Work Text:
C support
“Oh, hello, are you new?” Dimitri called. He crouched, one hand outstretched, and held still. He was addressing a dog. It was a small creature, hardly larger than the cats that roamed the monastery, its coat an indeterminate grey-brown that almost blended in with the stone of the monastery. Its fur was longer than most of the monastery’s hounds, giving it a shaggy, unkempt look. Unlike the other dogs that crowded around Dimitri’s legs, this one kept its distance. Dimitri smiled at it—just a curve of his lips, no teeth on display—and maintained his stillness. The other dogs, who at this point knew Dimitri often kept bits of food in his pockets, bumped him gently. The new dog did not approach. It twitched its ears back as if contemplating flight.
Moving slowly, Dimitri withdrew his arm and reached into a pocket. The other dogs’ excitement grew as he did so, for they recognized what was about to happen next. With care, Dimitri produced a handful of dried fish and jerky. Dimitri stood slowly, keeping the food out reach of the dogs mobbing him. They thumped him with their wagging tails and nudged his legs eagerly, but they didn’t jump up on him. It had taken quite a lot of effort to teach them that. By the time he stood, many of them had schooled their excitement enough to sit. Others, not so skilled at self control, bounced on their paws, their eyes locked on the food in his hands. Dimitri smiled again, pleased at their happy anticipation, and looked back to the narrow space between buildings where the new dog had stood. It was empty. The dog had fled. Dimitri sighed—internally only—and turned his attention back to the other dogs that were staring at him. Of course, he could not neglect them. He pushed the new dog from his mind and raised one hand high, fingers pointing down.
“Sit,” he ordered softly. “Sit.” After a few attempts, even the most eager hounds managed to sit, if only briefly. Dimitri distributed the treats among them, receiving many tail-wags, face-licks, and a few slobbery rocks as his reward.
C+ support
Dimitri met the shaggy, grey-brown dog again. When he could not sleep, which was more nights than not, he liked to sneak out of his room and walk around the monastery. For the most part, he only saw the monastery’s cats, engaged on nocturnal business of their own, whiskers forward and tails held loosely, when he walked at night. But more and more often, he caught glimpses of the unfamiliar dog.
“Hey there,” he called softly. The dog was peering at him from the narrow space between a building and a barrel. Dimitri stayed still. After a long moment, the dog padded forward a few steps until it was standing in the open. Dimitri took this as his cue and slowly put one hand in his pocket. The dog didn’t move. Dimitri crouched, muscles that had already carried him through a full day’s training protesting softly, until he could kneel on the ground. The dog’s ears flicked back, then forward again. Moving as slowly as the seasons changed, Dimitri extended his hand.
The dog sniffed the air, then edged forward. Dimitri was barely breathing, both eyes fixed on the animal. A few times it stopped, posture going rigid and wary, but the moment passed and it padded forward again. When it was almost close enough to take the food from his hand, it stopped. For a long, suspended moment, it stared into Dimitri’s eyes.
It snatched the food from his hand and ran, disappearing into the darkness.
Dimitri stayed on his knees for a long moment. When he finally straightened, brushing off his knees, he was smiling.
B support
He kept seeing the dog at night. It was growing, but it was still small compared to the other dogs of the monastery.
He was leaning on the wall of the bridge that separated the cathedral from the rest of the monastery when he felt a pressure on his leg. He looked down and shocked to see a grey-brown, furry shape. The dog had come to lean against his leg. As he stared, gobsmacked, it looked up at him. Its small, dark eyes caught the moonlight. Its ears were upright but relaxed, and its tail moved slowly from side to side. It held Dimitri’s gaze for a long moment, then pawed gently at his ankle. The touch jolted Dimitri, but his sudden movement didn’t scare the creature off. Slowly, he reached into his pocket for the bit of food he always carried with him. The dog took it. Before trotting off, it pressed its wet nose to the back of his hand.
A support
In the figurative rubble of Dimitri’s life and the literal rubble of the monastery, the creature prowled. There were vermin here, it knew, vermin to tear apart, as the creature’s world had been torn apart. The creature had arrived at night—what did it care for day or night, when it did not track the names of the days, much less the petty hours?—and was restlessly patrolling its new territory when there was a sound. The creature turned, blade in hand.
An… animal was standing in the shadows, barely visible in the space between the remains of a wall and several beams of fallen timber. It was a small, four-legged figure. Its fur was matted with mud and other things and might once have been curly. Its small, black eyes were bright, even in the anemic light of the cloud-veiled moon.
This was not vermin.
The creature held still as the animal—the dog padded out from its hiding place. Without stopping, it walked all the way up to the creature. The creature stared at it. The dog sat, still looking up with its bright eyes. After a long moment, it stood again and walked closer. The creature was absolutely still as the dog touched its cold, wet nose to the back of its—of his hand. The dog sat again, looked at him expectantly. He—it—the creature didn’t know what to do. After a long moment, the dog huffed and stood. Without a backward glance, it walked away.
The creature knelt in the ruined space.
Maybe it should just stop here, if only the ghosts would let it.
It was staring at nothing, gazing into the noisy, echoing darkness, when a real sound interrupted what passed as thought. It managed to turn its head. The dog was back. It had something in its mouth.
The dog stopped in front of him, eyes bright and expectant. Slowly, as slowly as the season’s progression, the creature put a hand out. The dog placed its burden in his hand.
It was not a chunk of ore, nor a rock. It was a battered old tinderbox.
Dimitri opened it. Flint, steel, kindling. He looked at the dog. It sat in front of him, silent and expectant.
The fire went some way to warm him that night. The furry shape that curled against him did far more.
A+ support
“Your dog is getting fat,” Felix said, staring at the animal in disgust. Ordinarily, this would be grounds for bloodshed, but since it was Felix, no offense was taken. (No more offense than usual, that was.)
“I do not own a dog,” Dimitri said calmly.
“Seriously, you’re spoiling that thing.”
“Was there something you wanted to talk to be about?” Dimitri prompted. With an irritated sigh, Felix turned his gaze away from the animal curled next to Dimitri’s chair and launched into a long-winded complaint about the army’s supplies.
“Whoa, someone needs to go on a diet,” Sylvain said, pulling up short as he and Dimitri entered Dimitri’s office. The otherwise well-kept room had a pile of blankets on the floor, and curled up on the blankets was a dog. Dimitri sighed.
“Sylvain,” he said warningly.
“Sorry, sorry, Your Majesty,” Sylvain said, putting his hands up. “I just… yeah. Anyway, so the Alliance’s minor lords want you to…” The dog, thus assured that its rest would not be disturbed, rested its head on its paws and began to snore.
“Your Majesty,” Dedue said, “I have something for you.”
“Dedue, I’ve asked you time and again to call me Dimitri,” Dimitri sighed.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Dedue said calmly. Dimitri sighed, but lightly, and put his pen aside. Dedue flashed a smile. “Dimitri,” he corrected, and he set a small basket on Dimitri’s desk.
“Cookies?” Dimitri guessed. Dedue and Mercedes had been spending time together, to the joy of everyone’s tastebuds.
“Not exactly.” Dedue reached into the basket and withdrew… well, it looked like a cookie, except that it had been cut into the shape of a bone. “They are treats, for her,” he said and nodded to the furry shape in the corner of the room. In spite of himself, Dimitri found himself smiling.
“Oh? You’ve never concerned yourself with her before,” he said.
“Well,” and here Dedue—steadfast, unflappable Dedue—hesitated. “They are made without sugar and with various canine-friendly ingredients. They are low in fat, too.”
“Oh, not you, too!”
“I am sorry, Dimitri. But I can’t help but notice…”
“If you’re going to be like that, you can call me ‘Your Majesty,’” Dimitri grumbled. The dog’s ears twitched as Dedue laughed.
“Dimitri? We all missed you at sup—Dimitri?” Ashe stopped short in the doorway. The others—all of the others, as it was supposed to be one of those rare nights when they could all gather and eat together—tried to peer around him and into the room beyond.
“Are you okay?” Annette asked, bracing herself against Ashe as she stood on tiptoe to see past him. Dimitri was on the floor.
“I am more than okay.” The voice hardly sounded like Dimitri’s, emotion making it alien. Carefully, the others eased into the room. Dimitri was sitting, half-obscured by his massive wooden desk. A furry shape the nameless grey-brown of stone lay in front of him, sprawled on a pile of blankets. As the others drew closer, the dog raised the corner of its lip to show just a hint of tooth. Its attention was split between the newcomers and Dimitri. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, and in his lap were—
“Puppies!” Annette gasped, clasping her hands together in delight. Dimitri nodded, not taking his eyes off the soft bundles of fur in his lap. His hands were on the floor, not on the delicate, slumbering animals. His cheeks were wet.
“Now I feel bad for calling her fat,” Sylvain muttered.
“You should feel bad regardless,” Ingrid muttered back.
“Oh, they’re beautiful,” Mercedes cooed. She eased closer to Dimitri and the puppies, but she stopped when the mother dog growled softly. Mercedes sat back, making a show of putting herself at a safe distance from Dimitri and the dogs. “Dimitri, is this where you were all night?” He nodded.
“Well, that’s understandable,” Annette said. She sat too. The others followed suit. Dimitri nodded.
“There is nowhere else I could have been.”
The dog, assured that the strangers would not be approaching her or her puppies, laid her head on Dimitri’s leg and drifted into sleep.