The ash house remained an object of fascination and wonder for the desert fox tribe for nearly the entirety of my stay with them. Somehow, they got it into their heads that they shouldn’t be the only ones to be able to see it. And so, the next time a trading group was sent to their neighboring tribes, they would share the news and invite everyone to come and bear witness to the extravagance within the desert fox lands.
The amount of praise, gratitude, respect, and tears I had to face every time someone looked at me made it all uncomfortable, as I was endlessly assailed by someone who hadn’t managed to thank me yet, in their own special way that made me glad I wasn’t compelled to agree politely to whatever they offered me.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I’m not a furry.
Marriage and adoption proposals notwithstanding, my time with the foxes was more relaxed and sedate, similar to my time with the axolotls, only here the temperature was higher and thus, worse. Everything else though, was just as pleasant as could be. Meat, vegetables, a sweet wine that they brewed from their own produce, I had it all. I had gotten used to bathing in public, so cleaning myself off in the river wasn’t a big deal for me, though the feeling of finally being clean was amazing. Trying to wash up in the ocean was a pointless endeavour, as salt and sand would stick to your skin afterwards.
The atmosphere was one I enjoyed, but I felt like I had to move on. I was self-aware enough to know that if I found a place comfortable, I would just give up, stop trying, and relax there, wiling away my days doing nothing. I doubted the chief would give me his blessing about roaming the desert, but I had to ask. If they had any maps, or knowledge of the land they could share, it would go a long way in my travels.
And just as I expected, the chief was dumbfounded when I brought up the topic.
“Why would you want to go into that deadland?! There’s nothing to see there! Plus, the sun is far more unforgiving in its depths rather than our home here! The desert is filled with all kinds of dangers, quicksand, predators, lack of water. No, I’m sorry, brother Rhaaj, but I can’t allow you to go in by yourself. Your life is more precious than you know.”
A cynical thought came to me, but I didn’t speak on it, as doing so would put a crack in our relationship that would be difficult to mend.
He doesn’t want me to die so I can keep making ash houses for the beastfolk.
It was an uncharitable thought, but it drove into my mind like a splinter, refusing to budge. I kept my mask of politeness on my face as I replied courteously to his warning.
“I apologize, Chief Vahl. You are right, curiosity is not something worth dying for. Thank you for informing me of the perils.” I bowed my head to him while clasping my hand, a display of respect….that I begrudgingly felt. Yeah, I could have held a grudge against him for not going align with what I wanted, but that would have been petty and immature.
And I was trying to move past such descriptions.
He sighed a breath of relief at my words. “I know you want to see the world. You’re young, and the continent is rife with opportunity. But, speaking as an elder, I’d advise you to visit the elven lands if you wish to see sights that will amaze you. That is where the true magic of the world happens.”
“You’ve been to the elf lands?” I asked him incredulously.
He nodded as he crossed his arms. “Some choose to visit the elven lands in their youth, as a xi ren sien tuu. The Thundering offers notable fighters the chance to visit as well, and most who visit choose to stay and fight beneath the shadow of the Wall. I was the chief’s son, and expected to lead the tribe after him, so I only saw the inside of their classrooms, but….believe me when I say, everything the elves create is beautiful. Everything.”
“I suppose I’m going to the elven lands, then.” I said.
I had always intended to visit the elves’ homeland one day, but the fox chief’s words only managed to solidify my desire. While I could admit that the beastkin continent had its own natural sort of beauty to it, there wasn’t much in the way of variety. It was mostly grassy plains, a smattering of rivers, the coast, which I had mixed feelings about, and the inhospitable desert. There were rumors of valleys nestled in rings of mountains somewhere, but no one I had spoken to knew of such landmarks.
Maybe it was time to cut my sightseeing trip on this continent short and head over to the elf lands. I did want to see their giant tree houses, plus….
Who knows what kind of other….opportunities…would present themselves there?
The only factor I could see being an issue were the dragons. They had intervened in my life in a major way, and I found it unlikely they would simply allow me to gallavant as I pleased. After all, could I really afford to discount the possibility that they weren’t watching me at this very moment?
It looked like I would have to reach out to the dragons somehow. The other council members would be unlikely to offer their aid, as I’m guessing most if not all of them wanted me dead. The only leads I had were rumors about where the dragons lived, and rumors weren’t exactly the pinnacle of accuracy. Would I really have to travel the entire continent searching for them? And who’s to say the dragons were even on the continent? For all I knew, there could be a dragon’s den at the bottom of the ocean, or on the moon, or in a separate dimension.
“Sigh, hey dragons, if you’re listening, I don’t appreciate all this ‘hiding in the shadows’ bullshit. Just come out and face me if you really want me to do something for you.”
Life wasn’t so kind as to grant me a reply, but I didn’t expect one.
My time with the desert foxes came to a close soon after, as the adulation of the crowd became overwhelmingly discomforting to me. I was presented with the usual gifts of food, water, weapons, clothing, and mounts, and they still didn’t think they had done enough to repay me. We parted on good terms as I left their territory and headed northeast, circling around the desert’s edge before exploring the rest of the continent.
Or at least, that was the plan.
I was barely two days out from the foxes’ domain when I felt yet another tremor, an aftershock of the battle between the sea serpent and its dark enemy. The battle had been ongoing for months, and that there was still no clear winner was disconcerting. The shockwaves from the titanic battle disrupted many animals that would have otherwise gone unnoticed, and sent the more meek-minded scurrying even further away from the aftershocks. It was difficult to pinpoint the exact location where the battle was taking place, but it had to be somewhere in the seas to the south, otherwise the monster would have evaded the sea serpent’s assault by simply falling back to the continent.
The shockwaves also dislodged the beasts and creatures that made the surroundings of the desert their home, and seeing as how I wasn’t in the mood to repeat my feat of standing alone against a tide of beasts, I had to hide in my beast space when I sensed beasts approaching the vicinity.
It was the third time I had had to hide in my beast space, but right before I would have entered…I was standing in the middle of a crowd, beastfolk of all types around me, talking about…the tournament?
I was startled at what had just happened, as I struggled to come up with a good explanation for my current circumstances. Just a moment ago, I was in the southwest of the continent, about to hide from the incoming beasts of the desert in my beast space, when I…appeared…in a city where beastfolk were discussing a tournament and how so-and-so of Clan Whatever was a prodigy with the maul, or how the humans and elves had imported their own food and were running low on certain exotic herbs or spices.
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I wasn’t exactly a genius, but I didn’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to know that I had been teleported across the continent. There was only one real suspect who would have any motive for portaling me this far, as well: the dragons, or one of their agents working according to their will. Evidently, they had decided to make themselves known to me, which suggested they were watching me, and had been doing so for some time.
“That wasn’t funny, asshole!” I screamed into the air, ignoring the shouts of exclamation as people reacted to the unexpected sight of a mad human in their midst, screaming into the sky.
It irked me that they could just do that, without any regard for what I wanted….but what did my protestations matter in the face of a dragon born at the beginning of the world? If I ever came face to face with a dragon, I would either be extremely respectful, or downright pissy. Either way, the dragons would control my fate, so what did it matter if I was rude to them or not?
I walked away from the crowds and looked for a relatively quiet place where I could be alone, hesitant to use any magic in the midst of the city where people could mistakenly assume I was attacking them.
I doubted all the friendship bracelets in the world could solve that problem for me.
The city wasn’t at all how I had imagined it in my head. The merchant’s diary that described the continent was more detailed about the people and tribes rather than the cities, which were only briefly mentioned, so seeing the city in person was a novel experience…despite the sour mood I got when I thought of how I had arrived here. And plus, how was it that nobody noticed me just appearing out of nowhere?
Everything in the city was natural. The buildings, if one was being charitable enough to call them that, were either huge tents constructed in the same style most beastfolk used, or structures composed of unprocessed tree trunks, boulders, stones, and woven reeds coming together to create a facsimile of a beaver dam of natural materials.
There were two structures that stood out to me immediately, however. One was an enormous ash house, at least five times larger in radius than the one I had built for the foxes. The other was an arena that looked similar to the one in the academy, and although its shape and the materials appeared to be the same, it was far larger in size, spanning at least eight football fields. The two megastructures were on opposite ends of the city, and it wasn’t hard to imagine why.
Staying faithful to their way of life, there were no roads at all, only hardened and packed dirt paths that people used as walkways. The ‘buildings’ all had an official purpose, but anyone looking for an inn or tavern would have to make do with the tents set up outside the city, as I could see an almost entirely separate city of tents ringed around the two megastructures and the other ‘buildings’.
I did note the presence of quite a few elves, though humans seemed to be more uncommon. An appropriate indication of how the two races treated the beastfolk, if the gossip passing through the rumor mills of the academy had any truth to them.
I had no plans for being here at this time, and I was resolved to only visit the city next year, or perhaps not at all, possibly heading straight for the elven continent instead. Now that I was here, however implausibly, it would behoove me not to take advantage of the opportunity. After all, there seemed to be places that offered food and drinks every ten steps, so why not take a break from the maelstrom of current times and just, let go a bit?
I must have eaten at least a kilogram of food, considering the way my stomach bulged and the drowsiness I felt that typically accompanied a large meal. There was no time to sleep, though, as the beat of drums fittingly thundered throughout the area, followed by everyone rushing in one direction with carefully controlled haste. It seemed the drums signaled the beginning of the next event in the tournament.
As I noted before, the arena was colossally enormous, dwarfing over the ones in the human capital and the academy, and it seemed capable of seating at least ten thousand, if not more. The massive open field in the center would allow multiple fights to take place simultaneously, and while beastfolk senses may have been able to take in multiple fights at once, I and my pathetic human eyes and ears were limited to watching singular fights on an individual basis.
The fights were brutal and bloody, as the beastfolk excelled in close quarters combat and had stronger and more resilient bodies that could withstand the punishment being doled out to them in every swing of the weapon, though not all weapons required swinging. In fact, there were many beastfolk who eschewed using weapons at all and preferred to strike with their bodies directly.
Fists were the most common bludgeoning tool, but headbutting, tail whipping, and body slams were just as popular. The next most used weapons were those fangs, claws, or stingers, and tongues that were either dangerous in their own right, or had a natural poison or venom within them. Finally, the body parts used by specific species were put on display, as some type of bird-man used the edges of his wings to cut an X-shape squarely into his opponent’s chest, though they both seemed capable of continuing the fight.
The fights were divided by age, and there were a plethora of categories, such as free-for-alls, melees that wouldn’t look out of place in a beast tide, or weapon-specific matches, such as who was the best “tail” user, or less prestigiously, “flail” user.
While it was entertaining seeing the warriors just bashing their bodies against each other, my interest was drawn to the weapon-users, as those matches were where I could possibly pick up a few things. I had still not found a suitable weapon for myself, and I was starting to think I had developed some kind of odd mental block towards the choice.
The fighters below me had none of that hesitation, as they moved with a surety of purpose that I was envious of, each step made with the knowledge that it was the right one, and each stance lending itself to part of a greater whole. Everyone fighting had trained for years, and for some, it was their entire life. If you sucked in combat, odds were you wouldn’t live very long in the beastfolk continent. The lands were untamed, and active efforts had to be taken to clear a territory of threats and dangers. So was it any surprise that the beastfolk held a reputation for being the race that produced the strongest fighters?
The battles going on in the arena only served to prove that point. In every event, all the combatants bore some wounds or injuries. Blood flowed from cuts and limbs were twisted unnaturally, fragile body parts were bitten or clawed off and bruises were more common than grass in the plains. Yet the only difference between the winners and losers was that the winners had the willpower to stand up despite everything.
Perhaps that was the secret to their strength, unshakeable will? If so….then I found it unlikely that I would ever come close to their level of physical prowess. I would probably be better off sticking to magic anyways, but there was always that quiet thought that popped up intrusively. What if I was in a situation where I couldn’t use my magic? How would I fight then?
It was a question I had no answer for.
The drums once again sounded out their rhythmic beats, and the crowds began to exit the arena, an hour before sunset. As I got up and let the crowd push me forward, I contemplated on whether or not I should even stay to watch the remainder of the tournament. I would have to seek shelter for the night with an unknown tribe of strangers, as the many, many eyes precluded me from staying in my beast space. Thankfully, the climate was more moderate here than near the desert, despite it being summer. The cool evening breeze was a welcome relief from the heat of the south, and I was at least somewhat grateful, if still mostly pissed off, at the person who teleported me without my consent.
I had just turned onto a narrow offshoot of the main path, and saw that the buildings were left completely unattended, the entrances unmanned and completely open, though thievery was likely unheard of here. The breeze once again caressed the back of my neck, the sensation a pleasant one, when it died out unexpectedly. I could still feel my clothes swaying gently, but my head was –
“Don’t move, human.”
A deep, guttural, and scratchy voice spoke from behind me, as a long steel blade was held against my neck, preventing me from stepping forward. I was…being robbed? When I had just thought to myself that robbery was a near impossibility? What were the odds of that?!
Slim to none.
In fact, now that my attention wasn’t wholly consumed by the blade at my neck, I glanced at the hand wielding it. Tiny scarlet scales, smaller than any scale should have been, covered the hand grasping the blade, a natural gauntlet of armor.
Another inconsistency occurred to me: I should have felt someone approaching me from behind, or from any direction, with my blood sense. It was a passive sense and didn’t require any input from me, being a product of my natural affinity with blood magic. That someone had snuck up on me meant that they didn’t have blood, they could somehow hide themselves from me, or maybe….
Maybe they were gifted in a rare type of magic that my blood sense wouldn’t be able to penetrate: spatial magic. And given that I had just been teleported by persons unknown….
“What can this insignificant human do for the dragonkin?”
The blade fell from my neck as its owner sheathed it, and I turned around to see who my ‘assailant’ was. Scarlet scales covered their entire body, though I saw that they chose to wear a green robe that matched the color of the common grass. A thick tail protruded from the bottom of the robe and lay on the ground unmoving. Narrow leathery wings jutted out from their back, and were the height of their entire body. The two horns atop their head were small, and curved upward from the area between their eyebrow ridges and the scalp.
The draconic face examined me just as I had done, and before I could react….she?...grabbed me, and we were soon teleported somewhere else, the familiar tang of the ocean teasing my senses once more.