he didn't have the gryphon with him, this whole encounter could have been at least a little more productive and a good deal warmer.
"You wouldn't mind a little extra company tonight, would you?" Sorin started, bitterly acknowledging that he meant that in a completely clean way, but that was when Sharlee swooped down on Cadmus.
Sorin bit back a laugh as Sharlee fawned over the gryphon, whose eyes had narrowed and whose feathers had fluffed up at being talked to like...like, well, a pet. Cadmus endured it, though, and sat there stiffly as Sharlee petted him and cooed and called him squishy. Squishy? What the hell? His golden eyes darted to Sorin, who was smirking, and then he sighed, laid his ears back, and resigned himself to his fate. The chest scratches weren't bad, though, and when a purr rumbled in his throat, it wasn't exactly forced.
As Sharlee went on about some 'Doeshe' thing, Sorin and Cadmus exchanged glances. It sounded like she was talking about a dog, but that line about him being hungry...
That was when something crashed through the undergrowth, and a massive white creature burst into the clearing--with a body in its mouth! Cadmus screeched and jumped to his feet, fur and feathers bristling, and let out a sharp hiss as he backed away from it slowly. Sorin just stared, brown eyes wide and mouth dropping open.
That...was not a dog.
The girl was talking to it like it was a dog.
It dropped the body, which was still alive, and then it was stalking toward Cadmus. Cadmus hissed again and scrambled backwards, wings snapping open and spreading wide as he prepared to launch himself into the air, but the dragon was quicker. It was on him before he could even attempt a take-off, tongue lapping up the side of his head and sending all his carefully groomed feathers and fur into disarray. Cadmus snarled and would have lashed out with his talons if Sharlee hadn't chosen that moment to step in between them and shove Doeshe's head away.
...Don't eat him...?
Oh gods.
Cadmus, the fur and feathers on one side of his head spiked upwards with dragon slobber, growled at the dragon one last time before before he trotted over to where Sorin was, tail twitching anxiously. "Let's go, Sorin," he hissed under his breath while Sharlee was distracted with the body-that-was-still-alive. Dragon. A bloody dragon! Cadmus prided himself on his bravery, but dragons were just one creature he knew better than to mess with. One had nearly killed him; in fact, it thought it had and had left him for dead, bleeding from a throat wound that would have been fatal if it had been just a few more centimeters to the right. Luckily that dragon hadn't decided to eat him. Thank goodness feathers were too annoying to deal with.
Sorin ignored him, though. He'd caught something Sharlee had said, something Cadmus, in his distraction, hadn't.
Healing magic.
He shook his head and reached out to stroke Cadmus' mane, and as he pulled his hand away he flashed the gryphon a discreet hand signal, the sign for 'mage'. Cadmus clamped his beak shut. "Aww, looks like your 'puppy' has spooked my pet here," Sorin called to Sharlee, and he ruffled the feathers on Cadmus' head again. "Anyway, I'm Sorin, Sharlee. Ah...is that guy okay? Noodles?"
What a strange name.