“Long ago, the great fi—” Ss’Rish starts, only to be immediately interrupted by her nysda, Ss’Vesh.
“How long ago nyska? Before Sv’Irey was alive?” Ss’Rish can’t help herself but snort with amusement at the hatchling’s question. Having recently made into her second winter, Ss’Vesh was still a bundle of energy and curiosity. Gently, Ss’Rish presses against the soft scales on her daughter’s snout in reprimand before continuing her story. “Much, much longer than that. Sv’Irey may be our hyrka but even she was not alive in the times I tell you. Now, will you let me finish the story or would you rather sleep without a story tonight, hmm?”
Immediately, Ss’Vesh’s eyes widen in alarm as she shakes her rattle. Ss’Rish snorts in amusement again and continues her story.
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“And from the fire, we rose. The pantherus, salticide and pythoniades together. Initially we fought against each other, until the monsters came.” Vewl shudders in Juril’s lap, her tail swishing from side to side unhappily. She always hated whenever the monsters came up in the stories. Her hurlin continues, seemingly unbothered by the kitten’s discomfort. “The monsters were called humans, and for many, many generations they hunted us.”
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“Dad, why did they do that?” Vewl asks, her wide eyes staring pleadingly at the bigger Pantherus, “why would they take mom away from us?”
“Because they are humans, little mursyl,” Juril grumbles, “and that’s what humans do; they take.”
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“The humans made our previous squabbles with the rest of the Otherkin -that’s the name we gave ourselves, we who aren’t human- irrelevant. We had a bigger threat to survive. And let me make this clear to you, my nysda, it took everything we had to just survive.”
Ss’Vesh shudders, her rattle shaking with agitation. Ss’Rish tightens her coils around the hatchling, and continues in a softer tone, “yet survive we did. The humans only know how to war, and eventually they started warring with themselves. That gave us enough time to build, to flourish, and now they have to hide behind their walls while we control these lands.”
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“It was thanks to the ‘genius’ of our first myrskia,” Juril says, with barely constrained anger and disgust, “that we made our agreement with the humans beyond the walls. We send one of our own to them, every two winters, and in return they leave us alone.”
Gently, Juril picks up his daughter, and nuzzles their furred heads together. “Promise me, mursyl, that if they choose you like they choose your mother, you will run away instead of going with them. Don’t let the humans take you away from me too.”
Mewl purrs softly into her father’s chest, “I promise,” she says, “I won’t let them take me away from you dad.”