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Man’s Best Fiend
By Ithyphallophobiate

	An unassuming day in the castle, Spitz woke up just like any other morning in the luxurious quarters he was given: hanging off the side of his large, too-comfortable bed, naked under the covers, his head on the floor and his blankets halfway off the bed. Yawning and wiping a bubble of drool off his chin, he lets out a deep sigh.  Getting to his feet and stretching, hearing his spine crackle as he tries to fix his posture. He can already hear Abby’s voice in his head, reminding him not to slouch in front of members of the court, telling him that holding his head low could lead to back problems later in life…not that other Gnolls ever lived long enough for those to manifest, but he was feeling lucky, so he might as well hedge his bets. Smacking his lips and getting dressed, before waiting for the morning delivery of breakfast, the dainty tea and pastries of which he’d quite rapidly swapped out for salted meat rations from that barracks (which he found more appealing), and some Barley Malt Beer, a drink he’d come to favor due to how it reminds him very much of his old home, and his time as a pup chewing on the seedy tops of the tall grass around the outskirts of camp. 
What came first, however, was instead the knock of much smaller knuckles on the outside of the door. 
*knock knock*....*knock knock*...*knock knock*..
Spitz smiled, he knew exactly who was at the door by the knock, though it was nowhere near their riding session. They’d reserved that knock for times they were alone, so what could she want at this hour…
Spitz opened the door, looking down at the small, cute cute that was his charge standing there…with a letter in sealed, blood red wax. A strange, straight-lipped smile on Abby’s face he’d never seen before. His smile fell immediately as he realized this might be more serious than he thought, and from the symbol on the seal of the letter, he knew exactly why. 
Abby walked into the room and Spitz poked his head out to look down the hall. No servants in sight, no errant shadows, they were alone. Satisfied with this, he locked the door, turning back to the strangely quiet girl on his bed, another sign something was amiss.
“...I’m assuming this isn’t a conjugal visit, Warden.” he jokes, trying to lighten the mood as he sits down next to her, reaching over to take the letter out of her hand. 
“So, what’s all this about, huh? Don’t tell me…” he says, tapping his chin a little in faux thought, watching as a smile starts to curl at the edges of Abby’s mouth, despite her better efforts to stay morose under the circumstances. “...well, judging by your expression, either you’re getting married, or it’s my letter of execution.” He jokes, looking to her and putting an arm around her shoulder to pull her close. “Either way, I guess someone’s dying, huh?” He says, looking down at her as she turns away so he can’t see her smile.
She hands him the letter after a minute, finally giving a little chuckle. “Actually it’s for you, tough guy…from the Queen.” 
“My mother…” 
Spitz heard the unspoken words hang in the air between them as he took the letter, looking at the wax seal with strange curiosity. He’d always known something like this was coming, ever since he’d gotten off the carriage with Abby back at the castle. Admittedly, he had a foggy memory of her parents. The rest of that fateful day was mostly filled with showing his various pieces of paperwork Abby gave him to official after official, at best getting a nervous sideways glance, at worse, a weapon pointed at his throat. However, he did remember the Queen a bit better than the king beside her, neither of them were the tallest people in the courtyard that day, but she certainly exuded a presence that made her unmistakable even in a crowd. Furrowing his brow, he slid a claw across the top of the letter to open it, both of them waiting on bated breath. It wasn’t magically rigged to explode, the first good sign, and as he unfolded the letter and started to read, Spitz’s expression flattened out. Relaxing a bit, but more confused now than anything else. 

“What does it say?” Abby asked, grabbing the letter after Spitz and reading through it herself. Relaxing a bit in turn, but just as confused as he was. “What’s a…Wahrg?” She asked, handing it back to the big gnoll beside her, who simply folded it up and put it back in the envelope. No doubt he’d have to show that to another eight people anyways. “It’s pronounced ‘Worg’, and they’re like horses for Gnolls…well, like vicious horses with giant claws and teeth that can cut through chainmail.” He explained, standing up and dusting off the wrinkles in his pants as he’d seen so many stuffy nobles do before. “Seems her army captured a young one, they want to see if they can be domesticated for standard use.” He explained, Abby getting up after him and walking with him out to the courtyard. 
Apparently, or so the letter said, the Warg would be coming in tranquilized around noon. It was already late morning, the sun rising up over the town on a nice, lightly cloudy day, the sun shining through the blue gaps in the sparse clouds above. Abby had to leave halfway through waiting outside with Spitz, greeting some royal douchebag from a far off land or something. She gave him a little parting kiss on the cheek, after checking that nobody was watching of course, and left him riding that feeling all the while until he heard the rumbling of heavy cart wheels along the pavement, and the feeling of Abby’s lips on his cheek faded as the day began in earnest…

It was a prison transport carriage, Spitz knew them well. A cage of corrugated steel with thick, heavy bars, left open to the public so those around could curse, spit, and throw things at the inmates inside. An additional bit of punishment before the prison cell, to further humiliate the unfortunate inhabitants. However, there were no inmates in this one…only a large, mangy canine lying on the floor on it’s side. Spitz grimaced, having forgotten in his time here the normal procedure for breaking Wargs, a procedure it looked like this one had only just started. Blood and serum scabbing around wide patches of shaved fur all across the animal, the pink skin below covered in bruises and wounds, the scars still fresh and scabbed over. Spitz was surprised, the Queen wasn’t kidding when she said they found a young one, wargs grow to maturity in a year like regular dogs. This one was still the size of a normal dog, barely a few weeks old. Spitz felt a painful tug as he watched the little thing, like a barbed hook had been sunk into the bottom of his heart. Barely a few weeks old, and it already had been beaten half to death, probably many times. He had to wonder how many of it’s injuries were from the guards and how many were from the horrible life it had been born into. Spitz took a deep breath, shaking his head and clearing those thoughts for the moment as the carriage wheeled up beside him, taking the papers and going through the bureaucracy of it all, signing over the warg to his care and everything. Though, during it Spitz took some grim pleasure in the fact that the guard in question had a new injury in the form of a few missing fingertips on his left hand. “Good, he’s not broken yet…” 

“...I can work with that.”

Spitz felt the sun beaming down on him from above, the nice, cloudless day leaving him sunkissed in the middle of the courtyard as he looked at the curious little thing, sitting cross-legged in front of it. It had been drugged for easier handling earlier, but by the account of the guards who’d done it it hadn’t been an easy task. The little thing had apparently bitten straight through a steel gauntlet to get to his captor’s finger as he was being fed the drugged meat, chipping a tooth in the process. Spitz had to give a little snicker as he remembered the guard’s angry face. Hand feeding a young warg was the height of stupidity, and many a young Gnoll had made the same mistake in their youth. 
The warg started to stir, and Spitz perked up. Standing up and stepping back a few steps before the little guy suddenly lunged out at him, not even opening his eyes first, tracking the gnoll purely by smell and hearing to try and get the drop on his would-be assailants. Of course, Spitz knew exactly how long that chain was, and the warg yelped as it hit the end of it. The collar around its neck suddenly yanking hard and choking him back, causing him to fall back to the ground. Of course, this didn’t stop the warg at all, leaping back at Spitz as he stood his ground, grinding the iron collar against his neck as he barked and snapped, rubbing the jagged iron against his skin as he lets instinct drive him, his short lifetime having taught him that life is kill or be killed..something Spitz hoped he could change. So, he sat down. Right at the end of the warg’s chain, the sharp teeth of the dog snapping only a few inches from his face, drool frothing at the canine’s mouth and flecking over Spitz’s body, though he doesn’t react. Simply sitting down and waiting, watching those scared, frenzied eyes with his own cool, collected ones, trying to convey through body language a lack of threat towards the canine, as well as the fact that he’s not afraid of the Warg, something that often conveys strength in the animal kingdom. It took more than a while, but eventually the canine calmed down, growling and padding back to the pole it was chained to, lying down and watching Spitz carefully as the sun slowly dipped below the 

Abby waved to the duke as she stepped backwards through the door, bowing politely a bit and closing the door, leaning on it and letting out a long-held breath. She’d forgotten how exhausting doing nothing but sitting and talking can be, especially when it’s mostly to nobles, dignitaries, and all the other posh, haughty people that come with life as a princess. She almost preferred dungeon crawls, at least then the monsters were outwardly evil instead of keeping their evil on the inside like people. Anyways, after heading to her room to swap into some more comfortable clothes and get out of that damn corset, she decided to check up on Spitz. He hadn’t sought her out all day, or even a servant to check on her, so she was starting to get worried. On the way to his room, she noticed something strange outside the window. Spitz was sitting there cross-legged and nearly motionless, staring at the Warg who was sitting across from him, similarly motionless. Both of them seemed calm, but even through the window she could feel the intensity of their situation. As she walked down to see him, she noticed two plates of uneaten food by the door to the courtyard. He hadn’t even eaten since she’d last seen him. 
Abby was definitely worried, but as she looked out the window, she recalled what she’d read on Wargs in her education when she was younger. There wasn’t much on their youth, but in adulthood they were formidable foes, almost more dangerous than their riders. A young one couldn’t be very dangerous, especially not for Spitz, but their ferocity…she couldn’t believe it was so calm…
	Abby furrowed her brow. She didn’t like leaving him alone in there with no food, but it seemed like that's what he was going for, and if Spitz was this sure about it, she wouldn’t walk in and ruin it. However, before she went off to do other things, she did set a servant to check on him every hour and report back to her. After all, he likes to do things his own way, but he can’t watch his own back. With that, she decided to hit up the library and relax a bit, taking one final look at her bodyguard as he sits there, stock still and staring at the canine. “Hope you know what you’re doing…”

As day turned to night, and the night started to drag on, Spitz saw the warg finally starting to waver. Still young, it’s stamina wasn’t nearly what Spitz’s was, and he could tell it was about to lose this battle of dominance.
This strange ritual of silence and staring was very, very rare among wolves and wargs, happening only when a lone member vied to get accepted to a new pack. Though rare, it was instinctive, evolution’s one chance for a lost warg to find salvation in the wild when it gets kicked from a pack by an upcoming Alpha or somehow survives a culling. The ritual was simple, but telling. Every small movement of the ears, the pace of breath, the quickening of the heart, all taken into consideration by both parties, showing their capabilities, mental state, history. Spitz didn’t catch much from the warg. Though his senses were canine, even he couldn’t catch these small details, but he knew Tusk could, ‘Tusk’ being what he’d named the beast in this time, after the small tusks that protruded from either side of his muzzle. However, he knew the canine was picking up much from him, still trying to decide how to feel about this new Gnoll, unscarred and clean, smelling of the fresh perfumes of nobility and humans, not of blood, rust and dirt like the ones he’d known before. The strangeness of Spitz’s circumstance and species clearly made Tusk confused and cautious, especially with his previous knowledge of Gnolls, but Spitz carried no blood on his breath nor malice in his eyes…

This silent dance of quiet evaluation started to be interrupted as Spitz saw Tusks’s eyelids drooping, his head sagging down to the stone tiles. His stamina wavering as the night dragged on, the beatings from before and the lack of food starting to take its toll as the canine slowly started to fall asleep. Spitz had been waiting for this. Slowly, he stood up. The warg’s mouth pulling back in a snarl as he starts to gently approach, but not moving. It’s tired muscles still atrophied from malnourishment and injury. Spitz came over to the chained beast, the poor thing nearly unmoving as he walked over and sat down beside it cross legged, grabbing Tusk’s head and putting it onto his lap. The warg kept his lips pulled back and snarling, but did not bite or snap, the snarls quieting as Spitz leans down and bites his ear, a little blood trickling down. Tusk goes completely still, his body relaxing entirely into Spitz’s grasp. Spitz smiled as Tusk’s breathing evened out, already starting to fall asleep. The ritual had been completed, and by nipping Tusk’s ear, Spitz had accepted him into his pack, and Tusk finally had a reason to relax. 

The next morning, as soon as she got out of her room Abby had a servant at her door. One of the younger new recruits, he bowed as he greeted her. “Good morning, your majesty. I’ve been told to inform you your bodyguard is still in the courtyard, though-”
Abby cut him off, immediately turning and walking quickly down the hall towards the courtyard, moving as fast as her dress would let her. The servant running up behind her after a moment. “Uhm, Y-your majesty-!” 
However, it was too late. Sliding aside plates of cold, uneaten food, Abby pushed open the door quickly. The early morning sun leaving the place in shadows as her gaze tracked across the paved interior to reveal Spitz and Tusk in the center of the courtyard, Spitz’s back against the pillar in the center where Tusk had been chained, sleeping soundly with the canine on his lap. Abby stilled her breath, the sight calming her worries immediately, a smile finally creeping onto her face. After closing the door slowly, she turned to face the servant behind her, the same one from before standing there trembling and hoping he hadn’t done anything wrong. 

“Please tell the kitchen to be ready to feed both of them at any time…”
“...and let Sasha know Ser Spitz will be there soon.”