“Are you sure that those will hold?"

“It should be fine. How are you feeling?”

My chest still hurt a little and my clothes were covered in dry blood, but I was more hungery and tired than anything. The cut completely closed a little while ago and only a faded scar remained. I’d been taking a nap before a someone’s shouting woke me up. Before I knew what was going on some big sharp thing came flying at me. I tried to dodge it but I hadn’t been fast enough.

The world went dark for a little after that, but I came to just in time to see a strange woman standing over me with a knife. I did the first thing that I could think of and pushed her away.

“I’m fine… Aiyana, who are those people?”

Aiyana had just finished tying up the strange woman and old lady, that I slammed against the wall, with some rope cloth that had been laying around. There was a large blackish-green bruise on the old lady’s head, but she was still breathing. I hadn't meant to hurt her badly, but my body moved on it own when I saw her standing over Aiyana.

“Th-They're survivors, like us. We’re not the only ones that lived. I thought that we could go with them, but…”

My chest began to hurt when Aiyana stopped talking and looked at me. Although it was only there for a moment, she had the same distant gaze mom would have whenever I lost control over my strength. I didn’t know what they saw when they looked at me like that, but I knew whatever it was scared me.

“We’ll worry about it later, for now, lets see what they brought with them.”

“O-Okay.”

The sky outside had turned orange by the time we finished going through the sacks the ladies brought. They’d managed to collect a lot of things, to say the least. There were multiple sets of clothes of various sizes. Some of them were either too big or too small for the two women. A few scrolls of parchment and other writing items. A bag of small metal disks with an image of a bird of some kind etched into them.

Aiyana said those items would be useful, but it didn’t seem like she was totally sure about that. In any case, the food they’d collected was more important than any of the other items. Seven medium-sized slabs of cured meat, five loaves of hard bread, three bags of wheat grain, and a small bag of mushrooms.

Depending on how you used them, there was enough food to last three or four people a month, give or take a few days depending on the age of the bird.

“Geisai, try these on and see if they fit.”

Aiyana thrust one of the smaller set of clothes to me before picking up a set for herself and walking behind the overturned table with our water bowl for some reason. She’d handed me a new brown overshirt and a pair of shorts. While they were still a little too big, the clothes fit better than what I’d been wearing.

“Uah… augh…”

The older lady began to stir just as I finished getting the shirt over my head. Aiyana came back from around the table when she heard the lady’s moan. Instead of the dirty and smelly clothes she’d had on, she was wearing a light blue overshirt with a flourished collar and a pair of brown pants.

“Geisai, if she starts speaking nonsense gag her before she can finish speaking. If she breaks out tackle her again. Understand?”

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I nodded my head along with what she was saying while my eyes remained on the half-dazed woman.

Slowly but surely, the woman became fully awake and started to look around her surroundings. There was a silent pause when our eyes met before an angry mask overtook the woman’s face and she began to struggled against the bounds around her hands and feet.

Unfortunately for her, the knots held strong.

“◼◽◾◻◽◼ ◼◽◾◻◽◼◽◾◻◽◼ ◼◽◾◻◽...!”

I balled up a nearby scrap of cloth and stuffed it in her mouth when she started shouting in that strange way mom and Aiyana sometimes did. But, Aiyana was displeased me for doing so.

“Why’d you do that?”

“You told me to.”

“... you really don’t know anything about the old language do you?”

"...Hugh."

I had no idea what she was talking about and she seemed to realize that fact as she simply signed and took the cloth out of the woman’s mouth.

“Girl, if you have an ounce of sense in that head of yours you’d kill that beast before it kills us all! Donovan, you damn lust-blinded fool, I hope your spirit rots away in the mire of sorrow for the blight you have allowed festering for so long ◼◽◾◻◽◼!!”

Her venom and hatred laced her words almost hurt to listen to and half of her spite wasn’t even directed at me.

“Why are you doing this? Geisai hasn’t even done anything wrong.”

The older woman stopped shouting curses when Aiyana questioned her behavior.

“Don't you dare address that creature with such an honorable name. Done nothing wrong? Foolish girl, your youth and peaceful upbringing has left you ignorant of the nightmares of the lost age. He and his kind are the worst plague inflicted upon all of Lantza. Nothing but death and misery is left in the wake of the Darh’ki.”

People didn’t even try to hide their hate when that word left their mouth. Why did simply seeing me make people act like that? Why was being a Darh’ki such a bad thing?

“What are you talking about? He’s just… just a boy.”

You would have been more convincing without that pause, Aiyana.

“Child, do not deceive yourself. Holding on to that monster only welcomes suffering to your door. They may resemble us, but that is but a mere facade. The beast that lies beneath will relish in the blood of your loved ones once set free.”

“Shut up!”

When I looked over to Aiyana I saw that she was trembling. Something the old woman said had shaken her.

“Try to deny it all you like, but you knew the truth. The very truth that was etched into our very being since his kind’s progenitor laid waste to the world before. If─”

Aiyana stuffed the piece of cloth back into the woman’s mouth before she could say anything else.

“Geisai, don’t listen to a word she said. It not true. Not a word of it.”

“Bu─”

“Nonia never lies, for lying has no value to her.”

I flinched when an unfamiliar and singsong voice interrupted me. The woman that had cut me had woken up at some point and was staring off into the distance now. Her blank expression gave away nothing as she laid on the ground and rattled off her passionate statement.

“There are many things that lead people to lie. For love, for hate, for profit, or any number of things. People are capable of lying to anyone, even if the one they lie to is themselves. However, people never lie in vain.”

“What are you talking about? What does this have to do with anything?”

I was having trouble making sense of what she was saying, but she ignored my questions and continued on with her rambling.

“That’s why Nonia will never lie. All her reasons to lie rest under the hill. Why lie when your heart was buried long ago. Do you think my daughter would like to stay under that hill, Nonia? She’d have to be put in the middle though. She always loved being in the center of attention after all.”

Tears suddenly started to stream down the older woman face after the rambling woman stopped talking. I tried to comfort her but I lowered my hand when she glared at me. Even with tear-filled eyes, her look was more frightening than any wild animal or monster.

Aiyana was lost in through as she clenched her dagger, the rambling woman hummed a weird song, and the older woman continued to cry. It felt as if a dark cloud hung over the entire room. Everyone was hurt in some way, but there was nothing I could do to help them. Worst of all, it seemed like I was to blame for all of it.