The rats flinch with each loud noise, wincing, and while they’d usually inspect closer, they just don’t want to get close to him for some reason. It isn’t fear. More disgust… But even with their obvious desire to trample him into the stone, they turn to guide him, surrounded. The one in front is not a doe, but a eunuch sentinel, there are three of them, two does, one of which is pregnant in the early stages and the other with newly weaned pups, with the same physique and feature types. The big one watching Ikit from behind is the only intact male. Some sneeze, paw at their ears in relief of the noise being over, or shake out the tension. That thing he was riding was a nightmare, their ears are incredibly sensitive. Sensitive enough to navigate with echolocation. They’ll navigate in the pitch black of the caves by the clipping of their claws reverberating off the walls, and breeze on their whiskers… It’s a mostly flat path, at least, worn by years of use under these beheamoths, but it gets straighter and smoother as they approach the city and it’s smells. And light. Dim lanterns and luminescent mushrooms used as landscaping. The rats colors are more visible than in the green, the does are a blonde dappled rat and a liver chestnut, the geldings are russet brown with white socks and blazes, the stallion is similar with a darker, glossier coat, three white socks, and a mostly white face.
The gates, two stone doors a foot thick, two stories tall, are open. Guarded by saddled sentinels, but no bridles or head gear, with riders seven feet in height, armed to the teeth… They paw the stone and blow through their noses, ears pinning, the mounted rats grip their weapons tighter. The unsaddled pack stops and waits, as a gelding barks as his rider remains silent. “What is the meaning of this, Rustgore? To bring this infected thing to our gates? Alive?”
Rustgore, the stallion, does not like to be talked down on or questioned by a buck unworthy to keep its balls, but he haughtily dignifies him with an answer. “He has business concerning the monarch, pup, and with my supervision, he poses no threat… You would do well to watch your tongue with a stallion.” He ends with a cheeky grin, full of massive teeth.
The gelding clicks his, tossing his head with pinned ears. “And you would do well to watch your tongue with a rat of rank.” Ooh Rust didn’t like that. His smile curls down and nose curls back, tail lashes once, but he does in fact think before he speaks. “You know his highness would be displeased to not have had an audience…”
“This I know, so I will take him”
“You will not!” The stallion snaps, hackles raising. Both guards step forward, growling low in their throats. “It is within our jurisdiction, the open stone, pest control, and petty herding is yours.” Now Rust moves around Ikit, shouldering one of his own geldings out of the way.
